Random Rummaging

In going through my bins and boxes, I came across a bunch of my med school application stuff. Some of this included my interview stuff: prep, school info, questions, etc. Since I'm a curious and somewhat distractible kid, I spent some time going through my notes. In doing so, I was reminded of different interview days and the different questions that came up. I've come up with a few lists, which are made in no particular order.

Most Common
-Tell me about yourself.
-What do you do for fun?
-Why medicine?
-When did you know that you wanted to be in medicine?
-Tell me about your research.
-Why did you apply to this school?
-Do you have any questions for me?

"Different" Questions
-You just woke up from the best dream of your life. Tell me about it.
-What factors do you look for in a medical school and how would you decide on one?
-I see you did some volunteer work in Mexico. Tell me about it. (I've never been to Mexico. This was the first question with this guy and a great start to the interview. He had the wrong file).
-What's your GPA and MCAT? (At a closed file interview, where he's not supposed to know those numbers). His response was "Oh. I see."
-I'll spare you the usual interview. Instead let's just talk. (And that's exactly what we did for the next hour. He found out I'd been on a few interviews already: we talked about medical education, his family, and gave me lots of advice).
-Tae Kwon Do, huh? Tell me about it.
-So, Rams or Bears?
-Tell me about this honors paper you wrote. (It was on a short story by Plato. Luckily I read over my entire app before each interview. I was really surprised he noticed this smaller detail. We ended up talking about it for ten minutes.)

Straightforward/Semi-Hostile Questions
-How many other interviews have you been on?
-Give me two reasons we should accept you over other applicants.
-Are you sure you want to be a doctor? Why? Especially in today's world?
-If there's one thing you want the admissions committee to know about you, what is it?

Personal Qualities
-Describe a time when you demonstrated personal growth.
-How do you deal with stress?
-Describe a time when you helped others.
-Tell me about a leadership experience.

Hypothetical/Ethical Questions
-A patient comes in and asks for a prescription for a relative without insurance. What do you do?
-You have a chronic smoker who refuses to quit. He is very healthy and becomes very agitated when asked to quit. What do you do?
-You just got the results of a neonatal genetic screening test and found an untreatable condition. How do you approach the situation and the parents? What if the parents suddenly become distant and disinterested in the child?
-There have been several studies involving flu shots and the elderly. Interpret this graph.
-You are the team doctor for a professional basketball team. You just found some signs that might indicate a career threatening condition. How do you address the athlete's, team's, and fan's concerns at the same time?

Medical Related
-What's wrong with the healthcare system today?
-Where do you see yourself in ten years?
-How do you want your patients to see you?
-How would you deal with a difficult patient?
-Tell me about other countries' health systems.
-Have you ever seen any questionable actions by Dr. Parks while working with/shadowing him?
-How, after all your clinical experience, will you handle two years of mostly preclinical work?
-Describe the process of becoming a doctor.

Cool Moments
-Talking about NFL football.
-Talking about Bulls and Illini basketball.
-"I sure as hell hope you come here."
-"This interview went very well, I'll do my best to get you in."
-"Let's just talk."

Stuff I Learned
-Interviewing is something that gets better the more it's done.
-Interview days were actually a lot more fun that I thought they would be. Sure, there's the stress for obvious reasons, but being around other kids going through the same thing makes it a lot easier.
-I don't know if I would do as well interviewing now as I did back during interview season. I guess it's something that happens when it needs to.

I'm So Excited...

Two possible continuations of the above phrase are "and I just can't hide it" or "I'm so...scared." The former is from an 80s(?) song, the latter comes from Saved By The Bell's Jessie Spano. All of the above apply to how I feel right about now, one week before moving up to Chicago. The excited part is especially true. As for being able to hide the excitement, I can probably do that. And as for being scared, I think anxious is a more accurate description. Po-tay-to, po-tah-to. Anxious since UIC is all new to me and since med school starts in a few weeks. I hear things can get kinda rough. Ah well though, I'm still really looking forward to everything.

Having said all that, this is probably the most excited I've been about anything in a while. I've always wanted to head back to Chicago since moving away way back when. There's just something about it that I've always been drawn to. I'll be pretty close to two L lines and three major highways, so that should let me get around easily enough. As for my immediate area, I'm only a 15 minute walk from the med school and Cook County Hospital. Plus my neighborhood is reasonably quiet and safe with its share of local restaurants and bars. On top of heading to Chicago, I actually get to go to med school, so I'm kinda excited(?) about that too. Moreso about eventually becoming a doctor than the process. Even so, I can do some of my rotations at Cook County Hospital, from which the show ER is based on. As someone who's thinking about emergency medicine, CCH's ER isn't a bad place to rotate through. When I'm not at CCH, UIC has an insane number of hospitals in Chicagoland to rotate through, each being known for a specialty or patient demographic more than others. Sooo, this whole situation works out pretty well for me :)

The only thing that's kinda weird is that I'm going from a school of ~30,000 undergrads to one of about 700 med students. And that's at one of the larger med schools in the country. I hear it can be like high school again with each class numbering only around 175...not unlike like my high school. But, orientation week has some social events which should help to let everyone get to know each other. So far, I know of a Cubs game and a bar outing. Last year, I think there was a cruise on Lake Michigan, so that'd be pretty sweet if that happened this year. It's kinda like a first day of school feeling again, except the kids are a lot older and will probably get drunk together.

So overall: excited. About everything. Chicago, med school, meeting new people, the whole shebang. :D Now if my stuff could just pack and move itself...

Cram & Purge

I was cleaning out piles of old UIUC stuff and ended up looking through some old notes/lecture notes. A couple of classes in particular caught my attention: Calc II, Physics, and Learning and Memory (Psych).

Glancing through that stuff, I recognized most of it. But hell if I could remember anything meaningful from it or do anything productive with it. The worst case of it was Calc II. Having took it around 3+ years ago, you'd think I'd remember something about it. Wrong. Negative. No sir. Seeing stuff like parametric curves, power & alternating series, and root/alternating/comparison tests kinda pissed me off. Didn't really see the point of any of it. But then again, I wasn't in a math heavy field. At least with physics and psych I could kinda figure out/remember what I learned back in the day. Not so much w/Calc II.

But even looking at my MCB & Organic lab books, I remember the stupid amounts of time spent not only in lab, but with all the pre/post/during/do whatever we say lab writeups. That and the wonderful teaching utility of lab exams. Those were educationally awesome. Bleh, similar stories around for other college kids...but seeing it again reminded me of all that business. I learned a decent amount from UIUC, especially outta some of my upper level MCBs. But I'm also surprised how much of it was cram & purge.

Chef Illinaisa

One of the few productive things I wanted to do this summer was figure out how to cook at least a few things decently. And by cook, I mean minimal use of microwaves, frozen foods, and cell phones. I'm wanting to do this mostly to save money - eating out and buying semi-made stuff all the time gets kinda expensive. I also figured that it's not a bad thing to be able to do.

Of the dishes that I have cooked, most have turned out okay. Surprisingly, I haven't screwed anything up too bad. There was only one dish that was bad enough not to be eaten, and I blame that partly on the six year old flour. Oops. But out of the dishes I've made, I'd have to say that stroganoff is the winner so far. I've still got a few more I'm wanting to try, so that may or may not hold up.

So if anyone out there has ideas and/or recipes for me, let me know. I'll try almost anything and hopefully won't butcher the food too badly. Even if I do, I'll probably still eat it.

Reach For The Sky

I was wondering how tall the Sears Tower was today, and this led me on a bit of a trek through some of the world's tallest and future tallest skyscrapers. Ah, the wonders of free time, wikipedia, and curiosity. And for the curious, the Sears Tower is 1,454 feet to its roof, 1,721 to its antennas.

I knew that the Sears Tower had lost the "tallest" distinction to the Petronas Towers and to Taipei 101. What I didn't know was how close all the skyscrapers were, especially when you start throwing antennas and spires around.

Another thing I learned was that Chicago's planning on building another skyscraper. This in itself isn't really news, since Chicago's been known to do that. What is news is that this skyscraper is supposed to be 2,000 feet tall. Say hello to the Chicago Spire.


So yeah, 2,000 feet is damn tall building...at least IMO. I found this picture of the current skyline with a few skyscrapers added in that aren't yet complete. The other shiny building towards the back of the Chicago River is the Trump Tower, which is itself already under construction. The skinny brown tower back and to the left of Trump is the Waterview Tower and is also under construction. And apparently, ground's already been broken on the Spire.

As I read about the Chicago Spire, I assumed it would be the tallest building when it was completed. Not so much. That's apparently gonna belong to the Burj Dubai, a tower going up in Dubai, of the United Arab Emirates. Ironically enough, its architects are from Chicago. Anyway, this guy's supposed to be around 2,600 feet tall to its antenna when its done. By my count, that's almost half a mile. Vertical. Now that's a tall building.

"The Universe"

I was watching a taped episode of "The Universe" on Discovery and it got me thinking. Thinking about the big picture. "The Universe" is a series covering different astronomical topics. The specific episode I watched was about Earth's birth, evolution, and future. Just so the reader(s) know(s), I'm gonna summarize the episode and then throw my own thoughts in towards the end.

So the sun (and eventually the rest of the solar system) was born from a supernova about 4.5 billion years ago. Earth was formed as a result of collisions among the supernova remnants. The planet was gradually built up from microscopic particles to about 80% of its current size. Comets and asteroids were constantly bombarding Earth in its infancy. Then, a large body collided with Earth, giving the rest of its current mass. Matter was also ejected from Earth as a result of the collision, some of which came together to form the moon. The moon gives the Earth its tilt (and consequently seasons) and, of course, tides. As Earth's various elements settled, a molten iron core was formed. Around 3.9 billion years ago, the rotation of this core formed a magnetic field which allowed protection from solar wind and radiation; without this field, any atmosphere would be eroded by the sun. This magnetic field was one of the more important developments for eventual life. One other important factor in Earth's developing life was its distance from the sun: not so far that water would freeze over, but not so close that water would boil off.

Speaking of water, the show talked of two theories from which this ubiquitous substance may have come from: comets and volcanoes. As the planet cooled down from its fiery birth, water from icy comets and volcanic steam would be able to form liquid water. Regarding comets, some are proposing that comets also deposited the basic building blocks of life, amino acids. The show mentioned the oldest evidence of life as dating from around 3.7 billion years ago.

From this point, most know about the development of single cell organisms, bacteria, photosynthetic life, the widespread release of oxygen, and the eventual evolution of complex life. As a chronological reference, dinosaurs were around from 230 to 65 million years ago. That leaves about 3.5 billion years of evolution in the mix. The show mentioned the history of Earth as representative of a 24 hour clock. Man's time on Earth (~130,000 years) would represent two seconds of those 24 hours.

In the short (geological) time that man has been on Earth, he has evolved from scavenger to the dominant species on the planet. We have evolved to the point that we are by far the most intellectually superior species. We don't just have simple tools and implements. We have technology. Technology that greatly simplifies life for ourselves. We can cross oceans in hours. We send little (or big) metal things into orbit around Earth. We split the atom. Split it and use it for power.

One result of our innovation is that of industry. For the past 300 years, one part of the world or another is/has undergone the industrial revolution. The literal and figurative fuel for said revolution has been fossil fuels. One now highly publicized result of this revolution is the production of greenhouse gases. The relationship between these gases, climate change, and our future has been documented over and over. A few predictions from "The Universe": within 40-60 years, the Arctic Ocean will be ice-free during summer; a once prominent Antarctican ice shelf (Larsen B) which had been around for 12,000 years collapsed in only 5 weeks. And by prominent, I mean the size of Rhode Island.

One of the show's guests commented on climate change and its effects on Earth; I'll be paraphrasing and adding my own thoughts in the following.

The things we do to Earth will not effect it in the long run. If we keep up our current affairs, the world will become warmer and warmer for a few thousand years. In the grand scheme of things, this is just a blip in Earth's evolution. In man's evolution, this will be a significant blip. This period of time will see coastal flooding, leading to millions of refugees. These refugees will strain established infrastructure and resources across the planet. Climate change will affect agricultural production, taxing both livestock and human food sources. Power grids will be increasingly taxed by climate change in efforts to escape more extreme climates.

According to wikipedia, we get 80% of our energy from fossil fuels. However, oil, gas, and coal are optimistically predicted to last 45, 72, and 250 more years respectively, at today's usage levels. These 250 years do not take into account India's, China's, or our increasing energy needs. Nor does it take into account that coal is the worst fossil fuel in terms of carbon dioxide production. The nonrenewable nature of fossil fuels, combined with their impact on greenhouse gas levels begs for alternative energy. Otherwise, wars will being waged over remaining fuel and climate change will accelerate.

For all the gloom and doom of the previous paragraph, I have faith in society to change. I just hope that it happens sooner than later. "The Universe" reminded me of how so many things have come together to make Earth habitable. Like I mentioned earlier, dinosaurs roamed Earth for about 165 million years. It took an asteroid to wipe out dinosaurs and lead to the rise of mammals, and eventually man. It'd be a shame if we wiped ourselves out. With modern humans dating back to 130,000 years ago, it'd be a bigger shame if dinosaurs outlived us.

That last example is pretty extreme, but not impossible if things keep going the way they are. I'm sure by this time in a few months, I'll be ass-deep in med school stuff and will have forgotten about this post. Won't have forgotten about what made me post though. I'm not saying I can change things, but I know of a certain executive office that could help things along. Especially as an office within one of the world's leaders in technology, resources, and funding. Big picture, GW. Big picture.

Summer Happenings, Part Two

Welp, I'm about two months into summer break, with around a month left. For those wondering what this med student's been up to with his last summer, this is your lucky day.

On the video game front, I've already mentioned a few games I'd been working through. I'm still randomly playing Guitar Hero 2. Fact: while I can play some games better drunk (Madden, pool), Guitar Hero is not one of those games. Fact #2: Free Bird on expert is insane. Even when sober. Even when co-oping with someone a little better than me (I've beaten ~83% of expert).

I already talked a bit about Call of Duty. After beating that, Kameo was next. Kameo was an entertaining 20 hourish game. It reminded me a lot of Zelda: the overall gameplay included a little stategery, puzzles, more involved combat (vs. Zelda), and saving a world from something/someone. The only gripe I have involves switching between characters. You're given four buttons with which to do this (for ten characters). Clicking on the thumbsticks could've made these same buttons assignable to the other characters.

Splinter Cell: Double Agent has all the stuff that I love from the other Splinter Cells, with a bit of a twist. There's still the straight-up sneaking around and being a ninja. The difference in DA: you're a double agent with both the NSA and a criminal organization. The new thing: when you're working inside the enemy's base, you're given a time limit. Within this time you have to pick between both the NSA's and criminals' missions. If you don't complete objectives, someone ends up getting pissed off. Nobody likes having the NSA and/or organized crime pissed off at them. Overall, it's what I'd expect out of Splinter Cell and I liked what they did with the double agent twist.

In the "Up & Coming" department, the only games I'm really waiting on are Halo 3 and Guitar Hero 3. Then again, I haven't been following the gaming scene as much as back in the day. It's probably better off anyway, this kid's a bit short on cash.

With this being one of the bigger movie summers in awhile, I was bound to catch at least a few. First up's Ocean's Thirteen. The movie was all right. The planning stage for the heist consumes a lot of the movie and has its share of slow moments. This is true for the other two movies, but it was really noticeable to me in this one. When the actual heist comes around it gets interesting, but overall I still like the first Ocean's the best.

Next up is Die Hard. Straight up, I liked the movie. If you're looking for something where you can turn your brain off and be entertained, look no further. The story is passable and holds all the action together well enough. Speaking of action, you'll definitely get a lot of it in Die Hard. It's kind of like the Bad Boys movies, with a little less humor and a little more action. I haven't seen the other three Die Hards in a while, but this one would probably top the list. Only downside is no yippee-ki-yay, but I guess you can't win them all.

Knocked Up features Dr. Izzie Stevens from Grey's fame. Not that I'm any professional judge of acting, but I think she does a pretty good job. Paul Rudd's also in it. I don't know if it's him or his characters, but I seem to like his stuff as of late. I'd been hearing that the movie was one of the funniest they'd seen. I don't know if I'd claim that. I'd save such a title for something like Wedding Crashers. Having said that, the movie was better than I thought it was going to be. And yes, it was pretty funny at times. Although, once the last fifth or so of the movie rolled around it was starting to lose its funny moments.

Evan Almighty is the last contestant on tonight's show. Steve Carrell basically carries the movie, IMO. All of the comedy in the movie comes from him. Even with this, there wasn't as much when compared to Bruce Almighty. Sounds like a pretty negative review, but I still liked the movie. Just not anything spectacular. Not too much else to be said.

In the movie edition of Illinaisa's "Up & Coming," I'm waiting on Harry Potter, Rush Hour 3, and Bourne Ultimatum. As for movies that I still wanna see, they'd be Spiderman 3, Pirates 3, Ratatouille, and Shrek 3. Yay for spending money :D Maybe I should've/will still work a bit this summer.