[yeliab_cram]

Happy New Year everyone. Apparently, 5th year is not conducive with time wasting rants. Although, in the words of a certain Mr John Lennon, Time you enjoy wasting is not wasted time. Profound.

Perspective is an interesting thing. I always think at Christmas and at the start of a new year, it is important to have a bit of perspective on life...

The other week i had to take my car in for its yearly service. Its a not-too-old honda and wanting to keep the manufacturer service history going, it went to the local honda garage. Sensible, i think you will agree. I think it is reasonable to expect the best service from the manufacturers themselves. Anyway, seeing as it was near christmas, nobody was free to give me a lift, so i waited with the car, drank lots of free coffee and watched an hour or so of that god awful prgramme that isnt Kilroy, but may as well be... you know the one i mean.

Anyway, after a few gallons of free coffee scented water had been consumed, the service man came over to find me. I have done enough PPD breaking bad news sessions to know that something was amiss. This was confirmed by his warning shot "i think you should come into my office" (i immediately assumed either i, or the car had cancer, possibly both). He then proceeded to tell me how much he was going to charge me for the service (a lot) but he still had this look of doom. What is it? i thought, has he found illegal immigrants in my boot or something? am i going to be arrested?

No. Apparrently, despite him driving and fixing the same type of car all day, every day, the bloke in the workshop had managed to reverse my car into the workshop door and was therefore a moron. In the process of this bit of destruction derby driving, the rear bumper and basically the whole back pannel had been buggered. What a twat.

Now, if i was in my usual, non chistmassy mood there would have been shouting, swearing and possibly some violence. However, on this occasion i remained calm and composed. I explained i understood that shit did occasionally happen, and that i understood people somtimes did silly things. So long as they fixed it by the end of the week, and paid for it all and were very nice, then there was no real harm done, was there.

Whilst some shouting and ranting at the poor man may have been theraputic, on this particular day, i had a certain sense of perspective, and realised the following. People **** up. I certainly **** up from time to time, and in less than a year, i will be working as a junior doctor. If i **** up, people may die. Thats bad. ****ed up car bumper is not so bad. I only hope people will understand if and when i **** up, and am now hoping that my good humour will act as some form of karma.

In other news, i have just finished doing Neurology and Elderly Medicine at Pinderfields. Pinders is a great place, i do not think you had the joys of the stories from my third year time there, but it has a fond place in my heart, mainly because in the accomodation the TV colour is ****ed, and George Aligiyah is purple, and the Simpsons are green. Legendary.

I only have two things to say about my time there this year. 1) Neurology is simply intelectual masturbation - whoever first said that could not have been more right. 6 patients on the ward, no solid diagnosis for any of them, except the lady who is clearly making it all up and is being turfed to psyc. and 2) the elderly medicine consultant WAS Micheal Stipe (the lead singer of REM for those who cannot place the name). Not just in looks, but also in persona. Humming Losing My Religion and Man on the Moon during ward rounds did not result in him revealing his identity. I have informed the next group based there that he must crack eventually. They have agreed to casually slip REM lyrics into conversation. The quest continues.