Paperwork woes!

Don't you hate filling out forms? I do.Its painful, it makes me nervous and did I say I hate it already? *sigh*
I recieved my contract and a tonne of other paperwork from the hospital the day before.I don't know why but I've always dreaded stuff like this. Out of all the people in the world, I should be totally conditioned for all this by now...I am and have always been the official paper work looker-up-per and form filler for my family for all sorts of stuff ;visas to passport renewals to you name it and not to forget my own licensing exams and residency applications....but the fact that I can already feel my hands go cold and the jitteriness set in suggests otherwise. So, here I am staring at this ominous looking large white envelope in front of me with all these forms.Come to think of it...how bad can it be? For example this one form should be real easy to get done with...I don't smoke,don't drink,no history of substance abuse or dependance, not bipolar or schizophrenic.Its a good thing they don't ask about OCD....cos right now I am pretty convinced I have an element of that..ha!Ohh and heres some more.....what days do I not want to be on call? during what months do I plan to take a vacation?what rotation schedule would I most want to have for myself...blech..You know why I am not liking this too much...because I just don't like thinking so far ahead...and I have to now..
Oh well,this needs to be done...new pictures need to be taken and everything needs to be mailed out in a few more days...joy!

Jeff Beck - Nadia

The Whirling Dervish

My Visual DNA

I was about to turn in after posting about DP's step 2 when I found this "visual DNA" at Que sera sera's blog.I couldn't help but get one for myself as well.While I've never been a big fan of such tests or whatever you may call them....I must say this one was so much fun and mostly spot on for me!

Read my VisualDNA™ Get your own VisualDNA™

DP's Step 2

DP (DrPak) takes his USMLE Step 2 (CK) exam a couple of hours from now. I hope very much that it goes real well,inshaAllah and look forward to him getting down to blogging again soon.

Through A Child's Eyes

From an email that O-C forwarded to me ; to the eternal child that I assume is alive deep down in all of you...enjoy!

March Madness

The only sport I have ever followed is cricket. Sadly, my enthusiasm for it has waned ever since I moved to the US...blame the studying,our team not doing particularly well etc etc. I don't even know whats happening with the cricket World Cup other than the fact that our team sucks. Things may have been different had I been in Pakistan but oh well.Anyways, right now I probably have working knowledge of college football and that too by default, courtesy D. Quite unlike a (typical) Pakistani girl, she is a huge sports fan. What little I know of American football today is because of her...be it college football or pro...she'd be on top of what ever is happening. Its always fun watching games with her but honestly I'd rather watch Law and Order or House or Scrubs.So,I was actually quite relieved (much to D's dismay) when the football season ended last year.
I spent most of today morning doing grocery with my mother and when we got home in the afternoon, D was in her favourite spot in front of the tv.....right where we'd left her. Apparently its basketball season or watever now and its called March Madness. She stayed there watching game after game after game till a little while ago when I dragged her out! What was interesting was that she had this paper in her hand which she'd used to predict the outcomes of each game...yellow is where she'd been right and pink is where she'd been wrong. She and a few of her colleagues are all doing this and whoever makes the most right guesses wins twenty bucks. ESPN, supposedly is doing the same on a much bigger scale and they just found out too late about it and decided to play (?) between themselves. I find this quite interesting and amusing at the same time but I don't think I'd ever be so into it all ; D just thinks I am dead boring.

The Match - 2

The match results are in and alhamdulillah I've matched at my top choice! :)
It all hasn't really sunk in as yet and hence the short blog entry....hehe...but thank you all for keeping tabs on me and all the support.Shall write more soon.

The Match

I got to know part of my "Match" results yesterday ; I say "part of" because I am yet to find out where I have matched but the good news is that I have matched into a residency program somewhere,alhamdulillah.I find out about the "where" bit on the 15th of March and shall of course let you guys know. I called my father to let him know as soon as I found out and not too surprisingly he did what he has always done in situations like these. Over the course of these past two years of taking exams and the fact that I have spent lots more time at home ever since I graduated I came to realise now that after almost every exam he'd ask me what my "gut feeling" was about how I did(and now that I think of it this goes as far as I can remember). My answer(since the time I was fifteen) has always been the same : "I don't know and right now I really don't care" and usually thats the end of it all. Now this might make him seem like those pushy parents who are on their childrens' backs to do well...oddly...I've never felt that way...but I am totally amused by this "what's your gut feeling?" question which also happened to be the recurrent theme after all of my interviews and then when I was about to submit my rank order list. Anyways, I have never been much of a thinker (DP says thats a blessing...I think he's just happy that I can't bug him on account of that in addition to all the other things I bug him about)...yeah... so not being a thinker helps and keeps me sane...but every time my father pops the "gut feeling" question its like my self set equilibrium gets all topsy turvy. So, yesterday he popped the same question about what my gut feeling was as to where I'd end up.My answer : "I don't know and right now I really don't care". What was a little weird this time round was that instead of letting it go like he usually does...he asked me to tell him what my top three choices were again and even though I knew he was always the strongest advocate of the program close to home...the moment of silence that followed after I'd told him my choices again made me realise how much he'd love for me to match at that program (my numbers two and three are out of state programs). It was as if he was taking it all in and balancing out the entire me moving away bit with the protective fatherly instinct.It also made me feel bad for that impatience riddled reply and made me think about how at times we take our parents' love and affection for granted....so,I told him that I hoped very much to match at my number one but if it didn't happen that way it would be Allah's will and be for the best,inshaAllah. I hope this took some of his worry away at least...it probably did.
The match is quite unpredictable.I personally know of four people who didn't match and just knowing that somone who went through all this with you and got unlucky is terrible. I feel very blessed to have made it through.From the blogosphere ,both Usman and Uzer got matched. Unfortunately, Moiz didn't...which is very upsetting.The next two days is whats called the "post-match" or the "scramble" where people who have not matched try and get a spot at programs that have unfilled positions. I don't know whether Moiz is going through the scramble or not but we wish him the very best and will be praying that things work out well for him inshaAllah.

The American Idol Vote-Offs

Since I have enough free time now to be investing five hours a week in watching American Idol, I thought it'd be ok to blog about this last vote off they had on the show (and alright...I admit I enjoy watching it and would do so even if I wasn't as jobless as I am these days). So these two guys were in the bottom two this week and one of them was to be voted off. The desi kid Sanjaya Malakar who is in the second video was pretty good during the auditions but he was nothing to write home about the week before and I thought he was terrible this week. Surprsingly, AJ Tabaldo who did ok the first week and did great this week (great song, sang well,awesome reviews by the judges) got voted off....the entire US desi population probably voted for the desi kid to keep him in the competition.He better pull off something great next week if he is to stay.

AJ Tabalado - Feeling Good

Sanjaya Malakar - Stepping out