It's gotten more intense, but I am exerting a herculean effort to make myself not stress out about all of the tests, demonstrations and activities we have coming up. My lab instructor for nursing assessment yesterday told us that getting an A on every pharm exam isn't what actually matters, it's if you can use your assessment skills on a patient and if you can document your findings. So, since she is a grad of my program, I will be trying to live by her advice. I still am reading and frantically studying, obviously, but if I want to take a break I will (ie root for the Lakers for an hour and a half before getting frustrated, giving up and going to bed). Cooking and working out has helped me to decompress and I've learned how to cook salmon, even if it's not always perfect. Blackened is actually how I would describe some of my "experiments".

We had a guest lecturer on skin assessment today so we got to see pictures of pressure ulcers. I decided that I'm not a fan of them. Please don't Google them if you haven't seen one - in stage 3 they're holes in the skin that make it so you can SEE bone and tendons. Spare yourself! I'm sure that after some exposure to them I won't be so freaked out, but for now I will choose to believe that I won't have to see a lot of them next month in long term care. They make me sad since they look so painful. :(

This week's lab was on breath sounds and I think I am well on my way to being a stethoscope pro. It's a little awkward telling your partners what you're doing (since they already know), but it can only get easier. We drew on ourselves with marker to outline the lobes of the lungs and I didn't really think about washing them off before I went to the gym between lab and class. When I was walking out of the gym, I realized my white shirt had purple splotches all over it where the lines had been drawn. Apparently, my fellow worker-outers now think I can sweat Kool-Aid. I decided it just own it like Regina George does with the holes in her shirt (end Mean Girls reference).

I recently became a fan of Pandora. The I put it onto my iTouch and it played ABBA for the first 20 mintues of studying on Sunday so that's probably why, but it also reminded me just how much I loved the hits of the 90s. I didn't realize my life was so empty without a daily play of "Bitter Sweet Symphony" by The Verve until I had it available. My Liz Phair station is also pretty entertaining, but I like it since now I'm not so stuck in my music rut.