151 replies to this topic

[brucegray666]

This one:

[Jim Ohara]

This one for me:

[Todd Gross]

Mike: What was the most difficult area of medical school for you?

[Russell H]

Here's a question for all:

If you were a bird what bird would you be? And why?

Okay so it's technically two questions. Stop being so pedantic!

One with big knockers.

OK, so i could only think of a joke answer. I don't know, something big and scary and cool.

[Todd Gross]

Russell: What teas would you recommend, especially for someone whose drinking of hot teas is limited to green and white teas? Should milk and/or sugar be put in them?

[Will]

Jefferson, what do you look like? Ever posted a pic of yourself here?

[Mike]

Jefferson, what do you look like? Ever posted a pic of yourself here?

Maybe it's time for a new 'What do you look like?' thread Will?

Todd in all honesty I didn't find any of it particularly difficult. The most difficult thing to cope with was a wrong decision about sharing a flat at the end of my first year that took me a couple of years to extricate myself from.

Academically, medicine isn't a particularly intellectually challenging thing to study at university, it's just the sheer quantity of information you have to cover, and the speed you have to do it at. I've always been lucky in that I assimilate and process information very very quickly (I can read faster than almost anyone I know, and have been able to do so since before I went to school), so I was generally OK. I put in the right amount of effort to stay in the upper 25% or so of my year, and used the rest of the time to hold down jobs to pay my way through, and to have a bit of fun.

I think we select people for medicine on the wrong criteria; we place too much stress on academic ability.

I took a year out to do an Honours degree in Psychology after my first two years of medical school, and that was far more intellectually demanding than anything I ever did in five years of medicine.

[Jim Ohara]

General question to everyone: Why are you doing the job you're doing right now?

[Mike]

The particular job I have right now? Because it's the only post of its kind in the entire United Kingdom, and I wanted it very very much.

[Russell H]

Russell: What teas would you recommend, especially for someone whose drinking of hot teas is limited to green and white teas? Should milk and/or sugar be put in them?

I tend to drink brands rather than types of tea. A good English Breakfast Tea should work. Milk and sugar are a personal preference - I started out on black tea, then switched to milk a few years later.

[craggy]

General question to everyone: Why are you doing the job you're doing right now?

because I kicked puppies professionally in a past life

[The Lorcan Nagle]

General question to everyone: Why are you doing the job you're doing right now?

I enjoy the puzzle solving, and they pay me a fair chunk of cash.

[Adam Wednesdays]

General question to everyone: Why are you doing the job you're doing right now?

I'm doing the job I'm doing right now because they agreed to hire me. It's that simple. With the exception of a one month period back in April, I was unemployed for over a year (due to a back injury), and for about 5 months before that I was on 2/3s disability income from a job where I wasn't paid that much to begin with (also due to the back injury).

[Arjan Dirkse]

When I had a job, I did it because I liked solving customer's problems, and hanging out with my colleagues, the team I was in was a nice bunch of people.

And yes, i got some money.

[Jim Ohara]

I'm doing the job I'm doing right now because they agreed to hire me. It's that simple. With the exception of a one month period back in April, I was unemployed for over a year (due to a back injury), and for about 5 months before that I was on 2/3s disability income from a job where I wasn't paid that much to begin with (also due to the back injury).

How'd you injury your back? How bad is it?

[Adam Wednesdays]

How'd you injury your back? How bad is it?

I injured my back working in a warehouse. It was at a Hobby Company and I worked in what was called the Manifest Department: after the orders were packed into boxes, they were sent down a conveyor belt to me and the other guys in my department, where we created the shipping labels (UPS, FedEx, etc), and then loaded them into the trucks. I hurt myself on the job, at the scanning station, while lifting a 100+ lb box.

I look back and it really was inevitable. The whole operation was really badly planned out; the management had twice as many people putting packages on the conveyor belt as it was designed to have, so the belts were constantly overflowing with packages and the packers were constantly complaining to the managers that we weren't working fast enough, so there was constant pressure to keep up the speed. I wasn't officially management, but at any particular time I was the one who was most likely to be responsible for running the department; our supervisor was constantly in meetings and being called away, and the word was that when he was gone I was his replacement, which meant I was the one who would catch all the flack even though I had no actual authority to do anything about the situation. So I was stupid and would push myself well beyond my threshold, lifting and moving heavy boxes at a speed that was far too fast to do it safely, and I paid for it. I knew it was impossible to meet the demands that the packers wanted (when I was fired, four of the top five fastest daily "average packages per hour" scores were mine; target was 100/hr, my average was usually around 275/hr), but I wanted to be the guy who the company could count on and I wanted to do my job well. I wanted to pay my dues, work hard, and move up to a better position. Up until I hurt myself, I was on track to do that: my manager and the company president adored me, and the fellow employees who weren't to busy complaining that I was lazy for not being able to clear the conveyor belts all made sure to tell me that they knew what a good job I was doing. Naturally, after I hurt myself the company dropped me like a hot rock at the first opportunity.

As for how bad it is? It depends. Some days it's just some tightness and soreness in my right upper back and shoulder. Other days it's so painful I can barely think, let alone get out of bed or bend down to tie my shoes. But it is much better than it was when I first hurt it, in June 2010. At the risk of getting too dark, the pain was so bad most of the time back then that there were a couple of times I considered swallowing an entire bottle of vicodin to make it go away. It's nowhere near that bad anymore, but it still is incredibly painful and awkward a significant portion of the time.

[Will]

General question to everyone: Why are you doing the job you're doing right now?

Because I like working for the Army and my "deployments" now are a month long at very most, I know when I'm coming home, I stay in hotels, and no one's trying to kill me. Plus, it's fun, I've been told I'm good at it and I work with a great group of people.

[David Meadows]

General question to everyone: Why are you doing the job you're doing right now?

I became a technical author by accident, as the company I worked for as a junior programmer needed one and I was a pretty crap programmer so I gave it a go... and found that I (a) was good at it and (b) loved it.

The specific job I'm in now came from a couple of career choices that I now regret, and the only reason I'm still doing it is because jobs in my field in this region that pay this well are few and far between.

[garjones]

General question to everyone: Why are you doing the job you're doing right now?

In my last one I had a horrible boss that wanted to deflect any negatives onto me so had to escape. When I had gone so had his scapegoat and he was fired 2 months later. My new job also pays better.

It can be a bit frustrating because with very remote manangement and project schedules I have times where I have little to do and right now I am working 15 hour days but it is generally interesting and is okay.

[Sanjay]

Christian - can you plan your next trip to London to cover the few days either before or after the weekend of the 17th March as I'll be there?

Ah, excellent! We'll have to have another drink up - and you'll be able to meet Mike F and Tim, if you haven't done so.