The education of Tessa

As I sit here studying for microbiology, I'm struck by the enormous number of organisms that cause rashes and diarrhea.  I mean, seriously, it's utterly amazing that we don't spend more time on the toilet or more money on creams and potions for rashes.  

I also find myself constantly spelling (aloud, but only in my head) the word "diphtheria."  Why, you may ask?  Well..  When I was in second grade I came in second place in the second grade spelling bee.  Care to know what word caused me to lose the first place prize?  You'll never guess.  Yep, of all words, it was diphtheria.  Now, what second grader in their right mind knows how to spell diphtheria is a mystery to me.  But, for almost 20 years now I have waited for an opportunity to display my uncanny ability to spell the word diphtheria correctly, and finally, medical school has provided me with that opportunity.  It's a shame that questions like that don't appear that often on our exams.

Turns out, though, that spelling is a big deal in medical school, as one of our professors made clear when he told us that the most important thing to learn about antibiotics was the correct spelling of "gentamicin" (it's NOT gentamycin, fyi).  Unfortunately, that's really about all I know about antibiotics, which is a problem since I have a pharmacology exam on Thursday.

At any rate, that's enough random musings about the state of my medical education.  Wish me luck as I attempt to remember which organisms/diseases can be acquired from drinking unpasteurized milk (for the record: Listeria, Brucellosis, Campylobacter jejuni, and Yersinia enterocolitica).

Finally!

It's only taken a few months, but we're finally down to only about 3 boxes left to unpack.  I have been assured by Rahul that they will be unpacked by his birthday next month...  In the meantime, here are some pictures of the place looking much nicer than the last time we posted.  I'm not sure why some of the pictures are not straight, I swear I'm sober!  At any rate, enjoy the pictures!

Well, we finally moved into our new place on Friday. All went pretty smoothly and we're starting to settle in to the new house. We've met one of our neighbors - a nice woman with 2 huge dogs. Here are a few pictures of the place. The only rooms that are pretty well set up are the bedroom and the TV room (of course!). Hopefully by the time Daniela and Ale arrive on Friday the place will look a little more presentable, but no guarantees! We'll send more pics once we've really settled in and have the boxes out of here!

Our New House!

Well, after a lot of looking Rahul and I found a condo in Chicago that we love. We put in an offer and it was accepted! Inspection was yesterday, and closing is scheduled for June 30th (yes that's a long ways away, but works best for us and the sellers for a variety of reasons..). Specs: 3 bedroom/2 bath condo in the Woodlawn neighborhood of Chicago (just south of the university). Here are some pictures for your enjoyment:

boston

it is sooo wierd - people keep telling me that i went to a beer festival. they are crazy

boston

it is funny- I complain so much about airplanes but when the captain said "we are cleared for boston", I was so happy

This is just a monster weekend: a sox game, a bso concert, a beerfest, the marathon, and passover.

Lasty night was the concert- das lied von der erde and the premier of harbison sym 5. It was fantstique- the new piece was a bit odd- a modern telling or orpheus and euridice- through three poems. When I had first heard of the scoring including an electric guitar, I was skeptical. But this was inspired- the guitar was played in a traditional manner, serving the purpose of his lute.

The second half was the mahler-one I've never heard live. Set against 7 chinese poems over 1000 years old- it spoke of loss, longing and the gradual coming and acceptance of death. Wrote after mahler himself was diagnosed with a fatal heart condition, I found the piece a great journey of sorts- towards destiney. The performance was sublime and subtle, but just as brilliant. One of the best concerts I've heard in years.

Today, I'm headed to the beerfest downtown at the arlington castle with bryan.66 breweries will be present. More on the return trip....

Why I hate flying

Ok. I realize how rediculous it is to actually fly to work. But, we live in chicago and my client is in south carolina. so, i guess it is needed. you think they could find people in SC to do this work....

and now I fly across the country alot. actually, every week. I tak the Monday 9:05 flight out of O'Hare and comback on the Friday 12:38 from SC. And yes, they actually have the same flight number.

oh- so the plan - it is one of those mini planes, hold like 50 people. it isn't very nice or comfortable, and whenever there is high winds, it can't take off.

which leads me to why i hate flying - the delays! ratehr than have everybody delayed 5-10 mins for weather, some are delayed like 2 hours and everything else is on time.

for the past few weeks it has been terrible! i spend sooo much time in the airport, mostly cause my flight is not important at all, and always gets bumped off its correct time.

so, the delays are predictable, but they suck. what's worse, if they say a plane is delayed 2 hours, you still need to be there when the original time is, in case they decide later on that there is no delay - cause some other plan is now MORE delayed. drives me crazy.

yep - i'm in an airport right now. and my flight is delayed.

dinner

Today I had paella. It was yummy. It had sausage, chicken and shrimp.

Coca and mami joined myself, lulis and alfonso. Tessa was not invited. Chula ate baby food- her teeth are gone.

No seafood. Except for shrimp.

I am rahul and I approved this message

A Night Out in Chicago!

Friday night was the annual Pritzker Prom. Each year the Pritzker administration and the Pritzker chapter of AMSA (American Medical Student Association) join together to host the Prom. It's unique in that it's probably the only event that is well attended by members of all four classes at Pritzker, though obviously more well attended by first and second years than third or fourth years. It was fun to hang out with my classmates, and to see a lot of the second years who have been somewhat incommunicado since starting the new quarter. It was also a cool opportunity to see and hang out with some of our school professors in a non-school environment. This year my class invited Dr. Ross (our head anatomy professor), Dr. Jim O'Reilly (also an anatomy prof), and Dr. Meredith (biochemistry professor). It was great to see them all dressed up and spiffy!

This year's Prom was held on the Odyssey II, a boat docked at Navy Pier on Lake Michigan. This was actually the second time that Rahul and I have been on a boat on Lake Michigan, since the first year semi-formal orientation event was also held on a boat. Luckily, though, the Prom was held on a yacht so that the freezing weather didn't put a damper on the fun. My classmates think I'm nuts, but rather than freeze to death on the walk to the boat, I decided to wear my new Ugg boots to the boat. Of course I changed once we got on the boat, but they still thought it was pretty funny. I just really dislike being cold!

At any rate, a fun time was had by all and Rahul and I had a cute picture taken by the photographer on the boat. Enjoy!

Our trip to the Imagination of Star Wars

We went to to the Chicago Museum of Science and Technology today, during the final weekend of both the Lights of Christmas exhibit and the Star Wars exhibit.

I remember the star wars exhibit from Boston - I had wanted to go but for some reason just never got around to it. We had tried to go many times, but during the first attempt, Tessa was sick, and then the second, the timing didn't work out. so, we finally made it just a day before it closed and left the area.

On the lights of Christmas- it was just a little exhibit where they had all these different trees, supposedly each decorated with things that were representative of their respective cultures and countries. it was neat - but as it was after Christmas, i couldn't care less. maybe next year.

Entering the Star Wars exhibit was a thrill. The music, the lights, the atmosphere. It was so cool to see almost 5 generations of people, walking through history, marveling at the fact that something that started out as a summer popcorn movie, before such movies existed, could become so much more.

Of course, the exhibit started with the main characters from episode IV: Luke, Han, R2-D2 and C3PO. I even got to take a picture with them. fun.

The first interactive part dealt with the idea of transportation in the star wars worlds - highlighted the land cruisers, pod racers and even the city transportation system. They had this Lego thingy where you play with them and build a little car, using magnetics to not only propel you, but to also suspend you above the ground. It was quite challenging, having to build these little cars that now only went straight, but also could go over hills, and up and down V-inclines. Naturally, we succeeded.

And by we, I don't just mean Tessa and myself. Joining us were our friends Lynne and Todd, another could recently transported from Boston to Chicago. While in Boston, Lynne worked with me in Connecticut and Todd was in Business School. They are just great, and we have fun doing the touristy things as well as just hanging out.

As we got into the worlds of star wars, the exhibit went on to talk about the different necessities of the characters, from Hoth to the volcano planet of the third film, they talked how the technology had been adapted to fit the environment. They showed inspiration of the native clothing of tatooine and the antarctic snowsuits for the rebels fighting in the cold of Hoth. And, for good measure, there were Wookies.

Next, there was a pretty neat demonstration that really showed how ingenious some of the robots were in star wars. It talked about multiple function abilities, their dexterity and ability to walk over multi-terrain floors and their crazy cool ability to apply critical thinking and problem solving abilities - especially where it comes to the rescue of our triumphant trio. And yes, i know there were multiple iterative of such - don't you just love Lucas' symmetry.

And what star wars exhibit would be compete without the highlighting of the weapons, villains and vessels of the dark side. They had actual props from the movies here, but did fail to mention why we can't have light sabers in our world. I'm holding out for one. A weapon for a more civilized time.

Lastly, we saw what was easily the centerpiece, the Infamous Darth Vader Suit. Just wow.

Yeah...it was a great day to go to a museum.

All our photos can be found at: http://picasaweb.google.com/rahulsarathy/StarWarsExhibit010508