Springtime in Valhalla

I've completely forgotten how beautiful Valhalla is when it's warm out. Studying for neuro is more difficult when you could be outside playing frisbee.

Our first neuro midterm was a heartbreaker. During the test I could practically feel the other students becoming discouraged. The AMP students have a good chance of doing well as long as the med student average is low, and some second years told me that close to half the class fails this first test.

It's a pretty stressful time of year. I have no idea where I'll be in four months, I'm still waiting to hear from my top choices, and I'm probably going to have to reboot my entire personal life. But the flowers and new leaves and misty evenings help keep things calm.

Bonus: I had terrible allergies in CT in April, but no sniffles at NYMC.

Neuroscience

Our first neuroscience exam is next Monday (4/27). We only have this one class now, and overall I'm digging it. The lectures are better, the material is really macro and interesting, and everything is just easier to learn. The biggest complaint I had about last block was that it was impossible to feel like you had studied adequately.

This is a pretty intense class, though, so while we have half the workload of last block, it's still twice the workload of first block (oh histology...).

During neuroscience the med students study the brains from the bodies they dissected during anatomy. There's a neuroanatomy lab once a week where a teacher basically points out the structures you need to know. Unfortunately the AMP students didn't get any kind of anatomy lab orientation so the first day was awkward--we just wandered up to the 4th floor without gloves, without a locker to put our stuff in, and without any clue how to get into the lab (SOMEone walked into the guy's locker room accidental-like).

As an aside: I feel NYMC had all these great intentions about making the AMP students blend seamlessly in with the med students but they ran out of time to set everything up before we got here. During histo they had microscopes and lockers for us, lots of guidance, and we never felt forgotten. Now the seams are starting to show. This will all be solved by next year but it's a little annoying to call up student housing to ask what should I do with my dorm/stuff over the summer and have them tell me, "We haven't figured it out yet."

But back to neuro lab--it's great! I totally stuck my fingers into somebody's ventricles on the first day.

It's snowing

Winter doesn't end in Valhalla, it just gets more frustrating.