Buckets are not my friend....

Just flown into Chiang Mai in the north of Thailand....a less partyish place one might hope after the past 10 days in the Southern Islands! Off to jungle trek in the morrow, elephants, white water and all that jazz!

Flew into Phuket after our marathon of flights took us from Dublin to London to Muscat to Bangkok and finally to Phuket, one after another with no stopovers - pure torture. Phuket = shithole so was glad to see the backarse of that dive after an evening and a morning. Then it was aferry to Koh Phi Phi, the supposed paradise of 'The Beach' fame. We were waiting for the let down, the dreary tourist filled dump but to be honest besides a little rubbish and a fair wad of construction IT WAS BEAUTIFUL. The Bayview resort was just savage, bungalow to ourselves, magnificent view, just generally perfect, faultless really. Phi Phi was great fun, some good food, had my first bucket - in terror due to an exceptionally camp German drunkenly leering at me - and did a speedboat tour of Maya Bay (The Beach itself) and the islands, tried to find sharks by myself off a reef (sadly failed). Was just a really cool place and the weather was spectacular despite history saying it should have been torrential downpours!

Onto Koh Phangan via ferry, bus, tourist scam 150minutes waiting in a dumpy restaurant, bus, ferry and tuk tuk - the best part of 14hours total, complete nightmare. Found the place we had hoped to stay in that night easy as pie but then found a tick and two cockroaches in our room so that made for an interesting night (think Maeve may had smuggled them in herself actually!). Left that place swiftly in the morn in hopes of finding a decent room in the nigh of jammed town - waiting for the Full Moon Party 4 days later. Somehow we managed to scam ourselves a room in the 'sorry we're completely full' Cocohut village we'd hoped to stay in in the first place - 40quid anight for a bungalow for the 3 of us, so that was amazing. Downsides were the construction next door starting at 8am and not stopping til about 6pm and for Maeve the extreme heat of sleeping by the ceiling (though she had her own bed!). Cocohut was savage though - pool, bar, restaurant, beach practically to itself. We lay in wait of the Full moon.....

The word you are looking for is 'wiped'...

A long long week (well ok not really that long but it seemed that way). So you've a 'long' week and now you're spent so what do you do? Yes go out drinking wine and half a bottle of vodka,...great fucking idea. So now I'm still 'wiped' and staring into another night of drinking til all hours down the country in some wood in Annamoe (claim to fame is it's fish farm....thrilling indeed). Scratch that, it's just started raining so you never know I could gain a reprieve from the woods!

Anyway.... another week over, another to come, ENT is actually pretty damn good if only I was used to standing around all day - my legs weren't made for this line of work - and seen shitloads this week; heads being drilled, throats cut open, ear cleaned (less glamerous it is true), electric ears and whatnot. Shining moment of the week goes to my actually managing to do my Clinical exam without entirely fucking it up and thus passing all my exams for another year - bring on Asia you bad bastard!

Currently I am eagerly (and nervously) awaiting my participation in a Spencer Tunick installation in the docklands next Saturday morning, very, very early (we're talking dawn here) - in the complete nip with probably several hundred people for prob 30 odd minutes! It's gonna be chilly and fucking weird but something to remember forever.... madness, what am I thinking?!! You can look forward (well maybe not) to my naked ass and balls coming to a national paper near you pretty damn soon!!

Shit.

BOOM shake shake shake the room...

This is partly what I'd like to do to the section of my brain dedicated to everything I learnt for those exams!......sadly this medicine lark requires I actually remember what I just learnt (and everything I ever do, sort of) which doesn't fit into my neat model of college education (in one ear, out the other). Gone are the days of mentally bombing what I've just spent, in a highly crammed period of time, learning, or more specifically memorising - who knows what half that shit actually meant?!

That picture also reminds me how ridiculously hot it is today (and lately) - is it my having not been in the country for a summer in 3 years or is it just oddly toasty? I'm sweating sitting on the couch in a curtain drawn room - this isn't the Ireland I signed up to be born into....where's the crap weather I can complain about....at length....all the time....to anyone and everyone??? Those bastard weatherforecasters - the devils incarnate.

Well I'm off to get trollied on copious amounts of Mojitos and vodka - maybe I'll get a lapdance and learn some more southern swing dancing this time out; Friday was interesting to put it mildly. Salud/To Liver Failure!

Being drunk is a consequence of being drunk (AKA drinking excessive alcohol)

Me = drunk. Me = tired. Me = unlikely to excel in clinical competencies in the morning or even make it to them since it's 6am. I've almost become bored of the internet - i've nothing to surf and pass the time aimlessly anymore; I need an internet hobby badly. Life is tough eh?

What to cook tomorrow, or rather today - that is the most concerning question pour moi anois. Should I fail to cook satisfactorily, Nicola is obviously likely to dump me in favour of Gordon Ramsey - he can cook a 6 course meal by way of terror alone. I'm clearly fucked!!

Suicidal ideation is a common side effect of studying about suicidal ideation...

It's 2:40am, I'm only probably 3/4 way through my neuroscience course and it's less than 7 hours til the exam - this is not going to be a pleasant night. I'm hoping I can swing 90 mins of sleep at least since I've the Health, Behaviour & Society (shockingly boring) exam on Wednesday and haven't even looked at last years paper never mind a lecture yet...and there's something like 17 of em.

Shoot me please, or rather get me a gun and I'll shoot myself.

I hate this time of year - no football on the telly (Euro 2008 is what 2 weeks away at least and I'm only partially interested), TV shows all coming to an end, exams (obviously), great weather during exams, exam results soon, no money...that's pretty much it.

Roll on Wednesday afternoon!

PS. I hope Hughes turns Chelsea down, would hate him to be stuck in that hellhole - it's like a more successful version of Newcastle; the revolving doors will never stop spinning now. Also, Ronaldo's starting to piss me off,...the guy better clear the air or kick the bucket

Ginger ale is entirely underrated...

This last month and exam period has given me copious amounts of 'spare time' to sample the great many drinks available in Ranelagh and most notably Morton's supermarket (the smallest, most expensive supermarket in D6 - NB: Donnybrook Fair is in D4). Having said that I've only really tried out a Tropicana Smoothie, Red Bull Cola (not bad), some more Fentenman's Curiosity Cola, some other cane cola thing and a shitload of Ginger Ale (sold out SuperQuinn of the stuff the other day - 3rd bottle that week). I've decided Ginger Ale is savage (maybe I should start a 'savage' list akin to the 'coolwall' of Top Gear) and not enough people know this so in line with my plaguing of my friends with the reality of religions I will endevour to MAKE them realise their ignorance of the greatness of Ginger Ale!

In other news I'm still doing exams - yay - and am a great example of how not to do them (at least if you like your sleep and sanity) - haven't got to bed earlier than 4.30am in two weeks straight and bar on exam days I've not been out of bed before 2pm. Grant it I'm getting through the work somehow - Can't concentrate for more than 20mins at a go. LOST, Peep Show (new and old - 'The Barge', what an episode) and Battlestar have not helped. Btw, I'm pretty fucking angry at the writer's & studios for their ridiculous disagreement right now - LOST would be another 4 episodes ahead and Battlestar would be resolved (though I'd be pretty depressed that it would be over forever, it's been so good this season again).

So yes exams, going so so, could have been alot worse, haven't felt shit after doing one yet so that's good. Also I've not felt nearly as stressed as normal, just from lack of sleep at times. Two writtens left, sooo close now....but stupid clinical OSCE exam monday week - will be a bit of bitch considering how nerve-racked I can get!

I am currently hating Tim O'Toole and The Dog for proposing Risk for tonight - bastards! Solidarity with Reynolds, accounting exams have probably got to suck more than even my med ones, studying must be nigh on impossible, that crap would put a coke head to sleep.

A shout out to Tim in Vanuatu - come to your senses man, you know you want to come, it'll be mad craic, working sucks ass and there's no point having money if you don't enjoy it - this is your last chance for a whole year and it'll be cheap for what you'll get!

I'm bored of typing.....

What else could I talk about?

Belated....yes, but no less the sweet - 1969, 1999, 2008 - Champione champione ole ole ole!!!

To FAR more interesting things...

Anatomy out of the way....as usual all that study was just not worth it considering they asked me fuck all.


So with the champions league final in sight thoughts turn to Chelski; After all the money he's spent you'd think Abramovich would have expected more so far but then considering the sort of shite he's buying thesedays you'd be forgiven to think maybe he's just taking the piss - kind of like when Rob plays Championship Manager, pure rubbish obviously. I mean £17 million for a whale-sized painting of a gigantic (and fairly bet-down to be honest) London Jobcentre supervisor, the guy has clearly gone a bit wayward. So if he can be convinced to buy that shite who knows what sized clump of his money mound he'll throw at Chelsea "we'll be in the black by 2009" FC this coming summer - the entire Euro 2008 Dream Team probably.


....dishwashers; they're probably one of the pinnacles of human advancement, I don't think I like any home appliance as much as the dishwasher, even the TV (surprisingly I can live without a TV now - doesn't quite make sense I know but I lie not).

This is no craic at all

Uhh,.... studying anatomy is akin to downing a pint of cold, liquified full Irish breakfast,...or at least I think it is - when Scotty had to do that during the amazing race last Sept (you legend you) it was pretty horrible to watch so I'm guessing it bordered on 'top ten worst things I've ever done' for Scott himself. The distraction of the FA Cup final on yahoo text commentary is hardly worth the time flicking over my IE tab to check on; what a shocker of a final from a skill perspective. Suppose it's good for the sport but it's no good as a worthwhile distraction. Have to wait another week for the Eurovision to provide a 'decent' distraction. Overall this is a pretty shitty weekend as weekends go. Thankfully I picked up a six-pack of 'kicks' from Tesco last night so there's no fear of me falling asleep anytime soon.

This will be epic...

well let's be honest it won't border on epic-ness but lieing to you is easier than admiting this will probably be a serious waste of my (seriously deprived) time and yours. But let's wait and see how it turns out.

This will be a wandering through the thoughts of my very unco-ordinated head - likely to be as wishy-washy, bizarre and constantly interrupted as you all know my thoughts are! I think the only person likely to appreciate my thoughts on using English in the fashion of a competitive sport is Ross, and even that is putting it at a stretch. The only person likely to appreciate my views of the religious sort is Tim and we've already discuss these at some serious length. Any medical talk, even non-descript references such as 'I was in hos...', I know are going to soar over the (happily ignorant) heads of everyone bar Tristo, Kelly & Greg. I don't think the lads want a second Tristo on their hands (though I'm assuming they already think they have - bastards!) in so far as throwing out terminology along the lines of 'two in the pink, one in the...' or 'granny's vag' - haven't heard anything good in while now Tristo.

Alternatively this blog can provide you with an update of what's going on for me through (in the short-term) my epic trip to SouthEast Asia & Oman in July/August (slipped another 'epic' in there nicely). Can't say it will be as exciting as PNG - pity I didn't start this up last summer in hindsight - I'm hoping this summer to return without any signs of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder! In the direction - a clap for Tim escaping PNG once again unscathed, no run-ins with the police this time eh?

So currently I am going through the thrilling process of learning off every single cubic cm of the head and neck......and loving every second I am..... Anatomy exam is Monday morning 9am so with that out of the way I've to look forward to 6 written exams the following week (more fun) and a clinical exam to round it off - finally finished 1st year Grad Med (almost), the hard part at least. Kicking into an attachment for June and then freedom.....as long as I don't fail which would FUCK up everything.

So sorry if I'm a bit absent of late, or in general, times are a changing, time is short, plus I'm a useless bastard!

Final note for today....only 5 days left......wish I'd ten grand,...I want to see John Terry weeping.....not so much to see him weeping, that's just harsh, but it'd mean I'd be VERY VERY Happy