things a medical student learns that you might not know #2

I apologize that it’s been awhile.

I thought I’d jump back in it by giving you a few clinical triads. The combination of these three symptoms is pretty indicative of a certain disease/medical issue and their combined presence warrants further investigation.

Diabetes Mellitus – inability of the body to regulate blood glucose levels

1. Polyphagia (increased eating)

2. Polydipsia (increased thirst)

3. Polyuria (increased urination)

Normal Pressure Hydrocephalus – increased pressure on the brain due to a larger than normal volume of cerebral spinal fluid (brain juice)

1. Dementia (often presents as decreased memory)

2. Incontinence (bladder control issues)

3. Gait Abnormalities (balance issues while walking)

Shaken Baby Syndrome – a form of child abuse

1. Retinal hemorrhage (bleeding into the back part of the eye)

2. Subdural hematoma (bleeding in the brain caused by the shearing of veins that cross the brain’s protective coverings)

3. Acute encephalopathy (sudden onset brain dysfunction)

Blowin’ it

We’ll be back next week, hopefully.

Going Sporcling?

Back in the day, Mr. Nash and I would often find ourselves at westside Denny’s during weekend late-nights. One of our excellent means of passing the time included what I now call “the category game.” This game, inspired by the underrated ESPN tv show ‘Stump the Schwab,” involved one of us coming up with a category and then us taking turns naming things that fit into that category. The game would end when someone couldn’t name anymore. For example, under the category “Robert De Niro movies,” I would start off with “Taxi Driver” he would say “Goodfellas” and we would continue until the least memorable movie, “Godsend” was mentioned.

Anyways, I recently came across a website that follows a very similar concept: http://www.sporcle.com. Here, there are many different categories (movies, music, geography, sports to name a few) and you can play the category game by yourself. It even has statistics on how people tend to do on these lists. It has nearly ruined my medical education. I highly recommend it.

a tall tale

I’ve never done any creative writing before and for some reason last night at 1:30, as I was trying in vain to go to sleep, I thought it would be a good idea. After some very minor editing this evening here is what I came up with, bear with me.

The sun was nearing the finish of its slow decent when Bernard Beaver climbed from his den to survey his corner of the pond.

“My little pile of sticks has nearly grown into a proper dam,” he thought to himself.

Bernard slapped his large leathery tail in both a moment of delight and pride at his own hard work and what it had brought him.

A pair of mallard ducks, startled from their rest by the abrupt thump of Bernard’s tail sprung from the water as if they could not take flight quickly enough.

“Sorry!” Bernard called after them, but his apology came too late. Circular patterns of ripples were already spreading across the pond from the many points where the tips of the duck’s wings had met with the previously still water.

Over the cattails and reeds along the far side of the pond Bernard could see cars rushing along a highway in both directions, their headlights flashing across the surface of the water as they whizzed by before fading into the cool spring evening.

The highway, although dangerous, was familiar territory to Bernard as were the many ponds adjacent to his own and the rocky fields just to the far side of them. Beyond that Bernard had never ventured. In fact, he had often mused about traveling to the great hill in the distance but never had he mustered the courage to set out on such a journey.

“It wouldn’t be too difficult,” Bernard said. He hoped that by saying it aloud maybe he could convince himself it was true.

He thought he would be able to get there by crossing underneath the highway and moving west along a nearby stream. The biggest problem would be avoiding all of the other beavers, many of whom were much larger than Bernard and not fond of uninvited guests.

But Bernard entertained the idea for only a moment more. He was not really one for adventure and the thought of confrontation with a larger beaver, let alone the unknown danger that might lurk toward the setting sun, was troublesome enough to sway him from the idea.

“In any case, there is much work to be done” Bernard thought as he slid from his dam into the dark water.

On land he waddled awkwardly, he was strong but his wide heavy body and stubby legs made him a cumbersome fellow. In the water, however, he felt at home, his webbed feet and tail acting in unison to propel him deftly through the pond.

Lifting his head to the surface Bernard gulped a great breath, and just before diving he took one last look toward the hill which now stood in the hazy shadow of twilight.

- – -

And here was my inspiration for the story.

Roadkill #6: Beaver (Castor Canadensis) Found on Westbound shoulder of Highway 26 mile 31, near Othello WA. Picture taken on 2/15/10 at 5:10 p.m.

A couple of interesting notes: Beavers are the second largest rodent in the world, there are only two extant species of beaver, beavers are really cool.

it happened at Wal*Mart

Saturday Nicole and I traveled from Pullman Wash. to Moscow Idaho for a mild adventure. We needed batteries for the camera so we made our first stop the Moscow Wal*Mart. While there we decided to take a look at Valentine’s Day paraphernalia, some of which was “Twilight” themed, featuring a number of the male actors from the film series. Nicole and I were making jokes about them when an older male standing behind us with his son informed us that “Those guys are gay.” Hearing this, Nicole and I both chuckled awkwardly, the guy must have heard because he felt it necessary to retort, “I’m not joking, those guys are gay.” At that point I found it difficult not to bust out laughing but thought it wiser to just grab the batteries and get out. And so began an adventure in Idaho.

down where the southern cross’ the dog

My father and I spend a lot of time talking about music. Blues has been a slowly and recently acquired taste for me. We were discussing our favorite blues songs and why. Not necessarily the best, but our favorite. Anyways, he decided to write his down for the bag. So here you go, Bill Nash’s ten favorite blues tunes (not in any particular order):

1.  “Statesboro Blues” – Allman Brothers (Fillmore East)

Duane’s solo on the intro is phenomenal. He plays so lyrical and his ability to swing is just not matched. The interplay between He and Greg on the verses is very special. Berry Oakley’s bass playing is the textbook example of walking through the changes.

2. “Sittin’ on Top of the World” – Howlin’ Wolf

Not only in my top ten of blues song, but top 10 songs of all time. A structural departure from standard 12 bar blues changes that maintains complete blues integrity,  even while throwing in a 4minor chord. His vocals ranging from sweet to nasty are great. The subject matter is perfect blues – she’s gone, life is hard, but it is OK as I am totally cool….Piano playing is free and sloppy. Recording is true to the day and has its own sense of charm.

3. “Sittin’ on Top of the World” – Cream (Goodbye)

This is a great live version of the Howlin’ Wolf classic and showcases Cream at the pinnacle of their playing. This was the song (as well as others off this album) that led me to the original blues masters. I am especially impressed by the bass playing.

4. “Souped up Ford” – Rory Gallagher (Against the Grain)

One of the most overlooked players of the 20^th century. This tune is a barn-burning romp all the way through. I cannot listen to it without smiling and tapping my foot. Especially good in a fast car on a straight highway. Love the way he yells “Lou Martin” right before Lou takes his piano solo.

5. “Lazy” – Deep Purple (Machine Head)

Purists will balk, but I do not care. By far my favorite Richie Blackmore solos. I wish he did more straight ahead blues tunes. The arrangement is also clever in that it is a traditional Jazz structure. Organ intro – leading to a common melodic them played by multiple instruments before breaking off to vocals and solos. Then the “head” theme is repeated at the end after a modulation and onto a halftime finish.

6. “Boom, Boom, Out go the Lights” – Pat Travers Band (Live)

Originally a Little Walter tune (though penned by Stan Lewis).  May feel a bit dated as it has the arena rock vibe, once passed that you cannot argue with the stellar playing by all. I was lucky to see this done live in the 70s as Pat Travers opened for Rush on a couple tours. The interplay between Pat Travers and Pat Thrall is a standout.  

 7. “Goin’ Down” – Freddy King

If you want to listen to what inspired Clapton more than anything (according to several interviews), this is a great place to start. The whole attitude and feel is perfect. Freddy’s vocals find that great balance of humor, vinegar and confidence. Freddy at his best would probably wipe the stage with anyone in the genre.

8 – “Goin’ Down” – Jeff Beck Group

Yes, another cover/duplicate entry. This rendition has an overall feeling of freedom that I never seem to hear in anything recorded in the last couple decades. I get a sense that the point during this take was to have a great time playing no matter what anyone (public, labels, promoters etc) thought. Consummate musicians playfully challenging each other to find that elusive magic. This was also the era when Beck seemed to stop playing like a guitar player and more like Miles Davis.

9 – “Country Mile” – Rory Gallagher (Calling Card)

Perfect blend of traditional and modern electric blues. Love the bass bouncing from one to minor third during verses and then the major feel of the bridge. Lyrics have a timeless flavor as they present first the negative aspects of one’s life and upbringing, with the joyous payoff of driving fast down a country lane. This gets into the Buddhism of blues – life is hard but there is also much joy if you can live in the moment.

10 – “Thunderbird” – ZZTop (Fandango)

This giant, sweaty, beast of a song makes my list as there is nothing I have heard that compares. Three guys playing unbridled, blistering blues at a decibel level shared with aircraft. The bass sound is the sonic equivalent of a Sloppy Joe with melted cheese. BFG’s tone is huge, but with such great clarity that you can hear his fingernails. The added fun of Gibbons playing the same lick 14 times but all in slightly different ways is one of the great moments in live music.

This list is only my own personal opinion and is not reflective of what I would list as the top 10 important, groundbreaking or influential blues tunes.

legends of The Hidden Temple

In addition to a great mid-1990′s Nickelodeon television program, Legends of the Hidden Temple is also what I hope to call a new section of grabbag that will chronicle an attempt to procure a space for and construct an indoor skatepark in the Olympia area.

Now, this process is well underway but neither Britton or I has been willing to blog about it because we thought we would jinx it or because we didn’t want to get ahead of ourselves. Either way, it’s really all I have been thinking about recently and now that it looks like it might just come together I wanted to share my apprehensive glee.

I say apprehensive because we’ve been burned in the past; this deserves a little background.

The quest for a prospective indoor skateboarding facility began early last fall when Britton and his roommate Patrick were informed by the city of Tacoma that they must remove our skateboard  ramp from his back yard or pay a $500 fee and then remove the ramp.

Instead of expunging said ramp we took as long as legally allowed and then some before carefully dismantling and extracting the ramp from the yard and hauling it to temporary storage in Olympia. After exploring a number of possibilities we realized the best solution would be to rent a small warehouse space to house the ramp as well as a few other small skateboarding obstacles. Finding such a space was much easier said than done. We met with agents who led us to believe we would be able to rent spaces only to renege on their original offers or refuse to return numerous phone calls. After weeks of getting the run-around we were beaten and had resigned, at least for the time being. We had told only a select few friends about our efforts. Months later one of those people turned up a gem.

Matt Lemier who, after elbow surgery to repair a skating injury, found himself with a surplus of free-time came to me with his find. A seemingly perfect warehouse, nearly 1600 square feet with a loft office in a great location. We scheduled a meeting and viewing for the next day and seemed set to act after seeing how great it was. Again we were foiled, the space along with the space adjacent were rented out the very next morning. Despite another setback a dormant spark was reignited. Other friends were informed and the search resumed. Brett Cihon jumped onboard as did Zach Weintraub as did his roommate Rob Malone both of whom are currently living in New York but moving plan on moving to the area in mid-march. Another day passed and Matt located another warehouse handled by the same property manager. Skipping out of work early Britton and I met with Matt to view our newest prospect, a 2400 square foot piece of paradise for just $1000 a month. While there we were informed of a major and most unfortunate issue, we would have to find an insurance plan with at least $1,000,000 of personal injury liability for our “business.” Not having any idea what this meant Matt went to work locating a provider and getting a quote while Britton and I went to work speculating on how we could get around it or at least try to rustle up some extra cash.

After finding out more information and crunching some numbers we realized our plan was beginning to fall apart. That brings us to last night when I began drafting a fundraising letter to send to anyone who either has money to burn or actively supports local skateboarding initiatives (i.e. Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, Oprah, Rob Dyrdek, Tony Hawk … you get the picture). The letter was pretty hopeless, a shot in the dark but I thought maybe worth a try.
Today (Wednesday) we met again to discuss our prospects. The best idea we came up with in nearly an hour of talking was to pool all of our money, take it to the casino and put if on red, compared to our other options – prostitution, auto-theft, cooking meth – it seemed like a good idea.

After revisiting the area of the proposed training ground and talking with other tenants about utility bills I felt a little disheartened but a few phone calls really turned things around. Britton called up a little known yet reliable friend who skates who said he was in and good for the money. We also got confirmation from Zach that both he and Rob were down to kick in cash and make the place a “thriver’s paradise.”

Matt inspects the warehouse space and concludes that it is awesome.

As it stands we are still finalizing some plans, talking back and forth with Zach and Rob who are currently on sig-zag cross-country greyhound bus ride, and discussing getting a business license to do this thing legit. In addition, I will be drafting another letter, this time looking for sponsorship from energy drink companies, something I think slightly more likely than getting free money from the founders of Microsoft. As always, more to come as this situation evolves.

The Killing Floor

Myself, Safari Bob, and Britton are in the midst of starting a professional recording studio titled, “The Killing Floor”, which, in the opinion of Mr. Nash, is one of the best blues songs of all time. We will be using Pro-Tools software which is a recording program which works on a Mac or PC. On the program we can record, mix, add effects, etc with almost unlimited tracks and possibilities. We are having a friend that works at 4^th Dimension Computers in Lacey build a system capable of handling the program, (lots of ram and a big hard drive, <not sexual puns>). We have obtained an M-Audio Ultra 8 USB 2.0 interface. This converts the signal from the microphones and instruments into a digital signal. Basically we will have eight microphone lines into the unit and one USB cable out into the computer which is great as it reduces cable clutter and simplifies the process. We are using Shure, Samson, AKG, Sennheiser, and other microphones, Behringer headphone amp, AKG headphones, Monster Power conditioner(glorified power strip), Gator Rack, Onstage stands, and a number of other top quality components. We hope to be up and running within the month and be recording and producing some sick beats, as well as working on our own bands material.

 

This will be a brief history of the bald mank twat that is known the world over for having a head like a fucking orange.

The story begins in the late 90’s. Ricky Gervais and Steven Merchant, most well known for being writers, directors, and actors in The Office and Extra’s, were hosting a talk radio show on the UK station XFM. In 1998 XFM was bought out by Capital Radio Group and the two were let go. Steve went on to do a production internship at the BBC. He came to Ricky and asked him if they should film a short, based on a character Gervais created called “Seedy Boss”(David Brent). Little did they know that this would become one the most popular TV shows of all time. After the success of The Office broke, Gervais and Merchant were invited back to XFM to host a Saturday talk show. This time, because of their fame and status, they would be provided a lackey to do all of the grunt work and also produce the show. Into the picture comes Karl Pilkington.

Karl Pilkington was born and raised in Manchester, England. He has little to no education. He spent lots of time on holiday with his parents, skipping school, and also rode his bike a lot. Gervais immediately took note to the roundness and baldness of Karl’s head. He has been continually mocked for the past decade because of this. On the XFM show, Ricky and Steve mostly poked fun, and asked questions of Karl about his childhood, idea’s about life, death, and freaks. The show also featured Monkey News, a piece by Karl in which he would tell stories of monkeys that had done amazing things, i.e. go into space etc. Recently the XFM Ricky Gervais Show Vault has become available on Itunes. I highly recommend it, as it will give you a taste of what’s to come in a vast and growing catalog.

After the XFM show was finished, Ricky, Steve, and Karl started a podcast. It was similar to the XFM show without music breaks. The shows varied from 30 to 60 minutes and contained countless theories and tails from Karl from injecting old women in the head so they live their life backwards, to washing dishes without any thumbs. The podcast also featured Monkey News again but was quickly overshadowed by an amazing find. Karl revealed a few episodes in that he had started a diary. Ricky immediately got a hold of it and began reading it out on air. Hilarity ensued. It began with stories of his most recent holiday to problems with his boiler. The podcast featured this in its first two seasons.

What really made Karl famous was his bizarre statement about eating an animals penis. It was when he was discussing the UK TV show “I’m a celebrity, get me out of here” where contestants had to eat an animals penis that Karl stated that he couldn’t eat a penis in the morning because of his delicate stomach. However, he stated that, “I could eat a knob at night.” Gervais then asked all podcast listener to make a dance remix with “I could eat a knob at night” as the sound clip. Since then there have been hundreds of mixes posted online and submitted to the show. A Google search for the quote yields 935000 hits.

 

The second and third seasons were very similar, featuring all the classics except monkey news and focuses on Karl complaining about his Kidney stones, various holidays, and a fascination with insects. He also claims to have seen a bee have a heart attack. Ricky has often states that the show should really be called “The Karl Pilkington Show”.

To date, The Ricky Gervais Show is the most downloaded podcast in history. All three seasons are for sale on Itunes and on Audio book.

After the podcast ended, the gang has gone on to do a number of specials for various holidays and events. Most recently they have been doing a series called, “The Ricky Gervais Guide To…” Where they discuss topics such as Arts, Natural History, The Future, and The Human Body. As you can imagine, these are all absolutely hilarious.

Karl has written three books. The World of Karl Pilkington (lots of excerpts from season 1), Happy Slapped By a Jelly Fish (Tails of holidays and complaints of places he‘s never been), and Karlology (a book about him trying to learn stuff).

I ask one thing of you Grab Bag followers. Even If you are not willing to buy the audio books etc. (all available on Itunes, search for Ricky Gervais) please go on you tube and listen and watch everything with these three guys in it but especially Karl. Ricky is making his life goal to make Karl as famous as possible but without respect. Study Karl, write about him, but up posters, tell your friends about the shows. Lets see how famous we can make Karl Pilkington.

Below are some great links related to this blog. Thanks to all that have read this and I hope you go out and get everything these guys have ever done.

Also, check out the HBO animated “The Ricky Gervais Show” coming out on February 19^th.

Later -Rob

^{http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wok3uJPXOh4}

http://www.pilkipedia.co.uk/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page

http://www.hbo.com/the-ricky-gervais-show/index.html 

shameless propaganda, bummer… summer.

Some near and dear friends of the the bag, Zach Weintraub, and Nandan Rao, have frittered and wasted their hours undertaking the arduous task of writing, producing, and directing a full length feature film. Bummer Summer, check it out here or here. I hope to soon provide some more information regarding this film, but for now I will leave you with the basics.

As far as I can tell (having seen very little), this film promises to be an angst filled coming of age drama, gritty and raw. Filmed in black and white, driven enthusiastically by a neophyte cast and crew. The one sheet’s billing block declares an original soundtrack by cast and crew. 

For a full synopsis, as well as other information, check out the Bummer Summer official website

The film was written, directed, and co-produced by NYU film school graduate Zach Weintraub. Nandan Rao, NYU film school registrant, co-produces, as well as undertakes the duties of director of photography. Filming took place during the summer of 2009 on location in the Pacific Northwest. Subsequently, operations were moved across this great country of ours, to the filthy bum laden, garbage covered, rapist teeming streets of New York City. It was here the film was completed. Bummer Summer was recently accepted to the 20th annual Cinequest Film Festival is San Jose, CA.

These are super good dudes, who have worked their asses off and given %110. It is rare to see that kind of passion for anything, from anyone these days. Whether you like what you see or not, you gotta respect that. Take a few minutes and check out the YouTube trailers. Official Trailer #1, and Official Trailer #2. 

Below are some stills I stole from the facebook page, enjoy at your own discretion.