Quick Update.

Well, Simchat Torah was quite nice. Howie (I know, I haven't really talked about him yet) was over (he has come over the last 3 years and is a de facto member of Shosh's family), the food was great, Sammy was adorable, but i twas rainy adn wet. I got no studying done whatsoever, BUT, I did finsih the Corps series. I am reading Sex, Drugs and Coco Puffs, by Chuck Klosterman (highly recommend it) and I am about to start Busting Vegas, by Ben Mezrich, the author of Bringing Down the House. Something about those MIT kids and gambling (speaking of which- I went t ofoxwoods yesterday, met up with some college firends for a bit (I know, still need to talk about them) and had a damn good time! = )


Anyways, Nothing new on the research front. Dr. Khine had to present some other research she had done on herpes this week, (which, she says, was very well recieved, which, obviously, is awesome), so this weekend and begining of next week will be the begining of getting to work. We have to make those corrections, and then I guess we start research soon thereafter.

BUT, I start interviewing next week. My first interview is Tuesday, at Jacobi hopsital. I'm excited, nervous too though. I have interviews so far at Jacobi, Robert Wood Johnson, Monte, NYU, Mount Sinai, LIJ, UCONN and Yale. Still waiting to hear from other places. But i'm psyched.

Also.. it's Shosh's birthday tomorrow. She's gonna be a quarter of a century old! Holy Crap!

ciao

WOW!

Amazingly enough, it seems my project has been approved. Dr. Khine called me on friday to say that she called the IRB and they told her it was "approved, pending several changes." It seems we need to fill out another form and correct some things in the consent. However, they have yet to email Dr. Khine and let her know exactly what needs to be changed. So.. the wait continues.

Anyways, my Raiders won today, which is good, and studying for the boards is coming along pretty well -- better than I expected.

Here is a new Sammy picture:Ain't he cute?

Anyways, we're off again tomorrow to Monsey for the last days. Fun fun. Too much packing. Seriously.

Also.. very exciting, I actually wrote some more of my sequel on Friday! Amazing! It felt good. Got my writing music pumping and got a page or so done. It was fun.

Anyways, off to go study more.
Probably no more posts till Wednesday/Thursday.

Happy holidays!

Sukkot

Well, the first days of Sukkot are over... we spent them at my parents house in Monsey. Beautiful weather. Just gorgeous. Sammy was with me in shul today.... under my Talit. I love it.
Sam is 2 months old now... smiling a bit more and making more noises. But thats about it.
iread a lot - up to book 9 (of 10) in the Corps series.. almost done.

Quick weekly research update........ NOTHING! waiting to here from IRB. Dr. Khine hasn temailed me yet so we havent heard yet.. i will be meeting with her next week. Meanwhile I continue to tread water waiting for a word.

I will hopefully have more tiem before Shabbos for a longer post... maybe to tackle some of those topics (MIT/Einstein friends, music, movies) that I would like too.. but we'll see.

GREAT week last week in football.. almost every game went out way, and my Llamas claimed sole posession of first place after slapping down the Beatnicks (i've won 5 in a row now vs the Beatniks).

anyways.. that is it for now.

Another Update

This is going to be short, as I am quite tired... fasting does take a lot out of you. First and foremost - Sammy! He is 8 weeks, almost 2 months and is so freaking cute! He has started really smiling and laughing at us, which is just an unbelievable feeling. It is really great. Todya he was wearing the outfit we took him home from the hospital in..... it was HUGE on him then, and now he fits in it just right. So cute. I'll have a picture uplaoded by the end of teh weekend hopefully.


Now for research..... I believe our project goes before the IRB tomorrow, so not much has happened in the past week. Nothing actually. I have almost all of my articles, and I have flipped through them again and looked over our methods and proposal. That's pretty much it. We need to hear from the IRb. Hopefully they dont drag their feet and let us know what the deal is.

adios,
D

Weekly Update

Well, since my dean, Dr. David, advised me to keep a log of my research, I have decided to do so on the blog here since thats pretty much whats going on in my life now (aside from Sammy).

So this is the first update, but 2 weeks have elapsed since my time for research started. Two weeks ago, we just found out that our project had not yet been approved and needed some revisions. We submitted it on August 18th or 19th. So, I spent last week editing our proposal, directly answering all of the questions that the IRB had and instituting the changes into the proposal and protocol (of course, with a ton of help from Dr. Khine), and I also needed to call the IRB bunch to ask questions, get a placebo addendum etc. etc. and go back and forth to Monte to talk to Dr. Khine and get her to sign stuff. This past Monday (10/3) i had to go into Monte to do kill a tree (i.e make over 1000 pages worth of copies). Amazing - you think we are in the electronic age that we could get this stuff done on-line... but no. I did feel kind of wasteful when i burnt through an entire ream of paper in about 25 minutes. Anyways.. that was what I have done so far in short. I have also been making sure I have all my articles about bronchiolitis and that I have looked into the journal that Dr. Khine wants to submit to and been looking at several RCT articles to see what format they want stuff in. The IRB meets this friday (10/13) so nothing else to do until then.

Anything else going on? I am up to book 8 in The Corps series now. I have never read stories with more likeable characters than "Killer" McCoy and Fleming Pickering. Another favorite of mine, Jake Dillon hasnt really been in the last 2 books... I hope he comes back soon.

I headed to the library on friday to start studying for the boards. Yes, I am taking them in December, however, I will not have time to study all day or even most of the day beforehand -so I am going with the drawn out studying process this time.
Speaking of the boards... I need to pay close to $1500 to take the 2 parts of Step 2 this year (even though I have been hearing they will soon be getting rid of the clinical skills section.. it is really dumb), $150 to submit my application. $65 to be able to do the match.. this is one money making scheme they have. EVERY 4th year medical studnet in the country needs to spend this $1700. There are about 180 4th years in Einstein. That means these people are getting $306,000 from my class. This is obscene.

Sammy is still very cute. We got his crib - still waiting for his furniture (NEVER buy anything in Brooklyn) and he slept pretty well last night. He is holding his head up more every day and actually was looking at the toys hanging over his bouncy chair - pretty amazing. We have a doctor appointment on Tuesday. A month ago he weighed 8'14. I'm betting this month it is over 12.

Also.. i have been doing Day Yomi.. and finished Shabbas this past week! VERY EXCITING! i bought an Entamins cake, and had a little siyum with 3 of my friends here. Started Eruvin yesterday - not really so exciting yet, but we'll see. It's very long as well - so it has potential.

Looking forward to watching football tomorrow. I'm going to my friend's house who has Direct TV and is a Pats fan.. so I will get to watch Dillon and Brady tomorrow.

That seems to be it.

Adios

Happy New Year!!!!

Well, another Sunday down, Llamas and Emus going in different directions. Good chance I will be high scoring team in my keeper league (again).... sounds good to me = )

Anyways, we're here at my in-laws getting ready for Rosh Hashanah... i had to go to Monty earlier today to make about 1200 copies to resubmit my research proposal to the IRB. Finally it's in, and we will here in about 2 weeks (which conveniently means that I have no need to be in the hospital until then = ).

I need to catch up on TV shows and movies (another subject I can write about when I have some time) . Music - I got Bon Jovi's new album, but I haven't had a chance to listen to it.

I'd write more (andperhaps I will have the chance later), but this all for now. Shosh is punching me in the arm and making me go to the mall with her (and trying to delete everything I write!) I love her so much!

In case i don't get back here till thursday.... happy new year!!!!