"All Day Gunner, No More Funner" Robby

Time seems to go by much more quickly these days. Between lectures, Grand Rounds, dissection in the cadaver lab, small group case conferences, extra courses like ICM and Medicine and Society, eating, sleeping, foosballing, going to the New Moon Premiere, going out, shopping for Halloween costumes, meeting people for coffee, shadowing in the OR, running a student organization, making YouTube music videos, Carolina basketball, V/House/The League/Big Bang Theory, watching the Redskins lose, and taking care of odds and ends around the house, there should be some study time somewhere in there. Our test this past Monday featured the Thorax and Abdomen, and unfortunately, I realized that I had just started studying the thorax 48 hours before the exam. The question was, is it possible to learn two weeks of anatomy in two days? The answer?

Epic fail.

The inevitable occurred: I failed an exam in medical school. In my defense, however, I only failed half of the exam. Indeed, I did extremely poorly on the AIMS online exam (under 2 standard deviations below the mean - so not cool), but I did do well on the practical exam. So what does that mean? That means I know the names of the structures, and I know where they are in the body. I just don't know anything important about them. This makes sense though. In the time I allotted to studying this past weekend, I only had enough time to learn the surface details. Luckily, with about 50% of the course complete, I am still well above passing, and am in no danger of potentially devastating consequences. BUT, that doesn't mean changes were not made...

My reaction has been to develop the "All Day Gunner, No More Funner" Robby for these next two weeks as a trial period. Before every class this week, I have gone through the PowerPoints for the next day and taken notes (on Tuesday I had 18 pages of notes before the Unit even began). I have attended the lectures the next day to fill in holes, and I listened to my first Embryology lecture (Zzzzzzzzz). I opened my Netter's textbook. I have memorized all the Netter's flashcards for this block, days and days before the weekend. I invented a way to describe what is beneath the inguinal ligament. I taught prosection. And I've acted like a douche bag know-it-all in the process. I only went to the studio to finish recording my rap because it was scheduled weeks ago. In short, I am an official gunner (for now), and I'm looking for no less than a 100 on the practical and over a 95 on the written exam this unit. Next thing you know I'll be sending out fake study guides to classmates with false information, ripping out pages of textbooks, and pouring coffee on my colleagues' computers.

We'll see how this trial goes. This is a short blog because it's time to get back to studying (obviously, weren't you paying attention?), but I will describe what it's like to be a gunner in more detail when I write over Thanksgiving, and I will undoubtedly share my remarkable exam improvement. Tootles.