So Blah...

Maeven posted this picture on her blog awhile back and I couldn't help but to repost it to share with my friends.

In other news, I'm patiently awaiting the next few chapters of Through Me as the last two chapters were absolutely excellent. If only I could get to the point where writing came that naturally to me. I'm still in the middle of trying to decide where to stick my Writer's Block-- or tell it where to stick itself.

And while I'm at it, here's another little comic/pic-thingy that I like:


Cyanide & Happiness @ Explosm.net

Amateur Blood Sucker

No, this has nothing to do with some new monster or organism I may have discovered.

I stuck my first victim today... Actually, I stuck two people. Only one of them gave me the tube of blood that I needed to attempt to collect. It's a new milestone for me, cause I never thought I'd be able to do something like that. The thought of puncturing someone's skin just to collect five milliliters of blood...

But anyway, I got a good, yet mild, rush from my first tube of blood collected. It's not like, jumping for joy exciting, but I'm satisfied with myself and I want to try it again. Not because I'm twisted and some sort of blood loving sicko, but because I want to keep sticking until I can do it without even thinking about it.

Then again, my idea of working as a Med Tech has always been more on the "No Patient Contact" side of things. I prefer to sit at my own little seat at my own little counter, inside the lab, and NOT have to make contact with patients. And that's the stuff we'll be doing soon anyway... it just so happened that drawing blood is something that we also need to learn how to do.

At least I know that I can do it now without too much trouble. I thought that I would be nervous out of my mind. I think I stayed pretty composed.

But anyway, as thus far goes, classes are not too bad. The only issue I have is with a specific teacher who I can't seem to stay awake for. On top of having a rather broken style of English, she's also pretty monotonous and reads all the slides verbatim. I have my laptop open doing other things in her class just so that I can stay awake.

I'm totally into my Hematology class, and as one can tell, am ecstatic about working in the lab. Blood banking is pretty interesting and new and the other courses are so-so. As stated already, I'm really looking forward to everything else in the rest of the program.

But anyway, school is good, days are long and tiring and I fight sleep now as I continue to try adjusting to being up early in the mornings again.

Happy New Year to all once again!

Happy New Year!

And for those of you who aren't really celebrating it, Happy Chinese New Year!

I wish I had a nice picture or the like to post up, but I've been so busy lately that I hadn't been able to get one. But that's okay. I'll probably do it later on tonight when I get the time, cause this is going to be a really busy week for me... aside from the New Year's activities.

I'm going to be exhausted, because between having textbook after textbook to read, I also have a few days of work coming up for me-- normally I wouldn't be complaining about it, but it just feels like I have no time for anything. I'm feeling overwhelmed.

But I'm sure it's a lot less chaotic than I'm making it sound.

And that's okay too.

In the meantime, I'm in school and waiting for class to start. And I'll be here all morning.

Let's think New Year, New Luck.

Happy New Year, everyone!

Med Tech Ahoy! -- Part 2 -- The Beginning

So I begin my new journey into a new route for my future. Really, that's just a fancy way of saying, "My first plan didn't work, so let's go to plan B... Ahah! Plan B is go for action. All is right in the world again." But really, I am looking forward to taking these Medical Technology courses. The entire program is laid out in an extremely vigorous and organized manner that even I couldn't screw it up if I tried.

To recap, the whole idea of getting yet another bachelor's degree is fully an intention of my own to pursue both a backup route for my future career as well as to secure working (and training) experience in the lab. Erego, I can finally say that I have a plan and I can even tell those job search forensic lab places that I have worked in a lab, with lots of different fun lab instruments and machines, and have been taught in the way of bodily specimen analysis... hopefully.

I hate to say that I'm using Medical Technology for my own devious plans, but really, it's not like I won't be working for the greater good of the people if I don't stick with being a Medical Technologist, right? Okay, so now I don't even make sense to myself.

My ultimate goal in life is really to become-- in some way, shape or form-- a good forensic scientist. My next step after securing a steady income and lab experience is to head on into further education. A Masters in the Forensic Sciences, if you will. This, in the end, is what I truly want at the moment.

Maybe in a few years I'll feel differently, but I even have the school I want to go to picked out. It's just a matter of finding out what I need to do to get into said school, a la advisors, information, etc, etc, etc... Money has always been an issue as well, and I'm not quite sure how all the financial aids, work aids, working grants, and whatnot actually work. I'm ignorant, I will admit that. But at this point in time, I have a pretty straight tracked mind-- finish this, then worry about that. It's probably not the best way to think of things since it keeps me from realizing the bigger picture, but if I try to do too many things at once, I can easily confuse my feeble mind.

Then where would we be? Well, everyone else can happily do whatever, but I'm sure I'd be in a world of confused messiness.

Again, I'm simple and I'm ignorant. Yes, my world is sucky, but it's comfortable.

But anyway, I start classes tomorrow morning. Everyday from eight o'clock in the morning up until passed noon, I will be learning the tricks of this new trade. Again, I am quite looking forward to this new endeavor, not only because of the future groundwork I'm laying, but also because the classes just sound really cool.

This semester its the first parts of each base course: Hematology, Clinical Chemistry, Immunohematology (of which they call Blood Banking), Serology, Clinical Diagnostics and Lab Management. Along the way, we are to incorporate everything into one whole, which is something that high school has never taught us... individual courses in college don't do jack to help a student take things from one class and apply it to the next either...

In the summer, I will be hooked on Microbiology, as I will be taking ten credit hours of it, including a two week, vigorous, nonstop Special Topics in Microbiology course that I absolutely cannot miss. In this matter, I shall tearfully wave good-bye to my twenty-fifth birthday while being tied down to microbiology lab work.

Have I ever mentioned that Microbiology is one of my favorite subjects? It's only second to Genetics. Granted, I would have done much better in that class had I not gotten a full on case of Slack-itis, but I loved all the lab work we did for Microbiology. Genetics is just extremely difficult and so I didn't get much out of it, but I really enjoyed it nonetheless.

In mentioning this specific aspect to friends, I got called a nerd. I would take it a good way because I like being a nerd, but I'm not sure being called a nerd at that point had been intended for good... -_-

But anyway, the rest of the program ends with the second part of the classes I'm taking this semester, during the fall. And then next spring, I officially begin my five month rotations and get to do some hands on.

I feel a bit excited, but I don't know if I'm going to be able to force myself to keep up. I still have remnants of Slack-itis, and my study habits are not getting any better. I guess I just have to keep telling myself that after this one year and five months, I shall be scott free from school-- for awhile-- and will have a better chance at a better job than I have now.

Wish me luck? I know I'll need a lot of it. I just hope I don't screw anything up too early in the program.

On a side note, I get a nifty little name tag and a lab coat. I feel like when I was back in high school and got put into some significant, teacher's pet organization-- somehow like I'm suddenly more important than I was before.

Hell, I am some naive little nerd. Such a loser... but a proud one at that!

So everyone just carry on now.

In Memory of a Great Author

Michael Crichton Official Site

So it just came to my attention recently that one of my favorite authors has died of cancer. And to think that I've always boasted how much I love his books and his subjects over contorversy and whatnot. But even though he died nearly two months ago, I didn't even know about it and was told by a friend.

I'm a very private person and typically don't care about the outside world too much. My life consists of home, school, work, and friends. So I guess now I can finally tell just how much I pay attention to news around even my own world.

I discovered Michael Crichton as many others probably did, through the movies. After watching Jurassic Park, it probably took me a few years to get into reading novels written by him. Back then, I was still in middle school when I first laid my hands on my first Michael Crichton book.

To this day, I can't say I remember which one it is that I read first-- it could have been Sphere or Congo but I honestly don't remember. I just remember that I liked it. Then I watched more of the movie adaptations and became hooked.

I was always a bookworm. So I will admit that Michael Crichton books weren't really my main priority. I've probably read everything there was to read in my school library, skipping passed the young adult books and heading straight for classic literature, contemporary novels, and all the other good stuff.

And then my brothers became fans of Michael Crichton books. The next time I picked up a Michael Crichton book after thost first two happened to be Timeline. It was one of the best books I'd read and probably one of my favorite of his. After that, I started diving into more of his older novels, including A Case of Need-- that he wrote under a pseudonym-- and many other books.

I really like this author because of his outside of the box ideas. His writing style was unique, jumping around from one scene to another so easily, but still keeping good pace with the entire storyline.

I've enjoyed reading his works for so long and it's sad to think that we'll never be able to see another book written by him.

From one of his eternal fans, may he rest in peace.

Wired... Weird... it's all the same, right? P.S. Crusades are dangerous.

I can't sleep right now. This is bad because I still have to go back to work tomorrow at three in the evening.

There are things that I know I shouldn't say, but I can't help saying because there is no better way for me to vent my anger than having it written down. I like to come bacn and read things I've written about... kind of like for future reference. "So the last time that this happened, this is what I did... or didn't do."

Well, maybe it's not so much like that, but at least I can believe I've tried hard enough to improve through problems that I come across.

Work is like a battlezone right now. But then again, I guess no matter where you go, you will happen across problems pertaining to people not liking each other. But today was absolute pandemonium.

I feel like we're in highschool all over again and we all have out own cliques wherein we just don't like every other clique and try to make trouble for them. No one understands what's going on in other cliques and no one tries to understand, nor do they communicate. Everyone acts like a child... and then you have those neutral groups of people who just want to be left alone and out of the war.

Okay, so maybe we're more like a cultural crusade war.

Or maybe not. That was a really bad analogy.

But I'm not even sure how to describe it at all. I only know that I remain within the neutral territory where I don't side with anyone and only with reason. But the more I think about it, the less I know which side reason is on. I go by my own standards after all. And somehow my own standards stand on the same level as one specific side of our little work war.

I just want to keep the peace. But I guess even peace keepers have tempers and my patience is sadly being tried. My patience is being tried. I don't want to be immodest about this, but a lot of people know that my tolerance for people's ability to test my patience is quite high. I tolerate people and situations pretty well.

But my patience seems to be drawn quite tight as of late. I no longer have room for people who do nothing but fan the flames of a roaring fire and I have no room for people who can't seem to grow up and accept their own duties. I especially have no room for those who fan roaring flames. Because frankly, if you have nothing better to say to make the situation better, then keep your mouth shut. If all you're going to do is make the situation worse, then just shut the f*** up. Stay out of it-- do us all a favor. Don't make things worse.

I think I especially hate those types who only seem to make the situation worse. How do we say this in Chinese? "Concern that the world isn't chaotic enough." <-- Yea, entropy is natural, but adding to it will only make things blow up. It's not pretty.

It's a touchy subject that this work war is based around right now. Strong accusations make for hard turn arounds if you ever want to take your words back. The cuts have been made and there is no turning back.

One of my coworkers was very loudly accused of being racist just because she wasn't willing to allow special treatment for certain people. No one else gets special treatment and everyone gets the same amount of workload. But tonight, this woman had already been given special treatment twice and was still not satisfied with how we try to keep the peace by accomodating-- nothing was making her happy. And so my fellow innocent coworker made her stand and said, "No special treatment. From now on, we don't change anything for anyone again. No more changes just because someone isn't happy."

And so she was called racist.

On a side, controversial note, I feel strong about even using that word. The word "racist" is thrown around all too easily in this country and in this day and age. There are no if, ands, or buts about whether or not someone is racist. There is no hard evidence or true testimonial proof. All one has to say is "she/he is racist" and they can go to court and back with personal testimony.

It's bull crap, and speaking on the side of a minority group, I hate that word. Minorities use it all too easily for any and every reason. I'm not saying that everyone uses it, but those who do are the ones who do so too often. And then what happens? Bad impressions, bad stereotyping, and if you wrongfully use those accusations, it makes people hate you even more and hate your people even more. And then, yea, prejudism happens.

I know that not everyone uses that word wrongfully. I will agree that there are people out there who suffer from racist judgement. It happens and there's no changing it.

But when I'm on the side of reason, and there is no reason to use that word at all, then everything just kind of goes to hell.

But I'm going to step down from my soap box right now before I get too far. Life is like that, which is why I prefer to keep the peace. If things will get no worse because I keep my mouth shut, then I will keep my mouth shut. After all, I don't know anything about fixing problems. I may as well just keep my mouth shut rather than run it-- unlike those people I hate so much who just want to make the situations worse by adding oil to the flame.

In the end, we humans are all just a simple, small species in this ginormous universe anyway. Why live through it making things difficult for others and difficult for yourselves? Keep the peace and move on-- stop stressing. We are all born the same way, we all develop and grow the same way, we all live on the same speck of insignificant earth in this universe, and we all die and go to the same place in the end-- into the ground where we decompose and get eaten by worms.

It's a big world out there and we're just little dots on someone else's map.

Stand up, stop stressing, and move on.

Ha. Easier said than done, I guess.

2009 Commences... Yea, it's another year.

So today is officially the first day of 2009. I started off the new year by toasting my coworkers with sparkling grapejuice... and then cleaning up after a bunch of drunk country partiers. KFDI can pat themselves on the back for screwing around with my New Years Eve celebration every year since three years ago. Or maybe I should be blaming the Hilton.

But either way, it's all over and done and I'm just as tired this year as I was the last. I woke up tired and I went to sleep tired.

And now I have a sore throat and my nose is still stuffy. This has to be a bad omen for something-- starting off the new year with a massive headache, sore throat, and stuffy nose. Or maybe things will get better.

After work let out, I joined two of my many coworkers at IHOP for an after work breakfast. They were sent home early while I had to stay until the end; but that's okay, I'm hard to piss off completely and I'm more likely to shrug it off and say, "I really don't care anymore."

We sat and had our breakfast foods-- I had Nutella crepes which were absolutely delicious. And then some weirdo came in and sat down at the table next to us where four menus were placed in waiting for another group. We later learned that he'd cut in line and didn't have companions arriving... yet. And the table he was at had been reserved for a different group of people who were in line with their names and everything. The hostess and the manager had to come and tell him to leave because he'd cut in line.

"We have a lot of people waiting in line," she'd told him.

"My friends are in the bathroom right now, can I order first?"

"If you're by yourself, I'm going to have to ask you to step back out into the lobby," she told him. "We have a long line of people who have their names written down already."

"My name's Adrian," he said. "Go look at it. My friends are in the bathroom. Can I order first?"

I had at first thought that he was serious and being picked on. But afterwards, the manager showed up and asked him to leave and he did. No other of his companions every showed up at that table and then other people were seated there. I can only assume that he was lying and was just trying to get away with cutting in line, eating his food, and then leaving.

But, oh well. My coworkers and I got a seat, we ate, and then we vacated.

We did spend a lot of time laughing about the party, bitching about other coworkers, and then talking nonsense about nothing significant. It was relaxing. It was nearing an hour by the time we got out food and I swear that the creepy young waiter kept staring at us. But now that I think about it, he was probably trying to gauge our patience on waiting for food. Apparently, we are very patient people.

As for my New Year Resolution that everyone's been asking about... I never have one. But I've resolved to do many, many things within the next year or so. It's just a matter of whether or not I'm motivated enough to make it happen.