Perhaps it's the End of an Era

It's weird.
I'm watching as most of my friends are grappling with the reality of shedding the ideals and stereotypes (for want of a better word) of "work". Work as the next stage of life perhaps.. mostly because of it's implications of the future. (work is the future right? .. didn't Freud say a person is healthy if they are able to work and love. nothing else.) And for a majority of my friends, work doesn't equate to what they pictured their future to look like.

And me? Well, i guess i took the easy option by delaying the struggle by a couple of years. =P

But seriously, the allure of the workplace must be something. Why else would people be doing it?

Or it could be just like school- some people hate it, some people love it, but regardless, you're there to learn.

*shrugs*

I've kinda finished christmas shopping *finally*!
I just hope that they like their gifts.
Boy was it hell to shop! Especially when you don't know what to get, and you're aimlessly wandering around the place hoping for inspiration to hit you in the face. My parents would have to be the hardest peoeple to shop for in the whole world! Luckily i broke down while we were wine tasting in Adelaide and bought an $11 jar of the hugest olives you've seen. That came in handy because i totally couldn't think of anything to get for dad. Tuesday, i chaperoned ian around while he went through the same process of wandering aimlessly around westfield- only condensed to one day. (lucky him!)

It's Claude's birthday tomorrow. umm.. in 6 mins to be exact. I wonder if she's better? It'd be terrible to be sick on your birthday .. even if it's residue sickness. Anyway, Happy birthday Claude!

And it's Christmas in 3 days! How exciting..! really.. i'm a little bit excited -for no reason some people might say. But i honestly love Christmas! =)

Sonic Hedgehog:

1) A famous hero for a console game entitled 'Sonic the Hedgehog". Dreamt up by a Japanese dude working for Sega.(i think) Reached peak popularity during the early 90's.

2) The name of a homeotic gene which has been proven to play a cruicial role during the development of a fetus. Sonic Hedgehog mediates the interactions between the notochord and the ectoderm and mesoderm beginning at abouts 18days after fertilisation. The notochord induces the body to form around it- it is the "anchor" for the development of the fetus.

A gene called Sonic Hedgehog.
How about THAT?

P.S. 6 days till i get home!

It took approximately 22 hours before this apple grew mould.

Yesterday was my cousin's wedding. (My big cousin- Chris!) I am so happy for him- his wife Elly is awesome! She has only met me once before the wedding, and still she remembered my name!
The wedding is really the conclusion.. well.. the the end of the beginning - pardon the cliche.
The beginning? They met in China.
Chris wanted to learn Manderin in China, so he went there for a year.
Elly grew up in Indonesia, but was studying Manderin in China also. However she had been there for a few years prior to 'the meeting'.
So what are the odds that an Australian born guy and an Indonesian born girl meet in some foreign country, randomly hook up, and remain hooked up for the past 5 years across different countries?
It's weird how things just happen. I bet neither of them had any idea how this would turn out.. =p
I like randomness. And this world is full of such probabilities.

Kind of reminds me of the Heart of Gold and it's Infinite Improbability Drive.

But real.

I often wonder how my friends at home are progressing through their lives...? If anything has changed, If they have discovered anything wonderous, If they have bought anything grand, If they still remember me?

Today I tasted my first Fruit mince pie. I learnt that Fruit mince pie's DON'T contain fruit AND mince meat, but just minced fruit. It was like discovering that Santa isn't really real! What a discovery! Talk about eyes wide open.

I am the sole proprietor of the Ministry of Spontaneous Acts of Infinite Variability.

I'm so sad.. lol!

Exams in 2 weeks, 3 days.(What's a chi^2 Test?!)

I'm so scared! =/

Today a friend at school asked me and a group of other med students to talk about the kinda of text books we used and would recommend to the next intake of students next year. At one stage i blurted out that I would marry Sherwood. (A physiology text). I didn't think that a day would come whereby I would appreciate a text book so much that I would declare my love for it in public. Oh well, there's always a first time for everything.

We're studying embryology and genetics at the moment- and i'm kinda fascinated about how the human embryo develops from a cell to a fully fledged being. It's kinda amazing. We saw an ultrasound of a baby at 12 weeks, and you could see it kicking and stomping around in the mother's belly and everything! I didn't realise that it was so.. well.. alive at the age of -6months.
We also had a prac where the professor shows us various embryos with developmental abnormalities and defects. This one chicken embryo had 2 beaks. Another had it's guts on the outside of it's skin- with each visceral organ duplicated! (So it had 2 stomachs, 2 livers, etc..) Another's head wasn't fully developed so it's brain was exposed.. gross and fascinating at the same time!

...underneath the steps...

There is 2 showers in my new place, and 3 girls and 2 guys living together.
Thought this was funnie- Who would have thought that the differences in gender could be neatly summed up and captured in a picture such as this? =p

Today the girls of the house went and indulged ourselves by watching Bridget Jones' Diary. When we arrived home, one of the boys had baked us scones! (There goes my theory that all guys have kitchen allergies... Especially to the oven...)
T'was a thoughtful, beautiful gesture. And the best bit- it was purely random- So it was a surprise!

Speaking of surprises- the fact that Baz remembered the date of my birthday was amazing! Smsing me out of the blue!

Speaking of out of the blue.. nothing screams breaking Australian news like the break-up of Delta and Mark Philippoussis for shock horror good old Paris Hilton.

Speaking of Paris Hilton, I think i need to get a life because i'm going to ask.... *wait for it* Did anyone watch the OC?