fitting in fun during crunch time

So obviously, it is nearing the end of the quarter as you may have noticed, since the number of blog updates are dwindling.  There is always a last minute rush by the faculty to fit some last minute things into the quarter in the remaining 2 weeks.  Therefore, I've been pretty busy and haven't had much time for blog updates despite having some interesting things to type about.  So here are the items of interest, in no particular order...

My Friday rotation involved placing implants, which I admit was VERY cool.  My partner Jay and I each placed an implant into a fake mandible, capped it with an abutment, and took an impression.  In "our mandible" there were a few implants already placed, but ours were by far the best; they were spaced evenly and had the proper angulation.  We made a pretty awesome team.  It was nice to have someone there keeping an eye on what you were doing because implants have about a million tiny little parts that all look alike.  And it was a lot like carpentry, so having a dude partner to explain some terms (like what a countersink is) was a bonus.  So this is what we did.  First you drill a pilot hole.  Then you use the smallest drill bit (blue) and drill to 10 mm.  Then you measure.  Then you use the next largest drill bit (yellow) and widen the osteotomy (aka hole).  Then you measure to make sure it is still 10 mm deep.  Then you use an even larger drill bit (red) to widen the osteotomy.  Then you make sure it is still 10 mm deep.  Then you tap the osteotomy (aka you put threads the hole).  Then you laugh like a 12 year old as your professor repeatedly says "I'd tap that".  Then you use a wrench to screw in the implant.  Then you fiddle with pulling the accessory parts off, which is more difficult than it looks.  Then you smile because you just placed one kick-ass implant.  Huzzah!

My implant is the gold one on the right, further to the back.  Jay's implant is the gold one on the left, further to the front.

There was a birthday celebration for my friend Maria on Friday night.  She ended up cooking dinner for about 20 of us at her apartment.  This seemed backwards to me, since I feel like the friends should treat the birthday person.  But, Maria insisted that in Vietnamese culture, the birthday person treats their friends.  So enjoyed her wonderful cooking.  And then we all played board games and I won Apples to Apples.

The quarter is for size reference! :)

I've also been playing quite a bit of softball of late, both on a school team and as a substitute for a church team that my friend Hillary plays for.  It's been a good time overall.  I've noticed some improvements in my fielding skills (I made an awesome catch tonight to bring the inning to a close), but my batting skills are still a little lacking.  I always make contact with the ball, but it always seems to go right to an infielder who easily lobs it over to first base before I get there.  Despite this, the D2 team I play on for school made it to the playoffs.  Tonight was our first playoff game and we won.  It was pretty awesome.  And, to prove my hardcore softballness, I have quite a few bruises on my legs to show off.  This one is definitely in the "top 10 most gnarly bruises I have ever had" list.  You can even see the stitching from the softball reflected in my leg.  (And no, I don't remember getting this one!)

Yesterday I went for a long bike ride (about 8 miles).  The weather was perfect.  I live near a paved bike trail (Skunk Creek Linear Park) that winds along a dry watershed area and it was perfect for my Sunday ride.  The animals were out too!  I counted 26 desert rabbits.  I think they are Arizona's equivalent to squirrels, because they are everywhere!  And I also saw a bunch of quail.  I still laugh at them running around with their little hats on.  Best part about the ride?  Jamba Juice is about a 2 block detour off the bike path.  Very refreshing!

In other news, the power went out last night.  No storms, no wind, and no power for most of the evening.  Apparently, a transformer down the street blew out about 1 AM, causing no power from 51st to 75th avenues.  I live on 57th avenue.  It was kind of strange, since I was laying in bed almost asleep when I noticed that it got really quiet in my room because the fan and the air exchange vent were no longer making any noise.  I got up to use the bathroom and my motion sensor night light did not turn on.  I looked out the window and it was so strange to see just darkness everywhere.  The moon was pretty bright, so you could see the outline of the mountains on the other side of the freeway and the neighborhoods at their base and it was all dark.  Even the freeway was dark.   Very cool, and very eerie.  My roommate, who was in the process of pulling an all nighter, came out with a candle and hiking headlamp on.  Apparently, they were effective in helping her study into the wee hours, since the power didn't come back on until 6:30 this morning.  It was pretty comical.  I was hoping that the power outage would last a little longer so that my morning classes would be canceled, but I was not so lucky.  At least it didn't happen when the temperature is 110 degrees and AC is a necessity.  We were able to survive with some open windows and a cool breeze.

And in the lab, I have been doing a fair bit of sectioning on the Cryostat.  Good news is my fingers are still intact.  I think I learned my lesson this summer.  Also, we have more rats!  (They are so cute.)  One of the significant findings of my project is that the estrogen caused the rats to lose weight.  However, the rats that received estrogen were a bit smaller to begin with.  Odd, because the experimental groups were randomly decided.  So, in order to strengthen our findings that the weight loss was truly due to the estrogen, we need to put estrogen in fatter rats and do some more treadmill running.  Luckily, it is not as huge of an undertaking this time because there are far fewer rats.  Finally, I present at the AzPS meeting in just over a week and a half, so there is lots of preparation going into that.

So you can see how busy I am.  Don't be surprised if there aren't many updates in the coming weeks.  Less than 2 weeks left of class until finals.  Yikes!