8-4 consult on a Tuesday is turning out to be a real pain in the ***.
4 hours in, and I've seen 30 patients. You do the math...

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1:45pm. Latest tally 36. Had to admit quite a few. My apologies to the ward people.

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Frustration is...

... trying to pry open those *&^$%^ specimen bags, which break apart JUST ABOVE the seal itself. Try having this happen to you 3 consecutive times during peak hour in the ER. Grrr.

... knowing at first glance that your patient "has no veins", but needs blood-taking, IV meds and a drip whether you like it or not, while your queue gets progressively longer.

... seeing a GP referral for "pedal oedema", when the patient has NO such signs, is perfectly comfortable, and could've been spared having to pay $65 for, well, nothing.

... attending to an NS boy for the nth time, who like his many other compatriots, thinks camp MOs are sadistic. ( Ok, I try to sympathize sometimes, but it's hard when the computer records show 15 ER visits in the past 3 months. %$%^&# )

... getting a hypertrophied bladder because going to the toilet invariably guarantees a three-fold increase in patients waiting on your queue. A very effective deterrent, by the way.

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Now that I've got that off my chest... :)

Eye For A Guy Episode 3

This just keeps getting better and better. Yesterday, Rachel demonstrated her wide social circle and the tininess of Singapore in one fell swoop when she grilled Adam the not-cute-at-all-but-very-flirtatious-and-full-of-himself ang-moh about him already having a girlfriend. The expression on his face -- priceless ! My mom fell asleep during the Ubin ODAC nonsense, but I quickly woke her up during the interrogation, after which we both went "Horrrrrrrrr!", which is Singapore-speak for "You're DEAD!". :P

So Adam got booted this week, but not before turning sour grapes and blah-ing about how he couldn't picture himself with Rachel in the long run, etc. My dear boy, don't expect to have any social life in this country after last night. :)

Hmm, it appears Rachel isn't that dumb after all. Either that, or she's just plain lucky.

Sivert remains my favourite of the lot. Getting quite sick of Mark, who keeps trying to outdo the others but always fails. Why do the men dislike Wai Chung so much anyway? I don't get it. He seems pleasant enough, though a bit on the egoistic side. Which guy isn't, btw? ;)

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Conversation with a female friend yesterday...

She: "Say it with me -- all men are b******s."

Email reply from a guy, after I asked if the above is true...

He: "Really, all men ARE scum. The same way women are all b*****s. Grin."

Your views?

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Taken off someone's blog:

"Was irritated with my friend's growing obsession with my "passivity" in handling recent romantic opportunities, and her insistence that I should make the first definitive move, i.e. ask the guy for a date. Hallo???

And then, there was the "what if". What if in choosing to walk, I miss the train? Well, if the train were meant for me, it would wait for me. If it were not, then even if I had run, and caught up with the train, I would not have been able to board the train, for whatever reasons.

If you would open every single door, if you could, to devour every morsel of life, is that Courage? Or just being "kiasu"? Could there not also be Courage in living with the knowledge that some doors needn't (or shouldn't) be opened; that you win some, and you lose some. Would you then open a door because you are more fearful of what you are potentially losing out on, if you had not opened the door? So, one lifetime may not be enough to see and do everything there is to do, but can we not live with life's little disappointments and move on? Na2 De2 Qi3 Fang4 De2 Xia4. No regrets.

"If it's yours, it'll come to you. If it's not yours, it was never meant to be."

I'm learning to have the Patience to wait it out. And I ain't blinking. "

Well said. Methinks it's a chicken-and-egg situation. You need Courage to be Patient. And Courage comes from... various things. Often Unexpected Things. Being put on the spot. Being yanked out of your comfort zone. Being forced to reassess, re-evaluate, rethink. Realize.

I'm a firm believer in convention. Girls making the first move strikes me as a little odd, enlightened / feminist-driven 21st century or not. And yeah, I subscribe to the waiting-train theory, heh heh. Call me a hopeless romantic. I think "Meet The Parents" is one of the best love stories around. But I'd prefer the man to look a little more like Owen Wilson rather than Ben Stiller. :D

Opening doors, to me, is of secondary importance. It used to be a priority, but as I was telling the guy who agrees that all men are scum, there are two main things I can fear: being "left on the shelf", or marrying some man then turning to him one fine day and thinking to myself, "What the heck did I ever see in HIM?"

I choose singlehood any day.

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To: The Dude in London

Kevin Spacey got robbed in a park over there. Which one, I wonder. And what the heck is he doing in London anyhow? Another Broadway play? Can you get me his autograph if you see him? Can you even recognize him? :D

Israeli terrorists are threatening to bomb the UK capital. Yeah, that makes a WHOLE lot of sense.

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Movie quote for today
From "Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl":

Mullroy: Not breathing.
Jack Sparrow: Move.
[Jack slits the ties on Elizabeth's corset and rips it off, causing Elizabeth to regain consciousness, and spit out a lot of water]
Mullroy: Never would have though of that.
Jack Sparrow: Clearly you've never been to Singapore.


3pm. The end is near. :)