Changes

There's been a lot of changes happening around here lately. Not the least of which being that I finished my surgical rotation. I had my oral exam on Thursday which went well I think. I had three relatively simple cases that I knew my way around fairly well. Then on Friday I had my written exam (aka "The Shelf") which was painful but I think I did pretty well. Nothing quite like 100 multiple choice questions to make you feel like you haven't learned anything despite all the studying you've been doing. I spent most of the rest of Friday knitting (OMG!!!), or eating/hanging out with friends I haven't seen in an eternity. Friday was awesome because I knit almost an entire hat (no pictures because I forgot to take them and now the hat and my camera are on opposite sides of the state). Saturday I packed...just about everything I own. Not all my yarn though...much to my mother's chagrin I'm sure. And I finished weaving in all the ends on The Afghan!!! It only took me three months :P And today...I drove across the state and moved in to the awesomeness that is student housing at Baystate Medical Center in Springfield. Here's a picture of my home-away-from-home for the next three months: As you can see The Afghan is proudly displayed. That little basket between my bed and my nightstand is all the knitting that I've brought with me. I have my current WIPs (Lacy Scarf, Dorky Socks, and Tribbles) as well as yarn for another pair of socks, a Pimlico Shrug and a pair of fingerless mitts. I also have intentions to visit yarn mecca...I even have a gift certificate, but I want to wait a bit until I figure out how much money I'll be spending a week to see how much I can reasonably budget. I should probably do some reading in prep for the wards and such tomorrow. Hope you're all doing well!! Happy knitting!

Happy Birthday, Blog!

Today is my first blogiversary. I started this blog due to a combination of a desire to talk about my knitting and my extreme boredom at my summer job. Over the past year I've found many other blogs that I read on a regular business and made a few friends. In the future I hope to have the time/money to participate in some swaps and get to know more of my fiber-loving comrades.

I got my Pay It Forward Exchange gift from Alicia! They're beautiful aren't they? There hasn't been too too much going on on the knitting front lately. I spent most of my 5 weeks off reading for pleasure and hanging out with people that I never seem to get a chance to see anymore. But I do have a some progress to show you. First of all, I managed to finished sewing The Afghan together. I still have approximately 1 million ends to weave in. Sadly I don't have any knots to tie so I can't practice my surgeon's knot on it. I've made a fair amount of progress on my Dorky Socks...not that far from finishing it but I don't think there's going to be much knitting time on this rotation. I also plugged ahead a fair amount on the Lacy Scarf. I really like the way that it's coming out...and I love all the compliments I keep getting on it, even from people who don't knit!

I'm sorry to say that the likelihood of my updating frequently looks like it's going to be pretty small for the next few months as I will have very little knitting to show you. There's only so much surgery I can talk about before I might start grossing people out :P

Things that I have learned so far on my Surgical rotation:

• The OR is my crack...seriously
• ENT is awesome
• Head and Neck is even more awesome
• Holding retractors can be a lot harder than you might think
• My very asthmatic body doesn't like it when I try to sprint up three floors (each story about 15-20 feet) to get a scope and a light source for a STAT page for ENT to the MICU...the best part of that whole situation being that they ended up not needing us.
• Surgical rotation is the best diet I could have ever asked for, the combination of never getting to sit for more than 3 seconds and rarely getting to opportunity to eat is doing wonders for my weight.
• When they tell you to go home...GO!
  

Too neat for my own good

63 As a 1930s wife, I am Superior Take the test!

I saw this on Lick My Sticks and Ponyknit and was way to entertained to ignore it. I am apparently way too neat for my own good since that's the only way I figure I got a score that high. They didn't have a box for "is a doctor"...I'm sure that would have been about -100 right there. Almost done knitting The Afghan...pictures coming soon!!

I Survived!

I did it! I finished the Step 1 and I lived to tell about it! However I haven't knit much of anything in the past month or so...so I have nothing to show you. I'm working on finishing up The Afghan and getting a few small projects done over the next month. I've already managed to finish a book for pleasure-reading...something I haven't done since the last Harry Potter book came out. I do have a couple pictures for you...because I wanted to document some things. First my hand is healed (has been for a while now but I finally bothered to take a picture)!I also went through all my syllabi and put just about all of them into recycling. Here you see in the first stack (on the left) all of the syllabi from first year plus my anatomy coloring book, in the middle all of the syllabi from this year, and on the right the four books I used to study for the boards (these books covered everything in the first two piles)And this is the recycling bin...I think I may have participated in the killing of a small forest as a result of picking up my syllabi...Happy knitting everyone...hopefully I have something to show you soon!!

Is it May 31st yet?

I am done...I am so done it's not even funny anymore. I realize that most of you are really excited about the super nice weather that we've been having lately but it has been MURDER on my willingness to study. I'm still managing to get a fair amount done...with much effort. But I really need it to be after boards so that I can stop freaking out about the hellish 8 hour exam that's looming in front of me and start enjoying life again.

Today was my last day of my Physical Diagnosis class. I have mixed feelings about it. I really liked getting together with all of the people at my site every week and I usually enjoyed the various specialties that we saw in the morning; but I'm glad that I won't be losing my entire Wednesday every week anymore. Irony: there's only like two more Wednesdays left in the semester.

Yesterday I got my first lecturer comment on my knitting. I was happily knitting away at a square for the The Afghan when pretty much out of nowhere the lecturer asked me what I was knitting...from clear across the room. She's the course director for Reproductive Pathophysiology and an OB/Gyn. Apparently last year the class made a whole bunch of hats for the babies in the NICU and such. Awesome moment...awkward...but awesome.

I also decided to use a different pattern of my lacy scarf. The Tiger Eyes just weren't doing it for me anymore. So now I'm using the Swirled Scrolls Scarf pattern. I like now it's turning out so far. It's complicated enough that I'm not bored out of my mind but not so complicated that it makes kidneys look like nice easy simple organs (hint: they are so totally not). I think I might be disappearing for a little while. In part because my brain is slowly becoming saturated with all things medical school to the point where I don't even want to listen to myself think...so I will try to spare you...unless something totally awesome happens of course at which point I'll be sure to fill you in. Wish me luck on all the studying that I have to do between now and May 30th! Happy Spring! Happy Knitting!

So much news!!

First, Alicia tagged me for a little meme that's running around:

1) Link to the person who tagged you.
2) Post the rules.
3) Share six non-important things / habits / quirks about yourself.
4) Tag at least three people.
5) Be sure the people you tagged KNOW you tagged them by commenting what you did.

My things:
1) I cut my pasta. Whenever I get spaghetti or anything else that is long and floppy I cut my pasta (using a grid pattern because I'm that OCD) so that the pieces are smaller and I don't get sauce all over myself
2) I always carry a tuning fork in my white coat...I'm pretty sure I haven't ever used it on someone who isn't one of my classmates or a standardized patient
3) I have a lot of stuffed animals on my bed. I make my bed every morning and they go back on the bed the SAME WAY every single day...and it's a very symmetrical arrangement too
4) I color code my class notes by learning objective. This is part OCD, part studying tactic, and part three-year-old being easily entertained by my amazing technicolor syllabi
5) I died my hair black once. I thought it was awesome. My mother was horrified at how pale I looked; but this was probably due tot he fact that I was wearing a black shirt at the time and (unknowingly) mono
6) I eat the food on my dinner plate in the inverse order or how much I like it. For example: Broccoli, Mashed potatoes, chicken, stuffing. No matter what else is on the plate...stuffing always goes last.

I tag Dorothy, KnittingNurse, and LadyLungDoc.

Second: I won the lottery!! Sadly not the money kind but I did pretty awesome in the lottery for my third year rotations. I'm off to Lahey Clinic for Surgery and Medicine and Baystate Medical Center for Pediatrics, Psychiatry, and OB/Gyn. I also got the family medicine rotation I was most interested in...but I think I would rather do a Neurology rotation during that time. The only one open right now is Neurosurgery at Baystate...the irony is killing me...but I think my mother might try to kill me if I went to Baystate for that rotation too (Baystate is really nowhere near my house and I'd be living in glorified dorms across the street from the hospital)

Third: Knitting! I promised more pics of the Doctor's Bag...and I'll show you those shortly. But I also have two socks now...I am so proud of them! I started to make a pair of ankle socks with the remaining yarn, but I'm pretty sure I don't have enough to do it on US2s so I need to rip back and try with something a bit bigger...and fewer stitches. I also made a hat. Stephanie's Unoriginal Hat to be exact. The pattern say it's for a women's small head. Now I realize that I used slightly smaller needles because I live in the US and don't have much choice...but I didn't think my head was that big...apparently I was wrong. Now for the Doctor's Bag. Here is it with just about all my stuff in it (I usually keep my purse and a small textbook to study during downtime in there too). Just in case you don't realize how much stuff is in there...here it is all laid out on the coffee table. I also wanted to show you my general over-achiever-ness: the feet that I put on the bottom. I personally think they're pretty awesome and it just goes to show that deep down inside I really am a gunner (sorry for the profane language :P)And, or course, the arty button shot:

What's on the needles now? Well I've decided to make a concerted effort of crank out the squares for the Warm Up America Afghan. They're not exactly the most exciting knitting which means they aren't terribly great at keeping me awake during class but I need to finish that sucker like it's my job. And for a little bit more exciting knitting I've cast on for the Tiger Eyes Lace Scarf. I haven't even managed a full repeat of the lace pattern yet but I'm already loving the way this yarn is working up in the pattern...I can't wait for it to be done so I can wear it all the time for no good reason.

Last Day of Freedom

First: HAPPY NEW YEAR!!! I hope you all had a good time ringing in the New Year. I went to a friends house for a little party and had a lot of fun. I don't really make New Year's Resolutions because I know I'll break them within a week and here's a few knitting ones for you:

• Finish my Warm Up America Afghan (including sewing it all together)
• Knit my Doctor's Bag
  
• Knit for charity
• Knit primarily from my stash
  

Second: A contest. Head on over here for a blogiversary contest for yarn or fiber...and don't forget to tell them I sent you!!

Third: Christmas! I've gotten a fair amount of knitting related items for Christmas...mostly yarn so I can't really complain to much about that! Here is a little collage for you so that I don't completely drown you in pictures :P Now admittedly the one in the top left corner isn't knitting related but it's from Alicia so I wanted to put in in there anyway...by the way Alicia, have I mentioned lately how much I love you?

Fourth: Knitting!! I know...it took me long enough. There hasn't been as much knitting as I would like this break but I did manage to turn one long-standing WIP into an FO. The Champagne by Night Afghan!! I started this shortly before I started medical school but since it ws on US50 needles it was anything but portable and difficult to stay focused on. But after a long day of knitting yesterday, with the help of LibriVox, I finally managed to get it done. I used Jiffy in Camel, Color Waves in Pebble Beach and Trellis in Champagne.

I've also gotten a teensy bit of work done on my Column of Leaves Mittens. I've been running around too much trying to see everyone to get much done but I will show you my meager progress: I'm sure with the 14 hours of class that I have between now and this weekend that I will get a fair amount done...if I can just manage to stay awake! I doubt you'll be hearing much from me this semester since it seems to be a bit of a marathon but happy knitting! And remember, knit fearlessly!

Nope...not dead yet

It's been a while hunh? Not much to show in the realm of knitting since I ran out of yarn to finish the mitts I was working on so I cranked out a few squares for my afghan. School is keeping me very busy right now. I have three finals this coming week and none of them are going to be fun (as if a final could ever be fun...but that's beside the point). But next weekend is the long weekend and I'll get to see a whole bunch of people I haven't gotten to see in a while. In lieu of something actually worth reading I give you my results for a quiz I found on Dorothy's blog a little while ago.

You are Elizabeth Bennet of Pride & Prejudice! You are intelligent, witty, and tremendously attractive. You have a good head on your shoulders, and oftentimes find yourself the lone beacon of reason in a sea of silliness. You take great pleasure in many things. You are proficient in nearly all of them, though you will never own it. Lest you seem too perfect, you have a tendency toward prejudgement that serves you very ill indeed.

Take the Quiz here!

I must say I'm not all that surprised...although I'm definitely happy since that is one of my favorite books of all time. Someday when I have money I'll have to buy the A&E miniseries...because Colin Firth is love. Ah well, back to studying!

HELP!

So...this weekend I tried to work on my Column of Leaves scarf a bit just for a change of pace. I'm struggling so hard on this sucker its not even funny. I'll make it a couple rows and then out of no where I've skipped a few stitches in the directions or something because I have far many more stitches than I need to finish the row. Now there are a few things that I think may be causing some or all of my issues.

1) The directions for a specific row wrap to a second line
2) I have yet to implement a lifeline
3) This is my first lace-type project
4) I seem to only be working on it really late at night

So my thoughts are that I will frog...again...find some yarn to use as a life line so that I don't have to start from scratch all the the time. Rewrite the pattern so that the directions for a single row are on one line. Put the pattern in a sheet protector and grab a dry erase marker so that I can cross off stitches as I do them. Try not to cry. Any other suggestions that you might have for me are more than welcome.

I think that it's time for me to go back to the mind-numbing cables of the Reversible Cable Scarf and the never-ending moss stitch of the Warm Up America Afghan.

On the plus side I get to see Yarn Harlot later this week with Alicia. Hopefully I won't have to get into work too early so that I don't pass out in the middle of something important/fun.

Ravelry!!!

Finally got my Ravelry invite today. Quite possibly the worst day for it to happen since I am desperately trying to read approximately a million papers to write a review for the lab that I'm working in for the summer. But I think that I have managed to organize and play enough that I can concentrate now. But first as promised I have some pictures of WIPs and FOs

Reversible Cable Scarf
Warm Up America Afghan
Champagne by Night Afghan
Cabled Purse
Coasters
I've also cast on the Column of Leaves Scarf...because I have knitting ADD...but that only has like 4 rows on it and therefore isn't really worth posting. Ok...time to get down to business on this damn paper...