Giving of Another Sort

Hope everyone had a very Merry Christmas. Mine was nice and relaxing. My sister and I headed to New Jersey and spent Christmas with a good friend.

So I decided to give you guys a break from my whinings about the application process for a minute and ask a question that I've been trying to answer myself. A somewhat uncomfortable question.

Have you ever heard of the organization called UNOS aka the GOD committee? Everyday this committee literally has to sit down and decide who they will give life to and who will literally die from their long list. A pretty tough job especially when you realize that these deaths could probably all be avoided if only more people checked one or two conveniently located check-boxes.

I haven't checked them either and I keep asking myself why? It's right there behind my driver's license and I pretty much pretend it's not. Tons of people go to the grave daily with valuable organs that could be gifted to one person on this long list of people waiting for a kidney, a heart or sometimes an eye. Of course many people site different reasons for not donating their organs and many of them are valid. But not only are people dying from this shortage, a black market has developed around the world where organs are being traded and stolen from unsuspecting people. I know it's almost the New Year and the last thing anyone wants to think of is death but I can't help but think of the John Q's of this world who are praying for a miracle for their son also for the New Year. In this case, the harvest COULD BE plentiful but the land is not yielding its wealth so the villagers die of starvation.

Why do you think people are so reluctant to donate their organs? I guess the question is why are you and I reluctant and if you already indicated yourself as a donor, what motivated you to? Would we be more willing if there was some kind of compensation(especially for non-vital organs)? Your responses are extremely appreciated.

Pursuing My HappYness

Happy Day Before Christmas Everyone.

So Fope and Ogizzle, I finally saw the movie. It was awesome but I probably would have enjoyed it more if I had not seen the 20/20 special on it the week before. So I pretty much knew how the movie will end. I badly want to say I felt the way he did after getting my first acceptance but in all honesty I didn't. I think I really felt that way when I got my job at Ivy Que.

Maybe cus its not exactly my dream school, I didn't even know anything about the school till I started the application process. OK I know I'm sounding like a bloody ingrate but I really am just being honest...I appreciate the acceptance and I'm excited about it but it doesn't have that "umphhh" factor for me. Another reason is because I have to find a cosigner for my loan. I have one choice of cosigners so far but I honestly don't want to put anyone in a situation where they have $200,000+ hanging in their credit report on accounts of me. I have a few other people to ask in case I want to spread out the loan so it's not only on one person. But my Nigerian peeps and some of you might understand my next point.

I honestly don't want someone signing the loan on my behalf and 20 years from now when I become a doctor(So help me GOD) these same people show up in my office wanting free treatment for the rest of their lives. Pretty much if I don't jump when they tell me to jump, they're going to go around town telling everyone

"You know she wouldn't have been able to pay for school if I didn't help her cosign her loan? And look at her now, she's finally a doctor and now anytime I make any request, she acts like I have dog breath"

I've talked to GOD about this and I'm waiting on Him to sort things out...again the story doesn't end till May 15th, and even after then, if I happen to be waitlisted at any school(God Forbid), I could be pulled off the waitlist anytime between May 15th and the week before Matriculation (Augustish).

So you see, I'm not exactly a bloody ingrate, it's just one of those things an International Applicant has to deal with. Our best bet is to get into one of the private schools that have private loans for which you don't need a cosigner, the other alternative is to have at least 3 years of credit history, then you won't need a cosigner. I got my first credit card in October 2005.

With all this in mind, my homework for the holidays is to write a letter to Harvard. Yes, Harvard. The worst they can say is NO! I turned in my apps since October, no news from them about an interview yet. I'm probably not exactly their top candidate but they are a private school and I'm sure they have a ton of money to share. Oh yeah and they happen to be the number one Med School in the Nation, perhaps the world(minor detail). Like I said, the worst they can really say is NO!

This part of my life is called....

Pursuing My HappYness

Merry Christmas to you all!!!

(Yes I said Christmas not Holidays, so shoot me. Even Jewish people admit that Hannukah is not their biggest celebration of the year and who celebrates Kwanzaa again? And to the Christians that say they don't celebrate Christmas because the date was chosen by the Romans to coincide with one of the Pagan Ceremonies, my only question for you is "Would you stop celebrating your birthday if you found out you were born on thesame day as, say...Hitler?" But anyways, to every man/woman his/her own...Whichever way you look at it Jesus is the Reason for the Season)

Oh and another side note, I saw them do stitches again in the ER yesterday and I didn't almost pass out. Compared to the last time, I call that progress...lot's of PROGRESS.

THE SMALL PRINT YOU "FORGOT" TO READ

Have you ever signed up for a credit card, insurance policy or just some random crap someone throws at you and then one day you get sent some obscure bill or charge that you never saw coming? Poor you, if only you had busted out the magnifying glass to read them small prints. You would have realized the truth. If only. By the way, here's another one you might have missed

The very first time you found this page, the very first word you read on this page, made you a party to a non-verbal, unwritten contract stating that you would stick with ABBEY till this journey's end. So just because she has one admission does not now exclude you from said contract. The journey is now proceeding to new frontiers and you are an officially signed member till at least May 15th, 2007 the day when she will officially agree to a dedicated relationship to one and only one Medical School, forsaking all others. A WHITE COAT ceremony will be the only event that would officially signify the termination of this contract.

OK so let me put that nicely...you guys have stuck with me so far, have even been more excited than I was for my first acceptance. I mean I began to realize the gravity of the acceptance when I saw all the comments on here and when my phone was ringing off the hook like I just won the lottery. So pwitty please stick with me to the end. I can't do it without you (OK so I can, but you get the drift). There are many more stories to tell and better yet, there are about 16 more schools I'm waiting to hear from, one email can change the enitre story, so one acceptance is simply an Insurance Policy that come what may, I'm going to be a Doctor. That feels soooo good to type. What the heck, I'll type it again.

"COME WHAT MAY, I'M GOING TO BE A DOCTOR"

Alright people...I'm much calmer than I thought I would be getting the news...but I'm in. The Struggle is almost over. One Acceptance in the bag. Got the news at 5am this morning, for some reason they sent the packet to my sister's address and she didn't come in from work till 5am(Computer Science Majors!!) but yeah...

I got the news and I couldn't sleep for the next hour or so. I just lay there thanking GOD and swinging in and out of some dream that I was back in the school on my interview day. Reliving the whole day, minute after minute. I was kinda expecting some kind of news this week...we were told we'll hear something between Dec 15th and 20th. I was going to blog about that but I was trying not to dwell too much on it, so here I am...whatever the case, Imma be a doc.

The one and half month of silence is over and to coat it all up, I got another interview this morning.

I probably won't get extremely excited until I see the letter, but for now, I'm just very grateful to GOD and to everyone that has encouraged me through this.

ALL'S WELL...

OK this is my attempt to start a new post and pretend like I just posted one up yesterday. Work with me OK? (I've been bad...very bad, but that's OK cus I know you forgive me, no?)

My interview on Monday went well. So well that I just want to throw caution to the wind and broadcast the name of the school on here. I'm in love! I'm in love!! I want to shout it on the roof tops. But anyways, let's step away from this Broadway production for a minute and talk about interview day.

The journey was a bit long and stressful. I used every means of transportation known to man except water and "rent-a-ghost" teleports. Even after getting to the interview city, it took about 2 hours to get a cab from the train station to my host's apartment. Didn't remember that part about the city last summer. My host was also great and at least spent sometime with me, she had her own stuff to do but at least she answered my questions. The whole host thing is just hit-or-miss, cus there's really no way to know who's who from a list of names and emails. As usual I didn't get much sleep that night. I dreamt about all the worst case scenarios...missing the interview altogether, forgetting my suit back on the East Coast, getting a run in my panty-hose while trying to put them on, and many other takes from the "Oh S#!t, I'm Soooo Totally Screwed" collection. But I guess I'm getting used to that bit of the whole process now.

The interview day was packed full with numerous tours of the schools high tech facilites, etc. Then in the afternoon was the interview. One of my interviewers was actually a Nigerian Doctor so that was pretty cool. Well I didn't officially know this till towards the end of the interview...but immediately I heard him talk I had it narrowed down to Nigeria or Ghana. So I say it's pretty cool that he's a Nigerian but that does have its pros and cons. Like you can't just randomly say you used to live on a tree in the middle of a jungle back home and you had to fight through a herd of hyenas, pythons and such to get to school everyday, how many people gave up but you stayed strong, then show the interviewer a few playground scars and let them know that you got it from trying to save a complete stranger from the hyenas. Cool stuff like that. I had to scrutinize everything I said. The one time I vaguely mentioned anything about Nigeria was here:

Interviewer - So of all your jobs, which one do you think contributed most to who you've become today.

Me - Ironically, my job in the cafeteria. I learnt how to deal people(employees and customers), how to motivate people to perform in a team and most of all how to be a leader. Back home a woman is expected to be subservient and in the background...

(He looks up from his paper at this point, I'm thinking, oh snap I'm in for it, but too late you might as well finish)

...so it was very different for me to actually be in a position of considerable authority. It taught me to be assertive and confident.

Interviewer - No! No! No! I don't agree with you, the next generation of women in Nigeria are very independent and anything but subservient.

(Oh my goodness, a Nigerian Male Feminist?! He must be a mutant. What to say? What to say?!)

Me - Well you're right, the NEXT generation of women are independent. But the generation of women we saw growing up are not of this generation. Only few of our mothers and aunts were independent. And even those that were, were called all kinds of names.

(Geez why did I get myself into this conversation?)

Interviewer - (Nodding) Well yes, yes you're right about that.

At this point he moved on to the next question. (Whew!). This was the only time in our close to 1 hr conversation that he actually gave me instant feedback. For the rest of the interview, no smile, no frown nothing. I really thought I was screwing up but I kept smiling at him as I answered his questions. I felt stupid but that was the only thing I could do to prevent my worry from showing. It wasn't till the end of the interview that he went back to some of my answers and discussed them like he agreed with them. I guess he's just one of those straight business type guys. We ended up chatting for like 15 minutes after he had finished going through the list of questions he had for me. Apparently, he had gone back to one of the teaching hospitals in Lagos, and tried to hook them up with some free useful equipment but they all ended up turning him down claiming he felt he was better than them because he was based in the U.S. Talk about looking a gift horse in the mouth, and then counting how many teeth it had. Then I told him about the embarassing ABC 20/20 documentary on Nigerian Scammers (thanks to Miss Adaure for the link). Unfortunately (or fortunately?) he was on call all weekend and didn't get a chance to watch it. About how countries don't give visas to male Nigerians anymore because even if they come here with good motives, they tend to stray into some mischief or the other... Pretty much some banal yet painful truths about Nigeria's situation. Before we parted he told me to not stress out about the whole process, that some schools will reject me but I will be surprised at how many will give me an acceptance. Very encouraging words.

While I was back in the library waiting for my second interviewer, he passed by and told me I had left my hand bag in the interview room...lol! how could I do that?...now I look like the surgeon that would leave a dirty rag in my patient's chest...or maybe I'm just overthinking stuff.

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Interview day got done at about 4pm. I had to be at the airport by 6:30pm and it was a 45 minute train ride away. But there was also another important mission I had to accomplish. One of the other cool premeds I interviewed with gave me a ride to KYDU campus. I had to look for Dr.K.

I had "borrowed" a piece of African art from my roommate for this sole purpose and even though I was crunched for time, I really didn't want to haul the piece back home. It took me about 30 minutes to find his office. I had forgotten how complex of a matrix KYDU med school was. I stopped by at some office to ask for directions. After a lot of hand waving right and left, and a lot of clueless nods from my end, I tried to find his office again. Unfortunately, I made about 3 complete circles, tried to sneak across the office that gave me directions all three times so they didn't know I was still completely lost, I'm sure the knew I was passing though, the loud wheels of my hand luggage probably gave me away each time. I eventually asked another person for help and found his office.

He wasn't in there so I assumed he was in his lab. The time at this point is 5pm. I walk in there and ask the new guy there for Dr.K, he was around the corner. I walked around and there he was...doing his science. He was really surprised to see me which was a good thing. And all he could do was stare and ask what I was doing there. I had to wait for about ten minutes in the hallway for him to finish what he was doing. As I waited, I overheard him telling the new student in the lab that I was the student from last summer he was talking about. The poor guy probably hated me by now cus I'm sure good ole Dr.K had talked his ear out about how I was now in Ivy League Que, etc. It's a right of passage.

We eventually went into his office, he told me about how his research was going, I told him all the mushy stuff he had taught me about life, about how I used to be so angry at him, how everything was coming in handy at work presently etc. We just pretty much laughed about the whole thing. He also really liked the piece I gave him, apparently he was into art. That was good cus I really wasn't sure. Eventually it was time to go, I had to be at the station at 5:30. We walked out of his office. I felt like a guy on a date lol. Should I make the first move, give that hug. Naaaahhh...that's way too much contact, we'll just shake hands and call it a day. We said "OK" like ten times and finally I was turning around to leave when I saw his outstretched arms and it wasn't for a handshake. Ahhhh thank GOD!

I made it to the airport at 6:26pm. 4 minutes before check-in for my flight closed.

ALL'S WELL THAT REALLY ENDS WELL

Public Service Announcement

So my roommate and I have been thinking about a way to help upcoming med students for a while now...even before I started this blog. So we decided to do a by email advisory service. Funny enough some of you have already subscribed to it and sent me questions by email but for the sake of everyone I figured I'd officially announce it. Between "Smart-one" and I, we know someone at every stage of med school and residency and at different schools in the US, so if you have any specific questions shoot me an email (abbeykay@gmail.com) and between the two of us and "THE NETWORK" we will probably be able to answer your questions. How should I study for the MCAT? Does school J accept international students? How can I get financial aid? How hard is Med School anyways? whatever it is, bring it on and I will post the question and answers on here for the benefit of everyone.

Also I just got this idea a few minutes ago. Won't it be nice to interview some of these people in "THE NETWORK" and put it up here? You know..."10 questions for..." Hmmm or is that just a repetition of everything I just mentioned above. I don't know...just trying to be useful. I would be flying out for my interview tomorrow. So I might not be checking this page out for a minute but if you think the interview thing is a good idea then please give me some ideas as to the questions you want me to ask. I'm thinking our first Interviewee will be "Smart-one" herself, I haven't told her yet but I'm sure she'll oblige.

Ok I'm expecting a full email box or comment section when I get back

Stability Issues

The rain drops inflicted their pain one after the other trying their best to not fall behind in the onslaught and the little one struggled. With every gust of the wind, "Snall-and-not-so-mighty" wondered if the proverbial camel's back was about to be broken...but then again there was the proverbial engine...she made it up the hill right? As she labored away mile after mile, trying to keep her feet grounded, the journey seemed to feel longer. She glanced back for a minute, apparently her new Master was in a hurry too, they had just met yesterday and she was already cracking the whip like there was no tomorrow..."Small-and-not-so-Mighty" hoped that was in no way true, because tomorrow, by hook or by crook, she wanted to be returned to her Madame, scrubbed till she was presentable and displayed until another paying customer was ready to loan her for a short time, today's arrangement wasn't going very smoothly.. .

Ok I don't know what picture you're getting with that story but that was as much drama as I had during my last interview trip and I had to share it with "Small-and-not-so-Mighty" aka the Ford Focus I was forced to rent for the trip. I'm not complaining though, the less drama the better, because I was expecting this interview to be pretty rough. Like I said earlier this was one of them notoriously ethics based interviews. But GOD came through and the only near ethical thing I was asked, I had already practiced earlier. The interviewer was also a nice fatherly-type guy which made the whole process very stress-free. We talked about both our research projects (mostly his, but that's OK, I tried to ask "intelligent" questions) and were having such a great conversation that he had to throw the question in as an after thought (Describe a bioethical situation you have encountered). It seemed he just threw it in to prevent the adcomms from bashing him about not going with the interview script. Now that I think of it something a bit interesting did happen the night before.

I got to stay with one of the MSI students for the night. I had initially planned to pick her brain that evening but let's just say she wasn't exactly your average host. After I arrived in the city along with my bags and baggages and a very turgid bladder, I had to sit in the car for about thirty minutes waiting for her to arrive from some event or something that she had only remembered she had to do the night before. Even after she let me in and I had baptised her bathroom (and a little bit of myself) with trace samples of my DNA , she showed me to the couch which would become my new haven for the night, packed her bags and told me she was off to study with some friends. Along with something in the line of not liking to study alone for "Histo", no they didn't have a test tomorrow and yes, she'll be back at about 2am, etc.

"Are you for freaking real?? Then why did you agree to host me if you knew you were going to abandon me as soon as I stepped foot in your apt?"

She left me wondering why I had picked her name from all the students on the list of hosts I had been sent. The thought of pulling up the list again and calling up the one or two Nigerians on there also crossed my mind. But ehn..it was already 11pm and they had clearly stated they weren't going to be available that evening. I called a few of my buddies and expressed my dissatisfaction with the whole situation. I was going to go to bed feeling sorry for myself and all but I had to snap out of it.

Here I was with this nicely furnished, albeit tiny apartment to myself, no need to be polite to anyone, no need to pay an arm and a leg for a hotel in one of the most expensive cities in the US and I still had the audacity to complain. (Forgive your daughter Lord)! With my head now in the right place, I decided to explore my freedom. Said exploration and a growing hunger brought me to the kitchen at this point, and I was fixing myself something to eat when my curosity got the better of me. I saw this little "IKEAish" half dining table(more like "dining surface") hanging on her kitchen wall. Looked all nice and modern. I should have admired it and went along on my merry way but of course not! My bush self in all my amazement decided to pull it up and see how it looked unfolded. I'm like wow...pretty nice. Two people could eat comfortably off it from bar kind-of stools and when you were done, you just folded it back on the wall and had your free space again. It gave the apartment an even more contemporary feel. But it was while trying to fold the table back up that it suddenly decided to go on a limb and collapse on me...screws and all came tumbling off the wall.(I'm cracking up like crazy as I remember this...lol). Karma had officially come right back to bite me in the butt for the slander I had committed against my gracious host. I could just imagine her walking in at this very moment to come pick up some book she forgot or something.

"OK we have to fix this quick...ABBEY you went to an engineering school you should be able to embark on a little do-it-yourself project"

Most of all, I didn't want to be "that premed that broke down her host's apt". After three or so tries, using my 60 dollar shoes (that were already showing signs of wear and tear, ALDO my behind, it might as well have been from Walmart) as a hammer and holding up the table with my head, I got the right nail precariously in the right place, all that mattered was that the table was sitting back in its place. Whatever happened when I left tomorrow was not my problem. (GOD pls let it hold-up till then!) I wisely took the disaster as a cue to call it a night before something else came tumbling down. And although I woke up every hour of the night, afraid that some little demon will come and switch of my alarm on me, or even worse change the setting from 6 AM to 6 PM, my rest was reasonable.

Now to the trip back and the Focus issues. The East Coast was starting to get left overs of whatever it was that made it snow in TEXAS the day before and it was raining and blowing like crazy. The Focus, like its Japanese second cousin, the Toyota Echo, is one of those tall and very light weight cars. From the little physics I know (that unfourtunately didn't come through for me on my two previous MCATS), this makes for a very unstable situation. I had gotten on the road at 4pm...in the middle of developing rush hour traffic, felt like I hadn't slept in a year, gotten tired of the traffic and proceeded to take a one and half hour nap in the car in front of some random deli store. Now that it was 6pm and I was finally alert and the road was somewhat free, Mother Nature decided to take her rebelling to another level. There were times I felt "Small-and-not-so-Mighty" was simply going to be blown off into the night under the angry wind, but thank GOD it didn't cus "What Every Driver Must Know" did not include anything about maneuvering a car in mid air. I managed to get her safely back to Madame Enterprise the next day without any new scratches...and as we speak, I'm bucking up for another journey, this time to the Midwest on Monday. (This is the one where I go see if Mr.Miyagi is real, let's keep our fingers crossed) At least someone else will be doing the maneuvering on that trip!

Putting a Face to the Cliche

(Updated 12/04/06)

So like I promised this post is going to be a "fun" post, fun meaning pictures and loosely career related...I will give details on my interview later(nothing exciting really happened though)

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If you haven't figured this out by now, I'm a strong patron of the idea that "We all have one life to live" and as much as I want to make most of my mistakes myself and learn from them, life is way too short to accomplish that. So let's thank GOD for those people whose actions (the good, the bad, and the straight up QUASIMODOish) are broadcasted across the media allowing me and you pick up a thing or two from them...and in the process bring several cliches to life.

These celebrities/tv characters don't all necessarily have the "ABBEY MAGNET", heck some of that are not even real, but they really have taught me some random thing or the other


KELLY CLARKSON: In my opinion...the best idol yet! Her songs are a significant part of my "GET HYPE" collection and even though I didn't watch idol that season(probably didn't even know it existed, it was freshman year and my fresh off the boat self could still hear the "face your books" lecture the folks gave me so I watched very little TV), but watching her performances now keeps reminding me of what I missed. I was watching the season 1 auditions a few weeks ago, at a time when I was significantly down in dumps with regards to this whole application process.

I had just found out that one of the premeds I interviewed with on the same day had already been accepted to the school we both interviewed at. I hadn't even heard a word from them, and it was now a month after the interview. It was one of my dream schools too...so I was getting worried. I was obviously not a first choice among their candidates. So they were waiting to review more applicants before me. Would they eventually pick me? Would they not? So there I was in my apartment, battling acute onset Mellonophobia when I caught the show.

It was the end of the auditions, 45 candidates were left. Simon, Paula and Randy had to cut 15 to be left with the 30 that would participate in the show. After a heated debate they agreed on 15 that they definately wanted to keep, went into the waiting room and broke the news to them. They still needed to pick 15 more from the remaining 30 "so-so" candidates and they debated for a few more hours as to who this 15 will be. They eventually reached a decision. Would you believe that Kelly was one of the 30 "so-so" candidates they had to think hard before they picked? And wasn't it this same girl that out shone everyone else when the show started and eventually won?

Is that a BREAK-AWAY or what?!

NNENNA AGBA: Our girl from the Nigerian East-side (insert chant here and throw up gang signs, lol), I wouldn't say I was the greatest fan of her look but the judges seemed to like it so I was pretty confident (like most other people) that if she didn't win the competition, she would at least be in the final four. She was good right from the beginning, took beautiful photos, won all the challenges, etc...but she still got cut considerably early in the show. At least my girl got a free trip to Thailand out of it.

The lesson here is the reason she got cut. The judges admitted she was great and probably one of the top candidates to be ANTM but she had a little problem. SHE WAS STAGNANT. She neither improved nor got worse. Just stagnant! And she got the boot. For some reason that judging session plays in my head pretty often...maybe too often. You know we human beings, we hustle for something and when we eventually get it, we have a tendency to relax. At least I do. So on the days I get to work and all I want to do is sit on my butt and become an Internet Explorer, I remember the letter I wrote to my boss literally begging for the job, I also remember Nnenna. In view of this, I ATTEMPT(key word) to dedicate at least one hour on my slow days to self improvement. I do something to make me look smarter...I try reading another boring research publication to learn some new lingo I can conveniently toss around during our next meeting, I pick someone's brain, whatever...just something to get me through another judging round...ANYTHING so I don't get NNENNARIZED!

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FLASHBACK

Location: Heaven

Time: March 29th, 1984 (Human time)

GOD: "I want to end 1984 with a bang...let's create something earth shattering"

Angel 1: "But, Great One, we just made your daughter ABBEY, roughly 6 months ago" *;)*

GOD: "6 and 3/4 months ago, you have to be more specific with your details...didn't we go through this last time too?"

Angel 1: (wings fall, looking sad) "My apologies Master, please don't NNENNARIZE me..."

GOD: "Cheer up, I will do no such thing, you know I always give chances"

Angel 1: (smiling)"How could I forget. You are the best...So what do you have in mind this time Lord?"

GOD: "Hmmm...a whiz kid!"

Angel 2: "Another Einstein?"

Angel 3: "Or a modern day Daniel?"

GOD: "You underestimate my creativity, think outside the box...Tomorrow(their time), LeBron will be conceived!"

Angel 3 to Angel 2: "LeBron?...Interesting choice of names"

GOD: "I heard that. Creativity guys, Creativity...let's get to work"

Angel 4: "What are his genetic specs? What would he be able to do?"

GOD: "EVERYTHING. (leaning back on His throne, smiling knowingly) ...Think Chamberlain"
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LEBRON JAMES: If I say I never used to hate on this guy I will be lying. Well maybe it won't exactly be a lie. I wasn't directly hating. I was hating on behalf of all the other NBA players that had been slaving away for years to at least get a spot on ESPN's top ten plays. Then some little kid comes along, their own kids' agemate and get's a spot there almost everytime he touches the ball.
So what did I learn from him? Success is not a zero-sum game. The fact that LeBron is successful doesn't mean no other player can be successful either. So rather than waste time hating, I've learnt to appreciate the successes of others and learn a thing or two from it because their success doesn't hinder mine in any way, if anything, it makes it easier for me. So next time you begin to feel somewhat green about someone's talents, success, luck, etc...catch yourself, take a lesson or two from it, appreciate God's work and focus on building your own success. But I know there are those few "Melroses" out there that rub it in your face so much that it's beyond human ability to not feel like strangling them!

JOAN Vs TONI*: Unlike Carrie and her girls that always seem to be on such great terms, Girlfriends gives us a little more realistic girl-on-girl drama. Best friends since childhood, Joan & Toni have had a disturbing on and off relationship. Riddled with petty jealousy, leaky mouth issues and one that was just a victim of pump and circumstance. Apparently all their history and a psychiatrist were not enough to solve their many problems.

Vs

So the lesson here is probably that try as you might, some relationships(social, romantic, business, etc) are never meant to be and even when they manage to exist, are simply headed for disaster. The sooner one figures these things out the better...I have wasted a lot of my time in the past trying to fix things that were obviously broken beyond repair but now, like many other blogger buddies have mentioned recently, I'm sooo moving on.
(*indicates fictional characters)

LATRELL SPREWELL: Another story from the NBA. I just rememebered this dude a few days ago and I couldn't help but laugh at the turn of events. In case you don't know him, its not really your fault. This guy seemed to spend most of his career on one form of suspension or the other. When it was time to renew his contract in 2005, my guy was about 34 at this point and his career was obviously on the decline. His team (Minnesota Timberwolves) offered his aging behind $21 million for 3 years but his greedy self responded that ~7 million a year(~5 million is the current average) was not enough to feed his his family.
My only question is "What does this family of his eat?" cus last time I checked 7mill can feed a whole country and change! You can be sure no one even listened to him...he has not stepped his foot on the hardwood since then. I wonder how he feeds his family now that he has no J-O-B. His lesson to me?...something about looking a gift horse in the mouth comes to mind.




CARRIE AND "BIG"*: What's BIG's real name anyways? Whatever it is, the cliche here is that "If I'm meant to be a doctor, no matter how many Aidans, sexy french men, and even myself that come between, it will happen" Nuff said





GREGORY HOUSE, MD*: When I eventually become a doc(AMEN!!), I won't mind walking the wards with this "pill-a-popping-leg-a-limping" character and in the process learn a thing or two while simultaneously becoming numb to garden variety racial and sexist derisions. I get the feeling this guy cares more about the disease than the unfortunate vessel containing them. But one way or the other, Hippocratic oath aside, both him and his patients end up happy at the end of the day.
His lesson to me?...when you are the shizznit at whatever you do, you call your own shots. Ethics become guidelines and rules become mere suggestions. Well, most of the time...

MICHAEL RICHARDS: (How on earth could I forget him??) Funny enough not much to say...the glaring cliches here are
-"Keeping it real can really, REALLY go wrong " and from the good book,
- "Be angry but [please, pwitty please] do not sin"


Honorable mention:
Pamela Anderson and Kid Rock- Note to self: Buying a third pair of flip flops from the same store even though the last two broke after two weeks puts you right in the same category with these guys. And no, the convenience of the store's location/familiarity is not an excuse...hop on the bus and look for someone, I mean something, more stable(I really am talking about flip flops, no metaphors lol)! In case you don't know, the cliche here is "Doing the same thing the same way, multiple times, and expecting different results, is straight up insanity.

OK before I start airing my mild OCD tendencies in public...I'll stop here, we'll get back to hardcore medicine now that I've had a little fun.

Brain cells reporting back for duty...Over
Roger. Welcome back guys...Over and out


Did I forget anyone obvious?