Hippie Moms

So I met DT very early on in medical school by way of ultimate frisbee. There was a regular pick-up game with the medical students where we met and hit it off immediately. One of my first memories of DT was a time in the student lounge when he came in and noticed a partially eaten sandwich in the trash. As he was hungry, he picked it out of the garbage, brushed off the ants and proceeded to eat the sandwich. At that moment, I knew we were going to be tight.

And as you can probably tell, DT and I were never quite properly civilized. This probably has at least something to do with parenting. DT's father, we refer to as Evil Empire. Evil Empire is so called because he divorced DT's mother, remarried, had new kids, and later got a dog that got the love that DT so rightfully deserved. This is the extent of the Evil Empire. The dog has prosthetic testicles and gets more love from Evil Empire than DT. I feel there might be something wrong with that. Evil Empire also may have organized a fake break-in when DT was growing up that led to the disappearance of the child DT's prized baseball cards. Like Rick James would say, cold-blooded.

So aside from complete disregard for conventions of what should be considered safe for consumption; what I'm trying to say is that DT and I shared a search for parent figures in our lives.

Hippie Moms was also a medical student and another regular at frisbee. I never really inquired too deeply into her past, but she was a little bit older than we were. She had her own father issues and my impression was that she came to America from France with her Mom as a kid to escape her father. She always struck me as someone who had to grow up faster than maybe she should have. In any case she she was to become the grown-up figure in my and DT's life.

Like a Boss

The Training of a Physician

Another issue I'd like to explore in this blog is the extraordinarily fucked-up journey that I took to become a physician.  Seems like popular culture is so inundated with depictions of doctors.  House, ER, Grey's Anatomy, Scrubs, Mehmet Oz... on and on and on.  I don't really see it documented the path that I had to take.  Well, maybe The House of God documented some of the horror correctly.  

So I think this might be a good place to tell some of my stories.  For whatever reason.  

And I'll start with an introduction to my roommate for most of med school.  We'll call him DT for day trader.  The man failed his pediatrics rotation as a med student because he was too busy day trading, so I think it's a good name for him. 

DT has problems. I mean, but we all have problems. It seems that people view physicians with such an aura of other-worldly greatness sometimes. We're just as full of shit as everyone else. I started out knowing this because my family is all doctors, so I never had an overabundance of reverence for profession. Anyways, here's a little introduction to DT. He lived on my couch for a year, then when I got a house, he wanted to live in my tool-shed. DT, prior to meeting me, lived in the student lounge of our medical school. Yes, he was a homeless day trader. And on top of that, he actually did own a house during this time that he partitioned in the most ghetto way imaginable in order to rent out as cubicle sized portions as cut-rate housing. So he was a homeless, slumlord, day trader. 

I am not making any of this up. This man is now a physician in New York. 

Anyways, more stories to come. I just wanted to make a quick introduction to the kind of stories I want to tell here.

Idol-a-Day

So this is what blogging is like.... Interesting. So one idea I had for this actually started back in about 1995 when I was a freshman in high school. I was talking with my best friend at the time about people upon whom we wanted to base our lives. We were going to make a 365 day calendar based on this idea that we would market as the Idol-a-Day Calendar. Sadly that idea has yet to come to fruition. But oh well, now I have a blog.

The first few people that come to mind are as follows:

Hunter S. Thompson – Admirable for his total disregard and contempt for authority. Ran for sheriff of Pitkin County, Colorado on a platform that included the decriminalizing drugs and putting disreputable drug dealers in the stocks. However, showing some restraint, Thompson did say that he himself would refrain from tripping on hallucinogens while on duty. Thompson also promised to tear down the buildings obstructing views of the mountains, tear up the sidewalks for grassy paths and rename Aspen as Fat City to discourage outside investors. It seems he would have won if not for the Republicans and Democrats joining forces to defeat him. He of course did a ridiculous amount of drugs, Wild Turkey and grapefruit while inventing his own brand of journalism. Loved guns. Wrote regularly for both Rolling Stone and ESPN. Inspired a character on Doonesbury.

Charles Barkley – Recruited as a college prospect with the scouting report, "a fat guy who can play like the wind." Short for a power forward at 6'4" and way too rotund. Owned the glass, ran the floor and threw down monster 2-hand jams. Once lost 2.5 million dollars in 6 hours playing blackjack. Got arrested for driving drunk after rolling through a stop sign on his way to getting blown. Claimed famously in a commercial to not being a role model. After all, parents should be role models. Barkley's current plans include running for Govenor of Alabama.

William Halsted – Father of modern surgery. Figured out that charting vital signs, wearing sterile gloves during surgery and attaining hemostasis are good things. Prior to the discovery of ABO groups he once transfused his own blood into his sister before performing life-saving emergency surgery on her. Discovered that cocaine is both a decent anesthetic as well as a hell of a drug. Eventually kicked the cocaine habit and replaced it with a life-long morphine addiction but continued being a legendary surgeon for 35 more years while main-lining morphine. Eventually passed away from complications of gallstone surgery. Smoked Pall Malls.

Demetri Martin – Pretty decent comic. Had a full scholarship to NYU Law, yet had the balls to drop out a year shy of graduation to pursue comedy. Ambidextrous. Not gay, but supportive.