A picture

Just because I can put anything I want in my blog

Television

So I watched a little TV yesterday. I don't generally watch much, but Adrienne was working so I turned on the football game while I studied. I didn't watch much more than a quarter though because Michigan stinks. I've never seen a game as bad as that. Oregon completely creamed them in every way. It was like watching Arizona play.

I think commercials are better now than they were ten years ago. I think advertisers may have finally figured out that you have to give people a reason to keep watching through a commercial break. There were some really funny commercials. I think they pull out all the stops for football season. Hey look at that, I just used a figure of speech from church to describe something that causes people to skip church.

One more thing about commercials. Apparently they're turning Geico's cavemen into an actual television show. Talk about clever advertising.

Dates

I've got to get a post in today. It's 9/8/7, how could you not post today.

for good measure...check out the time of the post

brains

Yesterday we cut out the brain. It was cool. We were the stars again. We got it out in one piece and managed to cut all twelve of the cranial nerves and leave pieces of each of them sticking out of both the brain and the skull.

So the test went well. I honored both histology and anatomy practical. I was one question short on the written anatomy. If you add them all together I got over 95%.

adios

We're going to the cottage. So have a great weekend

A response

CAITLIN ALANE said...
David- i saw someone talk about that book on tv and i was intrigued too. i wanted your opinion on the following. i could never imagine what it would be like to see the horrific suffering of the poor and serve them day in and day out like she did. that environment alone would cause me to question the goodness of God, like all of us are inclined to do. but i couldn't help but wonder...what if mother teressa did not really know the personal love of Christ in her life? (i know this might sound crazy). sure she obediently lived out God's call, but what if she never grasped the fullness of the Gospel? do you think that could be an explanation for her doubts?

Apparently my readership has risen by one to climb to an all time high.

I think this merits a full response. I'll go backwards.

1. I'm not sure that we need an explanation for doubt. It seems to be a normal, though perhaps not universal, part of the human experience. I think it is probably a function of our brokenness. Just a few examples: many Psalms, Peter, Martin Luther, Phillip Yancey. Even Jesus felt far from God, "My God My God, Why Hast Thou Forsaken Me?" And these are just people who have been willing to acknowledge their doubt. I feel far from God much of the time. Sometimes it seems like I'm a drowning man, I sink down into sin and doubt and i struggle and struggle and just as I am about to expire God grabs me and pulls me to the surface, then I swim and sink and begin the process again.

2. I am not in charge of writing names in the book of life, and I am not privy to its contents. So i don't know what kind of relationship with God she had. One thing that does seem to be clear in the Bible is that the followers of Christ will be known by what they do. The only test we have at our disposal is the fruit that she produced. And judging by that I'd say, "If not her...who?"

3. Mother Teresa's writings are intriguing to me precisely because she continued to act out her faith in such an uncomprimising manner. Her life is fascinating to me. She saw human existence at its worst and followed God into it.

On rudeness

I've had some people do some pretty rude things to me. But this has to rank up there. I stopped at the grocery store and I was in the twelve items or less aisle. The lady in front of me just had two things. She was standing in front of her cart, and she put them up, paid for them, then walked out...and she left the cart there in the middle of the aisle, blocking the way. She even looked back as though trying to decide whether to bother or not.

The thing that shocked me the most though was her normal appearance. Normally when someone is rude to you, they are young, or rebellious, or whatever...you know what I mean. Or they are in a protected place like on the telephone or in their car. But she was just a normal looking woman. It was amazing.

Maybe she's as spacey as me and when she looked back the shopping cart didn't even enter her field of vision.

It is finished

I am done. I don't know why, but for some reason, they put all of the tests on the same day. It doesn't make a whole lot of sense. Unless it is an attempt to reward those who have spent time to actually reward those who learned it all along, and punish tose who try to cram it all in at the last minute.

Anyway, I' pretty confident I passed. Beyond that I have no idea. You have to score more than one standard deviation from the mean to honor. And more than one below it to fail. So I may or may not honor these tests.

I felt fairly confident in the morning and grew increasingly less confident as the day wore on. By the end of the third (three hour) test I was pretty worn out.

Tests

My first test is tomorrow. I'm not sure if I'm ready for it or not. I studied a little today. Matt came down from Detroit to study with me. We got a little bit done. We'll see how prepared I am tomorrow. If I fail I'll have only myself to blame.

That said, I think that I'm going to do alright. Over the last few weeks I've really felt like I shouldn't devote all of my time to study. So I have made a conscious effort to do other things. To spend time with friens and family, and with my wife.

Tonight Luke and Ben are over for dinner. Adrienne asked them to come help us out so that we can get our new dishwasher installed tomorrow. The home warrenty people finally came through. But it turns out the new dishwasher is two inches too tall. So Ben and Luke helped us prop up the countertop and they're going to come back to finish it tomorrow after the new dishwasher is in.

Anyway. I have a test tomorrow and the chicken is done on the grill and it is time to eat. So I'm going to have a good time with friends and go to bed.

If I regret this next week remind me that I wrote this

Happy Anneversary

It's only a week late. And I didn't call. I'm an awful son I know, but here it is now.

29 years, wow!!!

On doubt and sainthood

I was driving yesterday listening to NPR and heard a story about a new book that came out recently. It is a collection of the correspondence of Mother Teresa with her confessors. They read a passage and I was intrigued. The letters often dealt with her recurring doubts about God's existence, presence, love etc. She struggled all of her life.

I would really like to read the book. She had tremendous faith, and she put it into action. She responded to the call of Christ to care for the sick and went far beyond what most of us would even think of. And she struggled to find God. It seems to me that often we ignore pain and frustration in our relationship with God. We want to always follow and believe with the faith of a child. But life isn't like that. Faith is difficult, it is trying, and I would love to read the thoughts and prayers of Mother Teresa as she moved through this.


Incedently, Christopher Hitchens, famous for his recent book on the nonexistence of God, is making a big deal about this and trumpeting it as new proof that God doesn't exist. If a woman so closely identified with Christian faith didn't believe, who does? I don't think he gets it.

On theft

The last couple of times I've gotten gas, I've stopped at this place on the way to school in Detroit. It's a pretty ramshackle place. Most things seem to be falling apart. But the pumps work.

Inside everything that can be concealed easily is behind the counter , which is protected by several thick layers of whatever. You have to slide your card to the guy under the glass.

It's kind of a little grocery store. You know, the essentials, toilet paper, toothpaste, bread, etc. I've heard that the city of Detroit only has one grocery store within the city limits. That may not be true, but I do know I've never seen one.

Anyway, back to the story. Everything is behind glass. But you don't have to prepay for gas. I'm not sure if the people of Detroit just haven't figured out yet that you can steal gas by pumping it and driving off, or if the theives generally don't drive or what. It's strange though. You have to prepay for gas in the nicest gas stations in Tucson.

At least I thought it was strange the first couple times, then this last time I noticed that everyone else does have to prepay. Everybody else has to take their money inside, I just stand there for a second and the guy turns on the pump then I go in and pay when I'm done.

I'm not completely sure, but I think this might be a sad testament to the state of the city and its racial fault lines.

Driving

I normally take I-96 home to Ann Arbor. It's about five miles shorter than I-94 and it has lighter traffic and the speed limit is higher. I don't really understand why people take I-94. But I have to ride on I-94 for about two miles to get to the 96. There are only two exits, but the traffic is usually pretty heavy.

So yesterday I was driving home. The traffic was really bad because for some reason I decided to leave during rush hour. And I was tired and a little out of it. I was listening to Marketplace (which incedently is my favorite show on NPR other than the funny ones on the weekend.

So I got off the highway and realized I had taken the wrong exit onto another highway. So I had to get off that and get back on and then get back to I-94. Then I did it again. I got off at the next exit which still wasn't the right exit. And i had to drive around to get back on the freeway. I couldn't believe that I did it twice in a row. There are only two exits that I have to pass and I got off on both of them.

So I got back on I-94, then I missed my exit. I ended up having to drive all the way back on I-94. It took me more than an hour to get home.

Moral of the story...pay attention when you drive

Studying

I'm having trouble motivating myself to study. I always seem to have this problem. I can only go over the same information so many times before I get bored. So I've reaced this point where I don't really know if I'm prepared or not, but I don't really want to study anymore.

Vote now

What do you think, should I go back to the old template?

On hands

It was interesting today. We started dissecting the hand. Up until today the hands were in a special plastic wrapping. It was strange. I can't really describe it, but somehow when we unwrapped the hands and started dissecting, the body suddenlt seemed more...human, if that makes sense. It had more personality, it was more real.

You have to understand that the face and head are still in a special wrapping. We don't get to that section until unit two. Up until now we've only seen the torso and arm.

Anyway, it was interesting to grasp in a not so intellectual sense, the significance of the hand. Our hands are one of only a few body parts that really set us apart from animals. Our upright posture is dictated by our hands.

I don't know, like I said, it's not something I can describe, but it gives me a little more appreciation for Paul Brand and his quest to save the hands of people with leperosy.

On Umbrellas

I don't like rain. It's been raining for two days now, and I'm sick of it. Where is the sun?

I saw something I've never seen before. I saw an umbrella bent backwards in the wind. I always thought that was a bit of movie exaggeration. But today I saw it happen. This lady was walking down the street with her umbrella and pop, it inverted in the wind and she was left holding a useless umbrella.

On overactive glands

It rained all day today. In fact it is still raining. This is the first day like this we've had in Michigan. We were supposed to go to a picnic on Belle Isle held by a group dedicated to supporting the families of medical students. It got cancelled though, or rather postponed until furthur notice.

So instead we went to game night. I think I wrote about us going a few weeks ago. It's at the house of Luke's boss's house every Sunday night. Since it was raining we played dodgeball in the barn. It was great.

But I think that the physiology of my body adjusted to the air in Arizona. Whenever I play sports or work out here I get ridiculously sweaty...way more than the people around me. Today for example everything I had on was soaking wet and my hair was wet and everything. It was humid from the rain and I obviously ran a lot and played hard, but still...

Anyway we had a great night.

On Rocks and Dirt

So, we just moved into our condo. our little miniature backyard is pretty standard. There were a few overgrown bushes and it was edged with that black plastic stuff that keeps weeds from growing and makes it easier to edge. Anyway, my aunt, Ginger, was here and Adrienne asked her what she should do with the garden.

So Aunt Ginger reccommended taking out the black plastic lining and edging, and also removing the gravel that covered the plastic. She had a great plan which involved Adrienne Putting the gravel into plastic buckets and driving over to her house where the gravel could be emptied into the driveway behind the boathouse and then filled with dirt from a pile there. So Adrienne jumped into the project with gusto. She Spent her two days off last week taking the black lining out and trimming the bushes. Then she began the process of switching gravel for dirt.

She managed to fill four buckets before tiring. The buckets sat full of gravel in the yard for a week. Then on Saturday she decided to take them over and dump them. I was studying. A little while later she came down and asked for my help. She wasn't sure what to do with the dirt and her back hurt from carrying the buckets of rocks.

So I came upstairs and found to my suprise......... four buckets of wood chips.


The moral of the story:

1. Garden in small managable bits, unless you happen to be a professional gardener.
2. My wife needs a bit more guidance in gardening than most.

On old movies

There's something different about old movies. They seem to move at a snails pace sometimes. In life today it seems hard to appreciate those extra spaces.

We watched Rebecca, the Best Picture of 1940 according to that little golden man. It's an Alfred Hitchcock film. I really enjoyed it. It's been a while since I've watched an old movie. It's been a while since I watched any movie at all actually. But Adrienne isn't really one for old movies. She almost turned this one off because it was in black and white. There were a number of things I enjoyed:

1. Dialogue--how often do you see a movie that actually contains any. There are a few, mostly cult hits, that have a fair amount, but not intelligent.

2. Language--they actually used big words. Movies don't use language your average high school dropout can't understand. They used to though.

3. Suspense: Hitchcock was a master at building suspense. "He didn't use any blood or, at least in the films I've seen, sudden action to induce fear. He built suspense slowly, with carefully doled out information, hints, and a little music. And the great thing is, that from the first scene in the movie you know what's going to happen. Unbelievable.

4. Unexpectedness: The plot twists are so unexpected as to be nearly impossible to predict. He is able to build the movie up so much in one direction that when an alternate explanation of events becomes apparent it floors you.

ANyway, we had a good night. We walked down to Dominos and got a Pizza and then watch a good movie on TV. It was great. And now it's Sunday so I don't have to study for a whole day.