woof..... poof!

After a month of studying English and Math for my gre (which i couldn't give thanks to the passport office jerks) and the long awaited marriage marathon in Mumbai (which by the way absolutely rocked)... i'm back in the tiny town of Manipal, only this time my 3 crazy ass roomys are back home celebrating Christmas n all set to enter the New Year while I'm hanging onto my seat in the bus (read roller-coaster) to Karkala (a village in the Udupi district) which welcomes me with the cacophony of new borns n their clueless mothers who are almost always younger than me (scary)...

Now something about me one must know, I'm one of those people who hates not having someone to talk to... and since right now, at this very moment, my buddy from Bangalore who kept me company almost the whole day is and NEEDS TO study & AXN is taking too many breaks between Fast n the Furious, I've decided to talk to ya'll........... so listen up people....Today i'm gonna tell you the story about how I lived my life back when I'd just moved to Bangalore......

YEAR: 1990-something.......

STORY SO FAR: We had just moved to Bangalore from Mumbai n i had this funky picture in my head of the new city.... But in a couple of days i realised I hated Bangalore.... the city shut down at 8 (not anymore though).... it did not have beaches....i had no friends to keep me company at home, the youngest resident in our apartment was diagnosed of osteoporosis... i had no idea why my school teacher kept yelling at me for not understanding Kannada in Kannada...... i din't give a shit about Vin Diesel, Paul Walker or fast cars.............. so basically i was 8 and i was in hell.

thats when came Maximus and Grace when i needed them the most, they were my imaginary friends (yeah i knew they were imaginary all along) and i still truthfully do not remember how they entered my life, one fine day they were there and i was glad they were :)

They were dogs.. Golden retrievers... they had the silkiest fur n loudest bark n were the coolest dogs on the face of this earth, i assure u.. :)

Now i know most of you may think i'm a cuckoo-case but i wasn't.. i was just plain lonely and desperate... and as a nine year old (i think its around that time they came) this was what kept me from completely losing my sanity... Nobody knew they existed... In fact this is the first time i'm actually telling somebody about them... not because they embarrassed me but because i didn't want people n kids laugh at me... My brother had an imaginary friend too n i've seen adults joke about it, and i know they didn't mean any harm but i didn't want them doing it to mine... simple.

Anyway Max came first (only i was allowed to call him Max... cos he was MY dog 8) ) and then came Grace because Max would get lonely when i was at school... They were trained, never needed a leash n followed me around almost everywhere i went... they grew with me i think because no matter how tall i grew i could always feel their furry head n wet noses at my fingertips :)

i remember once my mum asked me why i was walking around the house aimlessly and i didn't know what to tell her (she'd freak if i said 'relax just taking the dogs for a walk :D'), i ended up saying "i'm thinking".... she rolled her eyes n claimed i came up with the weirdest excuses for not wanting to sit quietly and she got back to cooking :)

For all those wondering if they're still around.. no they aren't... Max got hit by a car and bled to death... me and Grace buried him in a park... it broke our hearts...... Grace, well, she died as well in a few weeks, i don't really remember how that happened, one morning she was gone... i grew up and my brain killed her...

At times like this when i'm all alone, i remember the 3 of us together...
i miss them... so much.

"Walk away...if you want to...
Its okay... if you need to...
You can run, but you can never hide...
From the shadow thats creeping up beside you...

And theres a magic running through your soul...
But you can't have it all...

Whatever you do... I'll be two steps behind you...
Wherever you go... I'll be there to remind you...
That it only takes a minute of your precious time,
to turn around... I'll be two steps behind..."

- Def Leppard

...yeah sometimes my life does have a theme song...

My Very Enthusiastic Mother Just Showed Us Nine Planets!

-------- MAGNIFICENT SEQUEL TO "priyankaissoawesomeeverybodyworshipsher is a word"--------

This was the very first mnemonic i learnt, to those of you who haven't heard of it, this ones to remember the arrangement of the Nine planets in our Solar system (closest to the sun n outwards).
Now that i am in the era of big scary words n information i need to remember or else somebody dies (everytime a prof said it in class, i'd hear one of the Disney's wicked witches laugh....brrrr) Anyway since im in the medical field ill let u in on how we remember our stuff.... Mind you most of them are textbook, Some may seem highly perverted but well 'happy realisation people' that apparently whats been working over the years! :)

P.S: For the weak hearted, can-be-scandalized lot, Don't judge the medical guys alright, we need to make up stuff like this for the amount n the precision with which we need to remember it all :)


My first few classes of Anatomy were dreadful.. one PG would walk in holding a tiny bone and he'd point out to tiny lines n ridges n holes on the bone which some evil genius actually named.... i still remember the 3rd class on 'Humerus' was anything but HUMOUROUS, cos we'd reached our frustration thresholds by then n were almost on the verge of pulling our hair out.....
Thats when we decided to make up stuff (if there wasn already one) that helped us remember those irregularities and the other big words that'd come our way then on...

Suprascapular notch............Superman's Torch

Subscapular Ridge......... Subrahmaniam's Fridge

Anastomosis........... An ass and two more tits (used to be dicks.. but then tits sounded better)

Triamcinolone....... Try Amy, sin alone

Amantidine...... A man to dine

Tranylcypromine...... try Neil see Praveen (kinda disgusting cos we had a neil and a praveen in class.. both of which we dint 'try'...... by WE i mean my immediate circle of friends)

Floxacycline..... Fucks her cycling. (obv the guys in class came up with it...humph men!)

Axillary artery branches (Sup thoracic, Thoraco-acr, Lat th, sub scap, Ant circumflex hum, Post C H)................ Screw The Lawyer Save A Patient.

Throacic duct btw Azygous n esophagous.......... A duck btw 2 gooses.

Teres Major, Latissimus Dorsi, Pectoralis Major (thats how they're attached the arm bone)........ Lady btw Two Majors.

Gracilis between Semitendinosus and Semimembranosus........... Girl btw two Surgeons

Brachial Plexus branches (lat to med) "Musculocutaneous, Axillary, Radial, Median, Ulnar nerves"........... My Aunt Raped My Uncle.

Penis Autonomic innervation action............. Parasympathetic points it up, Sympathetic spurts it out.

Spermatic Cord contents (Pampiniform plexus, ductus deferens, cremasteric artery....ok do u really wanna knw it all?)............ Piles Don't Contribute To A Good Sex Life.

Kreb's cycle components (Citrate, Isocitrate, alphaKetoglutarate, Succinate co-a, Succinate, Fumarate, Malate, Oxaloacetate)............ Can I Keep Selling Sex For Money, Officer? (saved me in first yr... i hated biochemistry)

Impalpable Apex Beat (differential diagnosis).......... DOPE (dextrocardia, obesity, pericarditis/pneumothorax, emphysema, scoliosis/ sinus inversus)

Heart Attack therapy............. "O BATMAN!!!" (oxygen, beta blocker, ASA, thrombolitics, morphine, ACE inhib, Nitrocycline)

Venturi Mask colours n their corresponding Oxygen delivery capacity:
blue (24%), white(28%), orange(31%), yellow(35%), red(40%), green(60%)
.................Boys Want Only Young Rowdy Girls (was my final university Viva question... :D)

Placenta crossing diseases (TOxoplasma, Rubella, CMV, Herpes simple/zoster/HepB,C,E; Syphillis)............TORCHeS...

Cerebellar deep nuclei (dentate, emboliform, globose, fastigial)............ Do Eat Good Food.

the 12 cranial nerves (olfactory, optic, occulomotor, trochlear, trigeminal, abducens, facial, Vestibulo-cochlear, glossoph, vagus, sp.Accessory, hypoglossal)............... "Oooh OOooh ooh To Touch And Feel Virgin Girl's Vagina and Hymen" ..................[personally i think this is disgusting but we all needed this to remember the blasted nerves :(]

Crutch Training (walking on stairs, which leg to put first)........... Good to heaven (ascending) and Bad to Hell (descending).

Carpal bones (lat to med...Scaphoid, Lunate, Triquetrum, Pisiform, Trapezium, Trapezoid, Capitate, Hammate).......... She Looks Too Pretty Try To Catch Her.... ofcourse some of us prefer "Scared Lovers Try Positions That They Cannot Handle" :D

Ok now these two very important:
What to do when one faints............. "If face is red lift the head, if face is pale lift the tail"


Stroke symptom recognition (self check...very imp...remember).... FAST

F -> Face (uneven smile, droop, vision)
A-> Arms n legs (heaviness***, numbness...esp if its on one side of the body only)
S-> Speech (slurred, inability to talk.. tongue feels heavy)
T-> Time (RUSH TO THE HOSPITAL!)


Ok alright..Phew! that was like 4 years of my life in one post..... ofcourse there r many more, most i can only recollect the mnemonics now not the stuff inside :P (Hey anybody know what JHANDU BAM stands for??? its gotten something to do with Failure of wound healing i think..)

'priyankaissoawesomeeverybodyworshipsher' IS a word!

I semi-hated being a kid.... and i'm talking about the parts where i felt the rest of the world was so much cooler than me......
Like when me n my brother would study together i'd listen to him use words like "catalyst" and "molecule" (i knew it meant something small cos when we'd fight about me being small and id tell him he was smaller cos i dint have a comeback he'd say 'you're molecule small' followed by 'you're atom small') while all i got was sad words like "hand" and "soil" and when i was lucky "independance"....
i tried being as "smart" as he was by evesdropping, like at the age of 4 i knew some guy,Alexander, invented the telephone, i also thought (and was so damn sure) that they called him 'Alexander the Great' cos he not only conquered the world but also had time to invent telephones (at the age of 7 i learnt they were 2 very different people... i felt like my whole life was a big lie :P)

Anyway one day during a particular science class on plants and the environment i felt like i was finally there..... the word 'OXYGEN' came into my world, i was thinkin (woooooooooooooooow :O... this one not only has a Y but also an X!!! sounds funky too), i had barely finished enjoying that thought 'CARBON-DI-OXIDE' clawed its way in ("Hyphens........a word so big it needs HYPHENS!!!! i think i jus got shot n went straight to heaven").... then came "PHOTOSYNTHESIS"...

By the time we reached "CARBON-MONO-OXIDE" I was high....

Ofcourse then on the hits kept coming n i began to wish my "hand"-and-"soil"-days would return :(

Now i live with words like "pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis ".

THE PULLEY

When God at first made man,
Having a glasse of blessings standing by;
Let us (said he) poure on him all we can:
Let the worlds riches, which dispersed lie,
Contract into a span.

So strength first made a way;
Then beautie flow’d, then wisdome, honour, pleasure:
When almost all was out, God made a stay,
Perceiving that alone of all his treasure
Rest in the bottome lay.

For if I should (said he)
Bestow this jewell also on my creature,
He would adore my gifts in stead of me,
And rest in Nature, not the God of Nature:
So both should losers be.

Yet let him keep the rest,
But keep them with repining restlesnesse:
Let him be rich and wearie, that at least,
If goodnesse leade him not, yet wearinesse
May tosse him to my breast.

----- George Herbert.

I've always loved this poem, ever since my English teacher spent one afternoon telling us about it (even though it wasn in our textbooks... State board you see, lame English books... it shows)

Why am i even talking about this work of art now??

Im not a strong believer in God as a super-natural being who'l smite us if we don't kiss his perfect ass, neither am i an Atheist who doesn give a damn about my actions n conscience... I have a whole different perspective when it comes to Religion n God which i'll tell you about in another post probably...

But right now, at this very moment, ten days before my GRE... i do feel That Restlessness... N i knw the Big guy is one Sadist who'l never pour the 'Rest' on me so im jus gonna whine about it to you...
(see that Mr.God? yeah thats what i called ya.. a SADIST :P :)..............., before u put on your boxing gloves consider the fact that i also gave you a "perfect ass"... For the record: im only sucking up to you cos i have an exam coming up... nothing more nothing less)

following material is whole-ly Non vegetarian... Reader discretion is advised.

This post is dedicated to all my vegetarian buddies who cringe at my meal (which is very rude btw). Sorry to disappoint ya'll :P but thats what this post is all about.. me being a non vegetarian (the picture will make sense in time.. you'l see)... cos thats how i was born n brought up... and thats how i live with myself... 8)

Ok relax im not some carnivore who kills every object with a heartbeat or needs meat on the table every meal of the day... But I'm never (as of today atleast) turning vegetarian for i know for a fact eventually after about a couple of months (im optimistic) i will crave for a juicy KFC burger or sizzling fried fish and since i'm a foodie i assure you i WILL get my hands on it by hook or by cook :P ... so why bother converting? :)

Besides whoever says Vegetarianism is what Mr.God wanted us all to practice, huh?? Moses did not say "LET MY CHICKENS GO!!" now did he?
You know what i think (you've read this far so obviously u do wanna know)... i think God said "Alrighty then Mankind... heres what u fellas gotta do.. see those hairy things running around all over the place (pointing at the lions)... u gotta find a way to chase them n feed yourselves".... (what? its a food chain maaaaaan: grass -> deer -> lion -> man -> grass... The Circle of Life... see i'm fair, i blame us non-veggies too for choosing cluck-cluck over ROAR)

Now Man-not-so-kind tried it... theres proof, all those cavemen drawings...finally man gave up, cos well he had technical difficulties, n fed on the colourful fruits dangling on the branches.... now thats exactly how it happened...


Adam pissed Mr.God off by munching on the Apple, had he jus eaten the Snake you think Mr.God would've bothered??!?! (ever wondered why Adam eating the apple is called the 'Original Sin' :P)..... i rest my case.

Moral Of the story: Relax its not "Hard work good..lazy bad".. I'm not THAT person.

ok lets go again, Moral of the story: next time u're dining with a non-vegetarian, don't make him feel like a sinner cos u never know whos in the wrong lane... :P

Constipation of Ideas, Diarrhoea of Words :^)

“There are some things in life books can’t teach you”…. Its been said a gazillion times… as obedient as i am, its not shocking that I never really wasted much time reading too many and I’m talking about the kind of books you LEARN from, mind you (the boring-sorta-learn)

Annnnnnyway … today I’m an intern (thank you Mr.God), I lived the worst year in the life of a BPT student (21 subjects, in one academic year, is serious bullshit) … And now I feel like Free Willy (the whale...:P).. but then came the “okay so I’m free… yay! But now what?!!?” kinda feeling.

When One gets that feeling One starts to think about the things One would normally not actually bother thinking about.. and for a Thinker like me who unconsciously thinks about every think-able thought thought … Its paaaarrrrdddy tiiime! 8)

Ok so here are a couple of things that i probably learned.. I’ll try and go year-wise so I don’t miss too many..

1. “the woman you see most around you and does the cooking is your Mom… the man you see most around you and is the tallest person you have ever seen in your entire life (even if your "entire life" is only about a yr or two) is your Dad… the other fellow who transforms into pure evil when mom and dad are not around… that is your Big brother”

2. “He may be 5 times more capable of pounding you but you are 10 times more capable of getting him pasted by both your parents...”

3. “Barbie dolls are no fun… they are dolls that are as tiny as my arms and cannot move their elbows or knees and cannot blink... what good is that?!?!?! :O”

4. “Barbie dolls are not how actual girls grow up to be... trust me i've grown up and been pretty confused at times!”

5. “If you're the ‘limbu-timbu’ of a game it means you have the license to cheat”

6. “After a fall, never shake a tooth that’s already shaking”

7. “if you hear your grandmother wail about her only granddaughter not having front teeth (its been over a year since... who will marry a girl with no front teeth!!!) .. you are going to the hospital”

8. “X-rays don’t hurt”

9. “When you want something really bad… ask for it when the adult is groggy"

10. “when you don’t want something really bad… procrastinate until the adult feels sorry for you… if he/she doesn’t then you’re gonna get pasted big time”

11.“throwing soggy wet cotton balls on walls or windows is the coolest thing ever”

12.“throwing soggy wet cotton socks on the ceiling is not only the coolest thing ever but it will also help you miss your school bus the next morning”

13.“sitting on a dead rat doesn’t cause localized-bum-plague”

14. “Jurassic Park is a movie not a park”

15. “don’t stand around a kid who plans on throwing a brick into fresh cow shit”

16. “watching advertisements is not the why man invented television”

17. “Just cos it claims to be UNBREAKABLE doesn’t mean it really is”

18. “Moving to a new city sucks!”

19. “The idea of moving to a ‘newer’ city makes you realize the ‘new’ city isn’t that bad”

20. “Dammit should’ve just moved to the newer city!”

21. “Braces bring luck”

22. “Never trust your physics lab assistant.... and your 'i-think-thats-what-the-prof-said-instinct'.”

23. “Learn from your mistakes (never burn a battery while performing the same experiment the second time)... BUT to err is human (its alright if it begins to smoke during a different one)”

24. “Just because Manipal is not a jungle anymore doesn't mean it hasn't gotten wilder”

25. "Don't judge a person by his/her appearance... no seriously... don't..."

26. “To be blissful… IGNORE 8)”

27. “Hibernating may not be a natural process in your life cycle but sometimes it does get necessary…"

P.S. although always remember to GET IN AND GET OUT!!!

28. "Sometimes some things just cannot be changed, even if one wants to so bad, even if one believes one can… its just imprinted in your genes, a free manual you’re born with whether you like it or not"

29. "Your presence in the passport office doesn't count as your PROOF OF BIRTH" (oh...also... the renewal form says GENDER: Male Female Other.. :D talk about being open minded! :D way to go!)

30. "Watching an Adam Sandler movie is not a Family-time thing"

31. "Always wear excess layer of clothing while you play a game of JENGA TRUTH OR DARE.. :D... ALWAYS! "

32. "When a boy say he loves you.. DONOT panic and run faster than the wind even if you are only 8 years old and you have no idea why a 7 year old boy 'LOVES-you'-loves-you.... you don't wanna be damned by the Love-Goddess now do you?"

33. "If you possess the gift of shuttin out the sound of your alarm in the morning, change your alarm tone to your roomy's ringtone... that way even if the alarm doesn wake u a highly pissed roomy sure will" :P

The day i wished i had rubber PART 2

Pediatrics posting...

One very cranky baby...

with One very full bladder...

held by One very unlucky me...

ANY QUESTIONS?

The Day i wished i had rubber..

NO.... it has nothing to do with sex, :)
n YES... that IS the thought that came to into your head first, now don't u deny it! :P


Now that i have your attention, let me start from scratch. :)

It all started when i went looking for the professor who was in charge of my posting cos i wanted leave to enjoy my long weeekend home... Finally found him n realized he was taking an "improvement ELECTRO THERAPY practical exam" for some of my juniors... My gut instinct made me turn around n walk back but damn he saw me n called out.

I told him i wanted him to sign my form ("please").....
He told me he wanted a model for electrical stimulation ("you finished treating your patients right?"). :(

Now i couldn't refuse since i really needed that signature. So there i was sittin (i took care it was a wooden chair.. good conductors at the moment didn't seem very "good" to me) waiting for the kid to electrocute me (ok i know we use low voltage stuff but still.. it can give u a burn or a not-so-mild shock if not done properly). The prof asked him to stimulate a distal muscle supplied by the median nerve (nerve in the upper limb).. and he says "ok sir, i'll stimulate flexor hallucis longus (a muscle of the toe)" :O :O.... the professors slap their foreheads n say "Forget it! You know what jus stimulate the brachioradialis (the most bulky and superficial muscle of the forearm). And i was thinking ":O Mr.God are u kidding me!!!! is this how u want me to die!!! like a fried banana... at the hands of an kid playing with shocky thingies?? :( like a fly in a sidey sweet shop with Pest-o-killer... like mosquitoes at the hands of those who love playing tennis but never made it BIG n stuck to those electric machchar-killing-racquet's sold on the streets!!!!!!"

So the fella makes me sit with my arm propped on a pillow and i told him to do all the experimentation he wanted on my left (oh c'mon.. whats a physiotherapist without her dominant hand now?) He makes me tell him the motor point n some other stuff when the prof wasn't looking, and i obliged (quicker he gets his work done, fewer shocks i receive). Meanwhile i take off all the jewellery i was wearing, thanking myself for not being one of those rebellious teenagers piercing their navels and what not.... also damning the iron shakti wala Kellogs i had eaten that morning. (hey i've seen Xmen okay.. if Magneto could use it.. i dont underestimate this kid!)

now lemme tell u how it goes when done right, first thr r 2 electrodes, an inactive one which is a plate covered in dripping wet piece of cloth placed at ur biceps level, and an Active electrode which is a pen electrode which is placed on the spot of the motor point.. place it there n slowly increase the intensity till the patient can tolerate it (doesnt really hurt actually just make that muscle contract, kinda magical).. if point not found then drag the elctrode around DONOT lift it n place it back before shutting the intensity off.

But what happened was,
1. He forgot to make the cloth around the inactive wet, i was tempted to not tell him cos then no current would be felt and i'd live!!......... but then i felt sorry for him n said "dude isnt this supposed to be wet?" pointing at it and he goes "oh ya so sorry im so forgetful na!!" and THEN instead of making the cloth wet he takes a tiny piece of cotton and wets my skin :O eventually after a minute when my skin dried i stopped feeling the current (his ignorance, my bliss).. then another friend of his told him he was to make the cloth wet so it doesnt dry so fast.
2. He uses galvanic current instead of faradic, after i told him thats not the one he assures me that he knows what he is doing... (galvanic firstly is way more painful, and secondly doesnt give a properly visible contraction)
3. He constantly lifts the electrode instead of dragging it which gives me a shock everytime he places it back on me, finally i had to threaten him to make him stop lifting it. (My friends by then were also called to be models for the others and they lay in front of me with their legs on pillows getting treated with ultrasound which BTW is so not painful! and they also got a clear view of me jumping off my seat every 20 seconds)
4. When he doesn't see a contraction he goes "wait alright i think i know what im doing wrong" (FINALLY....) and exchanges the electrodes, makes the humongous plate the active one and the tiny pen the inactive, giving me an even greater shock in my arm (WHAT THE ****!!?!?!?!)!!!
Thats when i involuntarily squeaked when stimulated and my professor comes in saying "Priyanka, u seem tense would u like some coffee, tea anything? :) " and i go "yeah could i have a pair of rubber chappals please... :(( "
5. He doesn't even know what action the muscle he is stimulating produces and hence didn't know what he should've been looking for.... that means i was shocked outta my wits and almost had past life visions for an hour without any reason!


Mr.God up there sure has a sense of humour, i bet he was watching me with a can of coke and a bowl of popcorn!! Grrr... :X

burnt and crashed...

Its my first month of internship and i'm posted in the burns wards.. one of the most depressing places in the entire hospital...
Not because of what i have to see everyday,
not because of what i have to smell every minute,
not because of what i have to touch even if its with gloves,
not because i spent my Saturday evening burried under a blanket clearing my head n resting my back,
not because im gonna be spending my sunday morning washing a bucket full of clothes soiled with somebody else's blood...
(i'm sorry im having one of those gloomy times... pls bear with me if not move on to the next post..)
Its because of the stories u come to hear or be a part of in the process... the story of how each one of them enter the ward and the story of how they will leave it...

Someone like me who loves to tell stories n listen to them, these are the stories i hate...


I have 2 patients there i see twice a day,
One who got burnt saving her daughter from her brother-in-law.. my job is to make her walk, and OH MY GOD she needs some big time ass kissing for that but shes a darling :) .. i once joked about how she should eat from this one particular nurse cos that afternoon she miraculously walked 4 rounds voluntarily... and ever since she makes THAT nurse bring her food every single day.. :D So why was i stumped today when during my process of coaxing she flatly refused to walk n smiled at me with a twinkle in her eye n said "my son is taking me home u know and they will take care of me, i dont want treatment"? Was i sad she was going to leave... was i was sorry her family couldnt afford any more treatment..... was i upset cos i heard the doctor tell her son she will definitely not survive a week outside of this not-exactly-pleasant ward... was i just angry her son was bamboozling his mother??!?!

In Manipal when it rains.. it DOES pour..
The second one i treat is a maths and science teacher who has massive facial n upper body burns due to a kerosene stove bursting accident... when i first started treating her (about a ten days after her accident), her eyes were stuck shut n was bandaged all over for her skin grafts to heal.. we spoke, me in my usual gibber and she through her shut jaws... her dressings were removed and she opened her eyes this tuesday... she has a history of auditory hallucinations.. made me wonder if the non-hallucinating part of her brain thought i was one too until that moment when she saw me.. well but i was just glad she called me "Madam" all along (learn u assholes who call me 'sir' or 'Mr.Karnad' when i receive your phone calls! jerks!!)
Anyway i had never experienced being with her during her hallucinations until few days ago when she told me she wanted to take a break from treatment and that her father had come to see her, when i asked her if he is outside the ward she said he was right next to the door n she could hear him n wanted me to call him inside since her neck is immobilised in one position n couldnt turn her head to do so herself... Yeah i was freaked for a moment there but then i realised she wasn't crazy.... and trust me the psychiatry report says so too "she is not depressed... no complains of aggression... no treatment necessary".. i mean think about it, she was stuck on a bed in one position with her eyes shut n limbs bandaged n being fed thru tubes and all her sense organs cut off from stimulus except her ears and all she heard was the sound of her monitor alarm beeping, doctors asking her questions she wasn't expected to answer ("u took medicines last night?".... like duh... u employ nurses to shove medicines into my tubes 24X7 n u expect me to not "take em".. what am i to do, distract them by deviously peeing into a bag! pea brain!................is probably what shes thinking) , nurses (and me at times...) chattering and people (like me again) giving her commands she has no choice but to obey cos i'm "assisting" her (Active Assisted Exercises always reminded me of dad... those times when he gave me the "will u do it or should i make you do it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" growl... hey i got it very rarely okay now don't judge already!).... I mean kids have imaginary friends which are created to help them cope with stuff (i'm sure we all had one.. i had 2, at the same time, but lets not go there now, may be in another blog) so i can perfectly understand her hearing her father, she was lonely, the sounds were not enough for her active brain so since she couldnt see her imaginary friend she just heard him (i think its nice she brought her dad to help her through it all)... I've spoken to her, and she is as normal as you and me.. but ya anyway..

Today she stood for the first time.. not all by herself, there were 3 of us holding her erect while she whined about wanting to sleep... and after i promised her we will do no harm n when that din't work finally had to emotionally poke her by reminding her that we were there to help her n would never want her hurt.. it worked.. she finally made an attempt to stand.. was not much but i felt it..... and it felt awesome! Next thing i know the nurse walks in and says "oh don't bother...she is getting discharged on monday" :O :O

FOR CRYING OUT LOUD... why do people spend lakhs on operations n waste it by not letting them work... WHY ARE THE NEEDY (almost) ALWAYS POOR!!!!!!!!??!?!?!?!?!!!! AAARGHHH!!!

Living an episode of Grey's Anatomy [minus McDreamy :( ]

"WHO LET THE DOGS OUT!" my alarm rang (yeah thats what i wake up to every morning.... weird considering i love dogs).. my cell phone flashed 6:45 am... i noticed the rain slammin against my windows.... "yuk, now im gonna have to go to work in the muck!" i thought, switched my phone off n went back to sleep on my extremely tiny double bed hoping my roommate would wake me up when she does.. if she does... but then coming to think of it, i can't really remember what made me get my bum off that bed n go to work.. but i am so glad i did because today was one of the best work days i've had in manipal...
First all my patients were mega co-operative and had to kiss only one patients ass to get her to walk and not stay in bed all day! Then i got to attend my very first surgery... and us physios getting to scrub in for surgery is supposed to be very very rare.. Okay so i din't do any cool cutting-vutting, all i did was stand n watch n stay out of the way, and also cut bandages for the dressing and focus the lights (because the nurses couldnt reach them) so the surgeons can see best :), yet it was one hell of an experience... i mean man had i seen it last year i'd have done so much better in my surgery paper! Beautiful... every bit of it... But highly tiring.. stood for 6 hours straight, by the end of it i was almost dozing watching them do the dressing..
i got to see 2 plastic surgeries.. well 1 n a half actually.. and no none of them were nose jobs or boob jobs :P.. first one was a tumour excision but we reached towards the end of it because we had to treat patients of our own... the next one was a skin graft in a burns case (won't give u any gory details).. the best parts were harvesting of the graft, cauterization (where they take a hot iron and coagulate blood n seal blood vessels or even destroy tissue without causing any unnecessary bleeding) and suturing... Now i look at the surgeons in a new light.. they must have a heart of steel.. the whole time i was in there i had to remind myself that "it was not hurting the person.." at one point i even told myself "he wasnt human" jus so i stopped feeling sorry for him going through the surgerical procedure. But it din't gross me out or made me wish i was not in the medical field.. :) i love my job and the part i play along with everybody else in the system. :)
Anyway i got out of the OT at 3:45 pm and had to rush into burns ward to treat my afternoon batch of patients.. there this elderly nurse started chatting with me only to realise that she worked with my granduncle who worked as a surgeon decades ago when our teaching hospital had just begun... Now that made me proud.. for once someone din't ask me "Do you know Girish Karnad ?(no offence, i'm sure you're a great person but i have no idea how we are related even if we are)"...
Well it was only after i got out of the hospital on my way back home did i realise how tired i really was... Exaltation is the world's best anaesthesia and it had worn off now! Damn!

The Wheels On the Bus go Round and Round..

For someone who has terrible motion sickness, i've got shitty luck to be living in a land where the only means of transport to take me home is a bus. But I've had some awesome n awful times on my journeys.
I've been kept awake all night by cranky babies, grumpy grannies, uncles who snore causing panic among whales in the 7 seas, horny men who think when i close my eyes i also lose my ability to sense touch (NO I DO NOT... and its icky that i cant brush for hours after almost biting peoples fingers off.... next b'day, one of the ppl reading this, buy me a swiss knife... b'dayz on May 8th BTW.. thank u very much) and my favouritest are the coochy cooey couples (there are lots where i come from! n i've had my revenge for not lettin me sleep.. idle mind, devil's workshop..nanos work as excellent flashlights FYI)..
But thats not the only problem with travelling alone.. ive been embarrassed one too many times, i mean they teach you to eat with your mouth closed but somebody should tell us (who love to sing but cant sing to save their lives) that its a bad thing to sing with earplugs... especially in a quiet bus at 3 am... Seriously picture a person (read ME) on a bus filled with people and the person starts singing Mockingbird (by eminem) with closed eyes.... not good... especially when you open your eyes to see the whole bus staring at you like you've been possessed and you know the previous song on your playlist was Pour some Sugar on me (by Deff Leppard)!!
This time my bus got stuck on the ghats for 5 hours cos some tree fell and blocked the road... i reached home at 2 pm when i actually should've been there by 7 am! Well atleast the bus didn't smell of cockroach killing spray in the morning.. It was a concentration camp at night, i almost would've exchanged my seat to sit with this guy who smelled of Brut sitting about 4 seats behind me, good thing i didn't cos in the morning he looked like Yeti... :O

who CELLed the cat??

There we are walking out of the Cafe Coffee Day with dilated pupils, thanks to the 2 hours of caffeine-that-we-sipped or may be jus pure Gossip... and all of a sudden "This is the story of a girl..." my cell phone sings (awe shaaaat aaaaap i like that song :P)..
"hi pappa....CCD...with friends, i'd told you na........will be home in 10... im just leaving..... ya ya coming coming, nobody can afford kidnapping me......i was kidding, relaxxxx.. byeeee!!"
That was my dad wanting to know where i was, with who n when im coming back home... A father who sent his only daughter [what? it sounds better than 2nd child ;)] to Manipal when she was 17 :D :D
Sheesh sometimes i don't understand parents... they juggle you between childhood n adulthood (putting us in the wrong category at the wrong times usually)... they teach you to write an essay about "all Indians being your brothers and sisters" and in a couple of years you get the "boys can be evil" talk (although by then most girls tend to have a bad-boy-tracking-device implanted within them thanks to abundant eve-teasing..)... they worry when there is actually nothing to worry about (when i was 625 kms away having a nervous breakdown before one of my final university exams, my dad was advising me to stay 'as cool as a cucumber' :D and when i'm 2 streets away from home drinking coffee they worry!)
BUT I'm not here to marvel about our parents cos we all love them unconditionally.... Period.
I'm not here to tell you about my friends cos that'l take all night and my stomach is vigorously responding to the stimulus provided by the dinner bubbling in the kitchen (stay reeeeeal quiet n you may just hear something)..
I'm here wondering about that thing that connects us all...... OUR CELL PHONES.
We have them and all of us have hated owning them at one point of time (if that 'point' hasnt come in your life, i'm pretty sure you are a Man with the Best Boss!).. probably because of 'who' 'when' or 'why' it buzzed...
But how did we end up with this leash??? I got mine a day before i left for my hostel so the whole communication process simplifies, not that i was smart enough to not want one all along but i was just lazy to be responsible for one.. But seriously, these days there are school kids who EXPECT one for their 13th birthday (when i turned 13 i hoped for a Hrithik Roshan poster... which i did get... thanks sis!).... what is happening to the kids these days??!?! Is it the peer pressure or just fascination? Is curiosity killing the cat or just "cell"ing it?

LOTS in a name!

Naming a child is one big affair, especially in India.. It always amazed me, even as a child.. i wondered how do people know what to name their babies, its a big decision after all, Names are something we are stuck with throughout our lives!! One wrong decision n it could DESTROY our social lives!!
But as i grew up i realised its gotten way overrated.. Couples start naming their hypothetical babies even before they plan to have those babies! School girls maintained diaries with a collection of names they would like their kids to have (i ain't shitting u.. i actually know somebody who has one since she was in primary).
There used to be a time when they named the babies based on certain features.. like if the kid has beautiful eyes= Sunaina, melodious voice (ahem excuse me.....voice??!?!?!)= Sangeet/Sangeeta, Born on a rainy day= Mayur, Born on a sunny day= Aditya etc etc...
Then came the era of progression, there was always a pattern...all family members had names beginning with the same letter, or the name was a combination of both parents' names (eg: Sushita and Vijay could be Sujay).
Then came lets-see-who-can-come-up-with-whackier-names era, people would search all the worlds (or may be just the internet) to find never before heard of names (even just "sounds" at times)... some gave rise to really nice names but some made u wonder why would ANYBODY want to brand a poor puny baby with something that he/she'l be able to pronounce when he/she turns ten?!
Also there is the Numerology effect or just the guess-how-i-spell-it names... Yoseph (pronounced as Joseph), Triesha, Shoyeta..
And of course there is the name-the-kid-what-the-guy/girl-on-tv-is-named, im sure all the Aishwaryas, Aryans, Rishabhs [remember Rohit Roy of Swabhimaan fame?? :)] etc would agree with me..
I know an Aditya who was born on a Sunday, a Caroline (December born... "they named me Carol first but then Dads name begins with a C, mums begins with E.. so i start with a C n end with an E.."), a Hari ("was born on a flooded day, had to be brought home bundled warm and held up high because the water level had risen to dangerous levels"), a Madhavan (cos "The Madhavan" is soooooooo cuteeeeeeeee.. :D ), a Roshan (born on Diwali), a Shushruth (both parents are doctors), an Ishwariya ("cos some smarty pants who made my birth certificate couldnt spell")... Fascinating eh? I love attending naming ceremonies, there is almost always a little story behind it..
So after almost 2 decades of living with my name i went up to my darling mother one lazy sunday afternoon n asked her "Amma..... who named me?"... she (engrossed in embroidery) said "I did.."... Even better i thought, i get to hear the story from the creator herself, "why did u name me PRIYANKA ma?".... She looked up at me n gave me this smile n said "You were born more than a month before your expected date.. We were not entirely prepared, so i looked around n realised everybody was naming their daughter Priyanka.. i thought it was a nice name so...:)" .................... :O ..................... And they say KIDS say the DARNEST things! :D

No wonder my school attendance sounded like a stuck record, "Prajwal.... Prerna.... Prithvi..... Priyadarshini....Priyanka..... Priyanka..... Priyanka.... Priyanka...... Priyanka..... Priyanka.....Rashmi" And everytime i change my cell phone number i spend my free messages sending a "this is my new number...Priyanka" message and then half my balance letting them know which one!
BUT i'm not complaining.............. especially since my big brother wanted to name me "Tintika" :)