http://www.myheritage.com

Thank you Mindy for ruining my day. You look like hot hollywood chicks while I am stuck w/ scruffy looking has beens and an Elvis impersonator (yeah, I'm looking at your Carl Perkins!).

THERE SHE SUCKS!

I finally finished Moby Dick today. This has nothing to do with humanity, religion, God, faith. It took 4 painstaking months to get through it. And what did I get out of it:

"You can call me Ishmael."

That's it. If you're interested in the book stop reading after the first sentence because the rest is pure junk. Did you know that only 3,000 some copies of Moby Dick were purchased during Melville's lifetime? People in the mid 1800's were a much brighter group then we are today apparently.

REGARDING OUR IMPORTANCE

If God does exist, and we are His priority, or in other words, if we are so important, then:

1. Why all the galaxies and solar systems? Did God create all these just so we would have something to look at through huge telescopes in Central America? What do they have to do with us?

2. Why did He take so long to put us on this planet in the first place? Science has clearly shown that there were dinosaurs and sea-faring creatures well before man ever bothered to show his face. So why all this time and all these other species who came before us?

3. And why have fish that can be found on the bottom of the ocean floor that have gills or tentacles that light up because it is impossible to see that far down? Again, for out entertainment? Obviously they weren't meant as a food source or as pets.

4. And why cockroaches?!? I throw this in just because I abhore these disease spreading freaky looking things that crunch when you step on them. Why God? Why?!?

NOT UP FOR DEBATE

I doubt whether there is a God. What I don't doubt, it is a fact, is that there is a Godess. Her name is Lara Logan. If she's not a goddess, at the very least she is angelic. Ahhhh.......

CHF

Want to know what patients with CHF (congestive heart failure) look like when they are acutely ill? Then check out Botero. I found this gem of an artist when looking for a new calender. He is dead spot on for CHF. His paintings are mostly of edematous smoking people. Even the babies are all swollen and puffy like water balloons!

Go Bears!

DINNER ETIQUETTE

So I went out to dinner last night with some of my co-interns, residents, fellows, and significant others to celebrate finishing another rotation. There were 12 of us in all. We went to an Indian Restaurant. I had some free Non and tomato curry dip (Indian chips and salsa I guess) and the Dal Makhni (a delicious but admitably bland lentil dish). How much did this cost me? According to the menu $12.95 but according to how much money I had to fork up at end, $26. I got screwed again because three people got a glass of wine, another 3 or four got tea or soda or something of the like, and we got three appetizers that did not look appetizing to me.

Once again I paid without saying anything. Is it completely naive of me to expect the people who got a glass of wine to speak up and say, "Hey, we owe a little more because we got $6 glasses of wine. Joe, you don't drink so why don't you just throw in $20"? Apparently it is because this is not the first time this has happened. And it's really not the money. The 31 cents from yesterday's overpriced grande cafe mocha and the 6 dollars from last night's dinner. It's the fact that nobody thinks to be considerate enough to consider that everyone at their table shouldn't pitch in for their alcohol, desserts, or whatever else they order that the rest of the table doesn't share in or to sell a damn grande cafe mocha for the advertised price.

Damn I'm turning bitter.

THE JERK(S)

I am so tired of getting screwed over.

I stopped into my local coffee shop today. There was a whiteboard near the cash register that displayed the following:

"Special: Grande Mocha (regular or any flavor) $3.00"

Below that:

"Identify the qoute: 'Damn these glasses.' 'Yes sir, I damn thee!' and get $.50 off any coffee drink".

I knew the quote but I wasn't planning on using it to get 50 cents off my mocha which is already on special anyways. I order my mocha and the cashier rings up a grande mocha at $3.30 plus 33 cents tax for a total of $3.63.

Why does it feel like every company I deal with screws over the customer some way or another? Yes, I could easily have said something, but I am so tired of having to say something. If you are going to advertise a grand mocha for $3, then sell the damn mocha for $3. So I left the store without pointing it out and instead I will just have to take my business elsewhere. The Jerks.

YOU WILL DIE

Think back in the past month or past year and count the number of times where you thought about the fact that you would someday die. How many times is it? I'd love to know.

I'm not sure if it's because of my illness, depression, or the fact that I'm a doctor and see dying regularly but I think about it regularly. A 31 year old man should not find his thoughts focusing on the fact that someday he will draw his final breath. I sometimes think about it when I'm brushing my teeth. I sometimes think about it when I'm grocery shopping.

It's odd but it's also fascinating. Try itsome time. I really am in awe as I sit in a crowded bus and look at all the people in the bus knowing that each and every one of them will die. Each will have that experience. The happy couple reading the People magazine together, the professional business man with his leather bag, the elderly woman near the front, the three girlfriends in the back, the mother and her three children, one still in a car seat. Me. All of us will someday die.

Put another way, in 100 years almost every person you see will be dead. The entire race of man that exists today will no longer exist in 100 years. EVERYONE. The world will be completely replaced with a brand new batch of people.

I don't know why I think about it. I don't know what purpose it has. Luckily this blog isn't about answers.

And on a passing note; I'm 3/4 of the way through the movie Cider House Rules and so far it has nothing to do with the Cider House Rules!?