Somebody hold me.

This scary girl would have made a fantastic Clay fan (actually not - she only has one phone, when they were known to use a landline and all cell phones that they could get their hands on.)

Thank goodness for that piece of glass that keeps frustrating her - it keeps people like her from the famous types.

Ultimate Peep Show

Sorry that it's a little late - but I spent all of Easter in the fetal position thanks to my stupid pancreas. Still, this makes me laugh:

Looks like a seedy joint. Thanks Karen!

Also, I didn't blog the last two weeks of Idol because I wasn't home last Tuesday and this Tuesday, I just felt crappy and wasn't in the mood. But how about that David Cook, huh? And Michael Johns - love those two. Love Brooke White as well, but I wish she would have done the whole song with just the piano last night. Oh well. I predict Chikezie goes home - lackluster performance plus the attitude with the judges. Oh, and I am done with David Archuleta - the kid is starting to annoy me with his message songs that should be sung by someone about 10 years older than he is, if they're sung at all. And why did he pick some obscure song from someplace else - Australia? - when he could have picked great 1990 hits as The Shoop Shoop Song (It's In His Kiss) from Cher, Ice Ice Baby, Rico Suave (I mean, you know??), and Mama Said Knock You Out? (I actually like Mama Said Knock You Out, but it's a funny title. "Don't call it a comeback, I've been here for years ..."

Saturday Night Live sketch from March 8, 2008 - Spoof of Hillary Clinton's 3 A.M. campaign ad

Oh my gosh, SNL actually did something funny. And what's even more amazing - the sketch has FRED ARMISEN in it! And y'all know how I feel about the notoriously unfunny Fred Armisen - I think he singlehandedly brought down SNL, and that he could take any classic comedy and make it uncomfortably unfunny. Like Best In Show, or Office Space, or the More Cowbell sketch (best SNL sketch ever.)

Of course the Clinton/Obama spoof got pulled from YouTube within about six seconds of being posted, but I found this copy on TV Crunch.

Doctors are funny!

That is, except the tactless ones that ruin the Internal Medicine clerkship for 3rd year medical students. Anyway, I found this article online from The Journal of Family Practice (Howard J. Bennett, April 1995) and it amused me. It's about humor in the medical practice, and has wit throughout. Here's a couple of my favorites:

A surgeon, an internist, and a family physician go duck hunting.

The surgeon sees a duck, shouts "Duck!" and shoots it down.

The internist sees a duck, shouts "Duck! Rule out quail! Rule out pheasant!" and shoots it down.

The family physician sees a duck and blasts it out of the sky with a burst of machine-gun fire. As the tattered carcass falls to the ground, he remarks, "I don't know what the hell it was, but I sure got it!"

Rule out quail! Rule out pheasant! Hee. It's funny because it's true. I also like this:

To the Editor:

Last year, my husband, a pulmonary fellow, sent me a valentine; he thought that the cardiac system was receiving far too much attention on that day. I thought that your readers would enjoy the valentine.

A Pulmonologist's Valentine
Roses are red
Violets are blue
Without your lungs
Your blood would be too.

Here's the whole thing, if you're interested: Humor in the Medical Literature - Editorial

My Elf Self

I've been playing around with ElfYourself (thanks, Trinoh!) and I can't stop giggling at the "Elf Selves" I created for Scott and me:

http://www.elfyourself.com/?id=9588061433

I'm not sure why Scott's glasses look so ginormous - they don't in real life. But I think we are MUCH better dancers disguised as our elf alter egos than we are as medical students and chemists. Especially Scott. I mean, we've been together over 10 years, and I've danced with him exactly three times (at weddings that I dragged him to.) When I used to clog (boo hoo, I miss it) sometimes we'd be short on guys, and I'd have to dance with my ex-pre-algebra teacher, who is female. So I've danced with my female pre-algebra teacher many more times than with Scott. That's just wrong, people.

Anyway, follow that link. And laugh. (You have to have Flash Player running.)

This guy was obviously about to listen to Glenn Beck

Behold, Kasey Kazee, the Duct Tape Bandit, who attempted robbing a liquor store in Ashland, Kentucky:

Ah, the many uses of duct tape. I'll bet pulling all of that off hurt. Ouch.

Ode to a Pen

I was in T.A.G. when I was in elementary & high school (Talented and Gifted - or so they said) and occasionally, we'd go on these educational field trips with other TAGers from the county. One trip was to listen to some guy who was instrumental in bringing a primary care center to the county (in retrospect, I probably should have paid attention to him instead of writing poetry about writing instruments.) Give me a break, though, I think I was only about 13 years old (circa 1992) when this was written. Maybe not even that.

My friend Rebecca and I were trying to pay attention, but were bored to tears (as it turns out, "tweens", even smart ones, don't care so much about bureaucracy (I first typed "bureaucrazy" - ha) and construction.) Our gaze kept landing on another guy, who was positively doing acrobatics with his ink pen (I guess he was taking notes, for whatever reason.) He was twirling and flipping in a way that I'd never seen before and have never seen again. (Okay, maybe that was a little dramatic.)

So in true junior-high-girl fashion, Rebecca and I started writing notes to each other, and turned it into an ode to Steven and His Acrobatic Pen. My contributions are in bold (because it's my blog, yo) and hers are plain text. Behold:

This bites
The big pen
That twirls and flips
From his fingertips
It's caught our eye
Wonder if it was a good buy?
I don't know, but it's really fly.
He's a smart guy! Oh my, oh my.
Ooh, watch it spin
The way he works it must be a sin.
Wonder where it's been?
Maybe dipped in gin.
Goodness, watch that silver shine
How I wish it was mine, all mine
I'll bet he was a real good time
With that pen, some Vaseline and twine
Before now, I thought we could show this to him
But I'm sure he'd think we were really dim.
But it's okay, it'll be all right
I think I'll buy a pen like that tonight
And learn to flip and twirl and spin
Or maybe it's a talent for only men!
Maybe he could teach me
Maybe I could try
Maybe my twirling pen
Would catch someone's eye
You might spark some poetry
Oh gee ... would you teach me?
I think I'll save my money
To get a pen to impress the honeys
Do you mean the ladies?
Surely it's not true - I wish I wasn't beside of you!
Now my friend, don't be concerned,
It's the stare of only guys I wish to earn
We're drifting from the subject, Mr. Flip-and-Spin
Now he's got a ball to roll - made of gum wrapper tin!
Watch him poke it
Watch it slide
Where's that pen?
Did he make it hide?
I don't know, don't ask me
Where oh where could that pen be?
Look, it's back! Oh joy, oh joy
Is it a writing utensil, or just a toy?
Maybe he uses it to pick his nose,
Or does he twirl it between his toes?
That should be a new Star Search event
Twirling pens and rolling gum balls made of mint!

I think I'm a lyrical gangster.

EDIT - 7/13/07 - Thanks to Harvey, I now have a video to illustrate what I'm talking about. I'm not sure if my "pen twirler" is one of those on YouTube, but it's similar to what I remember him doing! He was way ahead of his time, I guess.

Political talk

Mom: I saw some polls on the news - in the national poll, Hillary was first among the Democrats ...
Me: They're idiots if they give Hillary the nomination.
Mom: ... and Fred Thompson was third among the Republicans.
Me: Yay!
Mom: Then they had a state-by-state poll, and John Edwards was first ...
Me: Boo.
Mom: And Mitt Romney.
Me: Well.
Mom: It was a state-by-state poll, you know, for the carcasses.
Me: Ha ha ha ha.

She meant caucuses. Caucusi? What's the plural of caucus? Don't tell me, I don't have room for that information until Wednesday evening.

Amusing ringtones and some health issues

We were in a biostatistics/epidemiology lecture for our Step One review course yesterday, and our professor's phone went off (it happens often when the instructor is an M.D.) and his ringtone was Alright by Janet Jackson. BWAH. He said, "Janet Jackson. I live in the 80s." And we all laughed, so he explained to whoever was on the phone, "My ringtone is Alright by Janet Jackson." That was probably the most awesome thing that happened in my life yesterday. (Isn't that sad? Oh my gosh.)

Probably TMI

Oh! And I think I peed out a kidney stone. I've been having some right flank pain and UTI symptoms (the whole burning pain, frequency, urgency, etc.) and the pain kind of moved from my right side to my right lower abdomen, so I diagnosed myself with some sort of ovarian malady. I also felt like I was going to barf for a couple of days (I attributed that to nervous stomach, since I have this giant beast of an exam hanging over my head and getting ever closer.) Then yesterday, I found myself peeing out something that looked like a wee little dark orangish-red Nerd. (You remember Nerds, don't you?) I think I blunted the pain over the past few days because my pancreas has been hurting so I've been taking my trusty Vicodin, but that kidney stone continued to hurt through the Vicodin HP. Wow. Those things must really suck if you don't have a narcotic.

/Probably TMI

And finally, someone made me laugh while I was trying to eat lunch, and my epiglottis malfunctioned and I ended up with cheeseburger lung.

And that's all I've got for now.

Diagnosis Wenckebach

Oh my goodness - I love dorky medical students. This is hilarious.

And if you're curious, here's some Wenckebach info (it's a Type I second degree heart block, with a prolonged P-R interval and a "dropped" QRS - which I just learned from Wikipedia. Heh.)

The search is NOT over. No, Survivor, it is not. Is not. Is not. Is not.

I have been looking for no less than 18 months for the SNL clip of John Goodman as Wilford Brimley - you know, when he's on the inexplicable horse and says things like, "I don't eat oatmeal - looks like someone else already ate it first" and "I don't even have diabetes - doctor just says I look like somebody who'd have it" and "I'm going to get off of this horse - actually, just onto a smaller horse, and then onto a large dog, and then just roll onto the ground."

At any rate, it's hilarious. I've set my Windows Media Center laptop to record every SNL that happens to run somewhere (on E!, or whatever) hoping to catch that clip. And I'm still looking.

But I was just perusing some of my friends on MySpace, and my cousin Nate has this little nugget of hilarity on his page - Wilford Brimley and his beetis. Or beetiz. Not sure which. Anyway, look here, this is funny.

Oh my freaking heck, that is funny. It almost makes up for having to hear "dia-BEET-EEES" ad nauseum. Y'all in my class know what I'm talking about.

Crazy Clay Aiken fans skeere me. I mean, look at this, from Gilded Moose - these people have to realize that they're insane, or maybe they're just happily oblivious.

I admit that I'm a fan of Clay Aiken, but I'm not crazy. Well, I am crazy, just for other reasons. And I'd never write about my ovaries with puff-paint on a T-shirt. By the way, shaking ovaries must indicate a serious medical condition. I haven't had female reproductive pathology yet, but it certainly doesn't sound normal. None of it does, actually.