Week 24 – Clinicing & Sleeping

Thursday #25 – I woke up this Thursday on a mattress on the floor of The Scientist’s bedroom.  I had planned to stay over after soccer training on Wednesday night (since their house is 5 minutes from the soccer field and mine is well over an hour) so had followed through with that plan, despite missing training due to a very long day of clinic.  Our first patient was in the learning difficulties clinic and we went overtime while she was suggesting future career paths for us – obviously not very impressed with our optometric skills, she suggested The Italian should perhaps become a makeup artist when she finished uni.  I in turn had asked her what she wanted to be when she grew up, and am not sure who was more shocked at the response – me and The Italian or the 10 year old girl’s mother; when she told us she wanted to be “a partygoer in the nightclubs”.  In light of her test results that day it was probably a fairly achievable aim she had set herself.  My second patient was a 5 year old boy who had been referred to the paediatric clinic because his school could no longer handle him.  Getting a referral letter with a lengthy medical history and a recent diagnosis of “behavioural problems – aggression” is always a nice thing on a Wednesday afternoon.  We struggled initially but by the end of clinic (or in fact an hour after clinic was meant to end) we were besties and he was sharing a KitKat with me…albeit a pre-licked KitKat.  After that day I was keen to just head back north where The Marge would cook me dinner and I could just relax before doing it all again on Thursday.

The BH&G Fan had poached me up an egg for breakfast before we headed off to the city together.  I informed DTM that The BH&G Fan made a much better bus buddy than he did as this was his usual bus route but unlike him, she actually sat next to me and talked to me.  I went to uni via home to get changed and prepare myself for a double dose of clinic and potentially 4 patients.  After the hectic Wednesday I had had in clinic I was hoping for some quick and straightforward patients.  Before that, we had a group meeting to get through; where we realised we had a whole lot of deadlines coming up and not a lot of research to show for it.

My first patient was a 20 year old uni student and we breezed through the consult.  The Not Much Older Than Me Supervisor seemed to be responsible for nearly all of clinic (rather than the usual 3 or 4 students) and so despite finishing on time, my patient and I were forced to sit around and chat for about half an hour waiting for the final check.  After spending most of the clinic waiting for The Not Much Older Than Me Supervisor, I had managed to miss the tutorial and now had to go straight into seeing patient number 2 in contact lens clinic.  What should have been another straightforward consult somehow ended up last 2.5 hours as my patient was up for a chat to say the least.  He was giving me lessons in history and geography, talking to me about World War II and spitfires, we discussed upcoming holiday plans, he shared his thoughts on the current security on aeroplanes and on top of that asked me a million questions based on his eye exam last week that apparently had not been dealt with then.  Every time I went to get The Seems-Nice-But-Is-She-Really Supervisor to try and wrap this consult up, she came up with some new ridiculous test I should be doing and my patient was not helping matters by constantly coming up with new symptoms.

After two long days at uni, I headed home with M-Dizzle, had a quick dinner of leftover pasta and got into bed – arguably the highlight of my day.  A long and somewhat painful day of clinic, not helped by a 2 week long cold that just will not go away – penicillin and codral both proving rather ineffective.  Next Thursday is looking up as it can’t possibly be this bad two weeks in a row.

Week 23 - Sorting & Rapporting

Thursday #24 – I had good intentions for a productive Thursday this week and had set my alarm early to get stuck into my uni work.  After having to assure DTM the night before that I was in fact excited about my upcoming holiday and uni stress was behind my apparent lack of enthusiasm, I had come to the genius conclusion that I would actually do my uni work so I can stop stressing about it.  It all sounded so good in theory but after an hour of sorting my notes into lots of different piles I was soon over it.  I tried to brag about my productivity to DTM and provided photo evidence, only to hear “did you actually do anything with the notes after you put them in little piles?” – The man had a point and sadly I had not.

With a hectic morning of sorting behind me, I headed to the shops for some more excitement and bought some needles and thread.  Not only had my riveting morning involved sorting notes but it had also included a load of washing and the discovery that our not-so-gentle washing machine had caused a bow to partially come off one of my clinic skirts – luckily it is easily fixed and I have more than one bow skirt to get me through in the meantime!

Shopping and sorting out of the way it was time to hit up uni for a double dose of clinic.  I’ve often been told I have good patient rapport and have prided myself on this quality – what I may lack in clinical skills I make up for in good conversation.  My first patient this Thursday was perhaps an example of when my rapport is too good as somehow we went from talking about colour vision to talking about big pupils and him suggesting that now would be a good time to go on a date…I’m fairly sure he didn’t mean with me but I did feel like I had perhaps moved out of a patient-practitioner relationship and into a BFFs one.  Oops.  I finished my day with another couple of patients and The Seems-Nice-But-Is-She-Really Supervisor telling me I should quit my job of 10 years and perhaps get one vaguely related to what I am studying.  I could see her point about me feeling like I “was actually a part of the profession” but at the same time am in no rush to join a profession I could potentially be in for the next 40 years.

A big mac for dinner and my Thursday was done.  Not as productive as I had hoped but it was a start.  Saw 3 patients and didn’t blind any so it was a win for everyone.  Had hoped that documenting my Thursdays would inspire me to fill them with new and exciting things but instead I just realise how much I miss my free movies and icecream.

Week 22 - Flooding & Time-Wasting

Thursday #23 – when I woke up this Thursday it was to the sound of torrential rain.  Having stayed at The Marge’s place so I could borrow her car, I had been looking forward to my first sleep in of the week – until she reminded me that the condition of stealing the car was that I would need to be up to drive her to work.  Bugger.  So we made our way through the rain to The Marge’s work and I then drove back to her place where the door was open and there was a foreign man in the kitchen.  I soon established that he was painting the window frames and carried on about my day.

With the car loaded up with boxes I headed off to my new pad via a trip to Target, as requested by DTM.  With DTM’s shopping done I thought it was best to face my fear and buy some gumboots.  As kids, we had kept our gumboots on the outside verandah and as a result The Marge had made me completely paranoid about the possibility of spiders hiding out in gumboots.  I’m surprised our gumboots never got holes and started leaking given the intense beating they would get before each wear in an attempt to kill any spiders that might be lurking inside.  I think the lesson was meant to be to check any shoes that are left outside for spiders before putting your foot in; but the lesson I took away from it was that spiders live in gumboots.  I’ve never had a spider in my gumboots but I also have avoided gumboots for 20 years just in case.

Gumboots bought it could mean only one thing – the rain stopped.  Having had flash floods and a mini tornado in my ‘burb that morning, I was fairly confident I’d be needing to wear my new gumboots to uni that day – I was also confident that they would look amazing with my clinic uniform.  Sadly I did not get to find out as since that Thursday morning there has not been even a hint of rain or puddles for which I might need my boots.  Boot-free I headed off to clinic to see some patients.  The Seems-Nice-But-Is-She-Really Supervisor asked me what I’d learnt and when I hesitated to answer she concluded “so today was a complete waste of time for you then”.  I argued that of course it wasn’t but still struggled to find a lesson in this Thursday’s patient.

We finally got home just before 9 to have a late dinner.  I looked on with envy at the lasagne The Hippy Engineer had cooked up for M-Dizzle’s birthday and turned to the microwave to heat up my leftovers.  I did manage to get in on the birthday dessert action so all was not lost.  M-Dizzle and I attempted to do an assignment with Step Brothers on TV in the background, before concluding that what should be a 5 minute task was taking us forever and we would probably be more productive without the movie on…especially since we had already watched multiple episodes of The Big Bang Theory before we even got our work out to start.

A bit of excitement this Thursday with the mini tornado (though M-Dizzle and The Hippy Engineer would probably argue that a leaking bedroom ceiling isn’t THAT exciting) and a fairly quiet day at uni.  With icecream for dessert and a free movie on TV it almost felt like a Thursday with free movies…except that the movie was old and had ads, the icecream was given to me with a fork and DTM was noticeably absent.  A special shout out to The Hot One, who was not really a part of my Thursday but who did turn the big Two Five on this day.

Week 21 – Lecturing & Drawing

Thursday #22 – another Thursday and another early start for uni.  Despite moving closer to uni I still somehow managed to get to uni feeling like I’d barely slept – turns out upping my sleep from 5½ hours to 6½ hours doesn’t really make much difference, I just spend less time on a bus.  M-Dizzle and I rocked up late to class; proving that by moving in together, rather than my punctuality rubbing off on her, her tardiness has rubbed off on me.  We sat through a lot of talks on vision impairment before going to the “low vision expo” which pretty much involved leaving the room for 20 minutes while those same people rearranged some tables and then returning to hear their spiels again, this time to a smaller crowd.  Some companies tried to woo us with DVDs of their product catalogues or insane amounts of brochures, but the real winner was always going to be Guide Dogs NSW who gave us a toy puppy; and for a moment we all forgot we were twenty-somethings.

We then made our way to The Whitehouse where I managed to watch M-Dizzle devour a chicken wrap and chips (a Whitehouse favourite of all of ours) while I ate the salad I had made that morning.  Turns out having to buy your own groceries makes you much more willing to eat them – there was no way I was gonna let my own hard work go to waste if any of that salad went off by me not eating it.  The downside was the discovery that cider does not go with salad.

A cider down it was time to head back to class and remember that the reason drinking before class is a bad idea is because it makes you super sleepy.  It’s possible that the content of the lecture wasn’t helping matters either.  The Italian introduced M-Dizzle and I to a new Pictionary game on our phones and suddenly the lecture picked up.  I can’t for the life of me instruct a child in vision training but I can draw a fairly decent plunger.  We then hung around for an optional lecture which we had RSVP’d to mostly because of the line which said “includes catering”.  Din dins was nowhere to be seen and so somehow we had become the type of students who went to optional lectures from 6-8pm and actually took notes.  I’m not entirely sure how it happened and I suspect it won’t happen again.  To make up for the lack of dinner, we swung by McDonalds on the way home and indulged in their new BLT range.  After remarking that a quarter pounder with added bacon just looked like a heart attack waiting to happen, M-Dizzle and I both went on to order one.  We remain unconvinced that this was a wise move.

After Maccas it was time to head home and catch-up on some TV.  Not the most riveting of Thursdays but this new Pictionary game did allow me to once again talk about my days at the College Of Fine Arts and any Thursday where I can utter the sentence “well I went to COFA” is a good one, free movies or not.