Weekly Update: We're Done Clerkship!!!!!

• Current Scholastic Pursuits
• I am excited to report that we've all successfully completed clerkship. It's hard to believe that I don't have any more clinical work to do until I start residency in July. No more rounds, no more wards, no more clinics. I'm sure I'll miss it all by the end of the week but right now it just feels like pure bliss. I've done ABSOLUTELY NO work this weekend. AT ALL. And I don't feel guilty. It's pretty awesome.
• Last night was the grad formal. Everyone got dolled up and I drove up to the Hammer with Scarlet and Constellation. It was an open wine bar, so I'm pretty sure some people are going to be hurting this morning. I understand that wine hangovers are the worst. But, I'm pretty sure everyone had a great time. I even won an award!!! According to the grad committee - I am the "Most Likely to climb Mt Everest blindfolded with my hands tied". Hahaha.

• Recipe I've Been Drooling Over
• So, I've been in an eating slump recently and the best cure for that is browsing cookbooks and searching for recipes online. In my search, I stumbled across a free online movie called Earthlings. It's an animal rights film that's very well done, except that it only offers a very biased view of things. For instance, it makes it seem like we only eat beef from factory farms or that we only undertake hunting solely as a sport and not as a subsistence lifestyle. In my case, I will only eat beef that I know was not factory farmed (ie. organic, grass fed, ethically slaughtered). Yes, it's more expensive: both monetarily and in the amount of time and effort it takes to source and acquire things, but at least I sleep better at night for it. I would also prefer to eat game than traditional farm cuts because I generally know that the animal had a better lifestyle than those in captivity. One day, I would ideally like to raise my own chickens for eggs and meat and have acquired my own hunting skills for other game. By being more invested in the process, I know that I make better use of every aspect of the animal (less goes to waste) and the process of preparing and eating becomes more meaningful to me than if I simply buy the disembodied chicken breast that is plastic wrapped at the store. I know that I'm kind of a rarity in this respect but I wish that these sort of films could offer people a staircase to change rather than a black-or-white change-your-whole-lifestyle-or-otherwise-feel-like-a-terrible-person approach.
• My favourite quote of the whole movie was from the blog that linked me to the film's website: "I think if we're going to teach our children to love animals, we should mean it all the way, right?" (we wilsons)
• Anyway, this is all to say that my search led me to look up more veggie-based recipes. And oh boy, do I have a list to share with you! But, to keep things simple, I'll keep to my one-recipe a week format unless some of these are too irresistible not to share sooner. I made this porcini risotto for Scarlet and Constellation and Friday night and it was a huge success. YUM!

• Favourite Thing on Etsy this Week
• I love, love, love this painting by valentinadesign. The colours and the detailing are exquisite. If I had more money, I would snap up this bird painting and the stag painting (see the side bar on the link) and theme my future living room using that colour scheme. It would be amazing.

• What I'm Reading Right Now
• I'm still reading the Munk Debates. However, I was sidetracked this week by a book introduced to me in our last palliative care session. It's called Man's Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl. It's an autobiographical account of this psychiatrist's experience as a POW in Auschwitz and other concentration camps during WWII. During this time, Frankl lost everything: his entire family, including his pregnant wife, were killed. And yet, he managed to find a way to create meaning in his life and used that knowledge to help him survive both during his incarceration and afterwards. From this experience, Frankl developed what he called logotherapy, which he outlines in the second half of the book. It's a short, fast, and moving read that I highly recommend.

• TED Talk I Watched This Week
• Hans Rosling is a brilliant Sweedish MD and statistician. He created Gapminder, which is a website that articulates the relationship between different determinants of health on a global scale. Here are two talks by him: the first, on the meaning of the washing machine and the second on just what his statistics mean for how we think of the world and our roles on the global stage. Please watch, it's worth your time.

• Song of the Week
• Just in case you haven't had enough TED this week, check out this wicked music video, created by tweaking some TED speeches. It's quite brilliant.

• Thing I'm Most Grateful for This Week
• All the wonderful friends and amazing people I've met during this 3 year journey through medical school. 

• Thing I'm Most Looking Forward to This Week
• Creating a schedule for my own CIR and planning my post-LMCC vacation!

• Bunny Photo of the Week
• Look how tiny Hoyle was when I first brought him home 3 years ago. I'll try and snap a photo of him later today in the basket again for comparison.

Here he is all grown up...

Jazz isn't any smaller, either...