Finishing from scratch.

Somewhere between not posting, attempting to keep up with grad school and work, and completely forgetting about the existence of this blog, I've gained 21 followers - how awesome.

Two months, two never-before taken whirlwind trips - to Calcutta and NYC - and way too many updates to summarize in one post. In an effort to blog smarter and not harder, here's a very brief recap of choice memories from 2010 thus far:

1) Favorite street side snapshots from abroad:

Missionaries in a foreign field

Trying to change the city's infrastructure is like Chasing Pirates.

2) Favorite places/eats in NYC:
- Westville, between Bleecker and West 4th. Try the veggie burger with bacon on a Portuguese muffin... the best contradiction you'll ever consume.

Red Velvet Cupcakes from Magnolia Bakery

- Mamoun's falafel in Greenwich Village
- And, of course, no NYC trip would be complete without a visit to... the NY Public Library!

3) Noteworthy developments & accomplishments:

Finished with PhD apps... in pre-interview, post-interview, & post-acceptance stages for various schools now.

- Checked a couple things off the iconic "should've done this in college (or just earlier in life)" list: ice skating for the first time, brunch at Rise & Dine with an amazing group of Emory students (see above photo), and dinner at Mary Mac's in Atlanta (the closest I'll get to real Southern food until I visit home again in a few months)

- Last, but not least...

The adorable bridesmaid dress for Nick & Emily's wedding!

"...I just want to say that I believe there are options out there! A take a number option, like they have in a deli."*

From The Wall Street Journal | Health

The Henry Ford of Heart Surgery
In India, a Factory Model for Hospitals Is Cutting Costs and Yielding Profits

One of the best quotes?

"What health care needs is process innovation, not product innovation."
- Dr. Devi Shetty

Also, Holy Taco (in East Atlanta) is my new favorite restaurant option for Mexican food. Much better than standing in a deli line for a chicken quesadilla...

*Quote from the latest episode of The Office. Don't know how many options there will be for health insurance if the vote for the recent bill doesn't go through, though...

H.R. 3962, in the House.

Recent weekend developments worth mentioning

In Atlanta:

Crystal Method

Via @ Buckhead

And in health care reform:
- Obama Calls Health Care Bill's Passage 'Courageous' (NY Times)
- Is the House Health Care Bill Better than Nothing? (Huffington Post)
- House health care bill has nowhere to go in Senate (Yahoo News)

Let the health care debates begin... again. Try to formulate your own opinions after actually reading the bill.

What's mine is yours, and what's past is present.

Yosemite National Park (the first title image for A Lifetime in a Fist*)

I won't have time to update for the next week or two. But, since a couple new friends have started reading my blog recently (a fact that I absolutely adore!), I thought that I'd share links to my six all-time favorite entries - primarily for their benefit, but also out of personal nostalgia.

So, enjoy reading and click away (I tend to overload my entries with hyperlinks to interesting sites/sources). Hopefully you'll be well-entertained, or, at the very least, well-informed!

Atlanta Skyline (the previous title image for my once colorless blog)

Descriptions & Links to (Re)commendable Favorites [in chronological order]:

1. Humble beginnings (food, photos, and musical talent)

2. Pure debauchery in the form of personal commentary

3. 5 things that make me happy (more music, food, and artistry)

4. One entry, among many, from my travels in Paris

5. Money, savings, and more (tips, a movie rec, and a book rec)

6. Latest but not last or least (music rec, food fav, and health care)


*Original Yosemite National Park photo taken by my dad; click the photo to view it in its optimal quality.

Econ 101, with a musical twist.

We might be in an economic recession of monumental precendent (check out Paul Krugman's NY Times article - it's been on the "Most Popular" list for the past 5 days), but some high school kids are still willing to pay exorbitant amounts of money for a concert ticket to hear their favorite electronica/pop band.

It's all about supply and demand.

Case in point: Tickets for the Owl City concert in Atlanta were sold out about a week ago. In other words, supply was limited. And, as common sense (and Graph 1 below) might tell you, when the quantity of a product goes down, the price goes up because people are willing to pay more to get what they want. In fact, it wasn't long before tickets started selling on $30 or $40 on Craigslist - even though the original cost of the ticket was only $12. In financial terms, that's called a price mark-up (though, in this case, it didn't really cost the seller anything to "produce" the ticket, so a profit was made without expending any services).

Graph 1: Relationship Between Supply & Price

By 8 pm on the night of the concert, demand had shifted to an all-time high (see Graph 2 below). Desperate, antsy teenagers were huddled in small groups outside the entrance to the venue, willing to pay upwards of $50 for a ticket. One kid actually offered my friend $70 (that's about 580% more than the original price of the ticket!), though my friend was nice enough to sell it to him for $40 - still a solid profit of $28. I'll omit the pseudo-verboten details, but a few of us (myself included) ended up selling our own tickets at a similarly substantial profit and we managed to make it into the concert.

Graph 2: An Upward Shift in Demand

Owl City's overall performance - and, in particular, Adam Young's unfiltered/unedited vocal performance - wasn't nearly as amazing as the ritzy recordings. By purely musical standards and substance, then, my first live U.S. concert wasn't quite what I'd hoped it would be. But the night itself was made memorable by virtue of my friends - the financially-loaded, ticket-seeking "friends" I temporarily made on the corner, as well as the more permanent, financially-savvy friends that I went to the concert with in the first place.

I'm beginning to see how my (currently limited) knowledge of financial accounting and health economics might actually be beneficial when combined with some street smarts; and with friends like these, well, who needs enemies?*

*"The Bird and The Worm", Owl City.

I fall asleep in hospital parking lots.*

*Lyrics from "Hello Seattle" by Owl City (my new favorite music addiction).

For the next two weeks or so, I'll be floating on the virtual corner of health care reform and health care debates, and physically residing near the corner of the public health school and the health sciences library.

Also, I'll most likely be using the word "health" at least once in every written sentence.

A snapshot of my daily "commute" (i.e., my walk across the street).

Lastly, just for clarification's sake, I don't actually fall asleep in hospital parking lots - but a lot of med students and residents do fall asleep on the exceedingly comfortable leather couches in the health sciences library.

Looking forward to health-related raucousness, pedestrian travel, and, if I'm lucky, well-deserved naps on the library couches in the near future. Read me on the flip side.

Knew you, new me.

Today is the first day of a new month, and the last day of an old era - I'll soon be moving out of my last-ever dorm room and settling into my first-ever apartment. My past four years in college have been, in many ways, much more than I could have ever expected, despite the occasional youthful indiscretions and the sometimes unpredictable ups-and-downs. All things considered (not to be confused with the amazing news coverage by NPR every weekday), I made it through without any major injuries, barring one badly-broken toe and a few memorable bruises during a recent game of frisbee in Lullwater Park. To keep the post concise, I'll leave out all the rest of the sappy and/or overly emotional events.

A snapshot of my brand new digs

It's about time I shed the safety nets that undergrad has so graciously provided (for a mere $46,000/year, give or take a few thousand dollars...) and learn to become my own guide to gaining grad school success. Goodbye to dorms (err, "residence halls"), outrageously expensive on-campus parking, and my undergraduate past; and hello to a freshly-furnished apartment, free resident parking, and my grand graduate future. Been there, done that, know the old version of who I used to be - and now it's time for the new me.

A week of firsts and twenty-firsts.

Not much has happened in the past week or so, but here are some choice firsts that are worth sharing. For the most part, all of these firsts involve fun with my friends and my newly-acquired ability to purchase and drink alcohol in the United States, since I finally turned twenty-one about a month ago.

1) Chicken Enchiladas & Margaritas at Los Loros
As the recent reviewers state, "If you need a strong drink in a laid-back atmosphere, Los Loros is a top place to go... The food is cheap and who can complain about $2.50 margaritas (m-w) that knock you off your feet." That was exactly the experience I had... and I think it'll suffice to say that a margarita is not (and never will be) my alcoholic beverage of choice.

Usher at Emory!

2) Usher & Usher's New Look!
Usher, the media mogul and entertainer that Atlanta has claimed as its own talent (even though he's originally from Dallas and grew up in Chattanooga), made a guest appearance on Emory's campus last week. He was here on the behalf of his camp, New Look, which is one of dozens of camps and conferences being held on Emory's campus for part of this summer. Usher's New Look is essentially a non-profit, charity campaign that aids youth and teaches them to harness their talents in sports and entertainment so they can change their community in a socially- and financially-beneficial way. Last year, the camp participants learned about the fundamentals of entrepreneurship and launched a fragrance with the help of experts in the industry. Interestingly enough, it's the alcohol content in cologne that actually makes it so refreshing on your skin.

The Moe's & Joe's Logo

3) Bar-hopping in the Virginia Highlands
After devouring two delicious chocolate-frosted marshmallow brownies (click on the link for the recipe!), my friends and I headed out to the Virginia Highlands this past Tuesday night, to celebrate a close friend's twenty-first birthday. On Tuesdays, Moe's and Joe's serves up $3.25 pitchers of PBR (Pabst Blue Ribbon) beer, and, like the rest of the twenty-somethings there, we joined in the debauchery and bought a pitcher to share amongst our group of five. Afterwards, we escaped the claustrophobic crowds and relaxed at a more quiet table at Fontaine's across the street.

Not surprisingly, we ran into a lot of current Emory students and recent alums at Moe's and Joe's; but, out of sheer and more unexpected coincidence, we also met a girl who works in the genetics department at Emory, in a lab right next door to one of my friends. We ended up conversing about research and medicine and professional aspirations - funny how all of that catches up to you, whether you're sitting in class on a college campus or at celebrating over drinks at a local bar. Sometimes, even alcohol can't succeed in helping you escape the sobering realities of life after college.

Reverse cultural shock.

Five or so weeks in Paris can completely change your outlook on life in the States - like I wrote once before, the real cultural shock hits after you get home from a foreign country. The following are observations in point:

Paris is a city where...
... people spend more hours on the important things in life: eating and enjoying their meals with friends, relaxing in parks and at neighborhood cafés, and walking instead of driving to purchase warm baguettes and pains au chocolat that are baked fresh daily from the local boulangerie.

Atlanta is a city where...
... people waste a lot of hours on unimportant things and then rush through the rest of life: speeding through the drive-thru of fast-food establishments, grabbing artificially-sweet-calorie-filled custard danishes and cups of coffee to go, and then sitting in traffic while commuting to work in their cars.

Paris is a city where...
... if you're a woman and you exist, men hit on you on every street corner, metro stop, café, store front, etc., etc... and sometimes keep following you for blocks, until they get a chance to hit on you.

Atlanta is a city where...
...if you're a woman and you dress provocatively in public, men glance over but don't say anything at all, because saying something remotely offensive might constitute a sexual harassment lawsuit.

The three things that I miss most about Paris:

The métro

Despite its initially claustrophobic-inducing qualities, its lack of air conditioning, and its gritty-watch-where-you're-sitting atmosphere, it's an unbelievably efficient and all-around relaxing commute once you get the hang of things. Even at its most crowded, sardine-packed times, you get the sense that you're only truly Parisian if you can handle the everyday idiosyncrasies of the métro to navigate your way through the city.

The food

Simply put, it's fresh, it's French, and it's fantastic. Every meal I had seemed like the best meal I'd ever had - above is a picture of the amazing four-cheese pasta we had at a restaurant that we stumbled upon during our escapades in Montmartre.

The weather

Compared to the sweltering summer heat and humidity of Atlanta, summer in Paris was a haven of temperate afternoons and relatively cool evenings. Although the weather patterns were somewhat unpredictable and the rainstorms were often unexpected, at least the sun never burnt you to a crisp the moment you walked outside.

Paris isn't perpetually perfect, and Atlanta isn't absolutely abominable, but it'll just take awhile longer for me to really adjust to being back. Though, I think my Parisian perspectives on most of the aforementioned things will always influence my decisions here in the States.


In other miscellaneous news, Dr. Pauline Chen's latest article in the NY Times ("When Doctors Make Mistakes") propelled me to start researching public health practicums that focus on physician-in-training and patient outcomes. I remember reading her book, Final Exam, when it first came out about two years ago - it was incredibly honest and well-written, and I definitely recommend it to anyone who's considering medical school or any reader who just wants to better understand patient care from the physician perspective.

10 years or so.*

Tonight, I was scheduled for a desk shift from 10 pm to midnight - basically, sitting in an office and answering the phone, if it happens to ring. So far, not much has happened, outside of one or two pizza deliveries and a lot of small talk about logging onto the internet, delayed flights, and dinner plans. But, every now and then, my soundscape has consisted of snippets of discussions that seem like windows to my future, if I were to become a clinician, that is. It's odd how your professional aspirations can catch up to you in the places you least expect.







I did a little research, and, apparently, the group of physicians in the lobby have come here from around the country for an event on "Therapeutic Targets in CMD". For the less clinically-inclined, CMD stands for Congenital Muscular Dystrophies - they're basically a group of muscle disorders that strike early in development and cause generalized muscle weakness, among other symptoms. You might have heard the phrase on television before, since Jerry Lewis is the national spokesperson for the organization that raises money for CMD. The underlying cause of disease is a genetic mutation, so rest assured that you probably don't have a CMD if you weren't diagnosed with it at birth.

Emory Commencement photo from Emory Alumni Association albums

Summer's a little more than half-over, and most of my friends, all recent college graduates, are poised to start their first year of medical school or graduate school in different cities around the United States. A few others are about to dive into the intimidating field of entry-level business internships or philanthropic teaching positions like Teach for America, both of which pay modest salaries but offer the possibility of life-changing professional experiences.

I wonder where everyone will end up in a decade or so - it would be ironic if I ended up at a conference like Cure CMD, especially since pediatric rehabilitation is the specialty that I've always been interested in pursuing.

*10 years is an alternative rock band from Tennessee that released a digital bundle of their music about a month ago. I haven't had a chance to hear all their songs, but a few of them, especially their singles "Beautiful" and "Wasteland", are pretty good.

Fin.

La dernière semaine/The last week:

I meant to post updates on my last week awhile ago, but I got miserably sick as soon as I returned to the States - hence, here's the entry about my 5th and last week in Paris, finally, two weeks after the fact.

Some major highlights from the week include sitting on the sidewalk of Rue des Rosiers and eating "The World's Best Falafel" from Chez Hanna on Tuesday afternoon and celebrating the last day of neuroscience classes by having my last Parisian gelato (stratiacella et mangue) and then shopping for French books, presents, and clothes to take advantage of all the discounts during the Soldes (insane sales and bargains that all the stores throughout France have during a select period of the summer) on Thursday. Our entire group had a pretty fancy farewell dinner that same night, at Café Viaduc, where I indulged in my first burger made of foie gras and my last mousse au chocolat. Afterwards, a few of us spent one last night outside of our dorms at Cité Universitaire, laying in the grass and staring at the night sky, before getting busted by campus security for having alcohol on campus and lamenting the death of Michael Jackson - some things never change, whether you're in the Atlanta, Georgia or in Paris, France.

I spent Friday resting up for Saturday (Solidays concerts!) and finishing off the last things on my to-do list for Paris: finally finding a French version of the Unbearable Lightness of Being (La légèreté insupportable de l'être), spending hours reading the book and sipping the best and most authentic chocolat chaud in Paris (a sinfully rich, dark chocolate concoction with heaps of fresh whipped cream, known as "L'Africain") with my brunch omelette at the famed Café Angelina, and then relaxing at the Jardin du Luxembourg before having one last crêpe dinner at Rouge Pomme. If you click on the link for "L'Africain", you'll find a post about Café Angelina's hot chocolate, as well as the recipe for the drink, compliments of an Australian blogger who can actually be followed on Technorati!

Solidays concert program design

I won't go into too much detail about my experiences at Solidays on Saturday, but I think it'll suffice to say that I've never been surrounded by so much energy - the crowds (think Bonnaroo, but with even less regulations and thousands of Europeans), the musicians (5 stages of concerts at this immense camping festival venue in Parc Boulogne of Paris), and the cause (Solidarité for SIDA/AIDS awareness) definitely created an amazingly memorable atmosphere and a fantastic finish to my time in Paris. I didn't last long enough to hear Girl Talk perform at 4:30 a.m. the next morning, but Stephanie Mckay and La Phaze are just two of probably a dozen or so incredibly entertaining talents that I heard during my eventful afternoon/evening at Solidays.

A few of us in front of Fontaine St. Michel (at the beginning of the trip)

After reconvening with a few friends at the St. Michel fountain (ending the trip like it began) and being entertained by street performers/break dancers there, I had my last cup of Parisian chocolat chaud at a small café, right after midnight, and took the last métro back to Cité.

I don't have any brilliant phrases to succinctly sum up the time I spent in Paris, and I can't even begin to find the words to name all the things I loved and will miss now that I've left. What I do know is that I had an absolutely amazing five weeks in France and I'll definitely be going back again some time in the near future, maybe for a public health internship next summer or a graduate semester abroad. I miss Chipotle burritos, barbecue ribs with hot sauce (e.g., Fat Matt's), and Bruster's ice cream sundaes, among all the other random foods and food-related memories with friends that make America so awesome, and it'll be good to get back to those things once I recover from being sick. Happy 4th of July, everyone!

"Just get back up when it knocks you down."

Maybe I should've joined a girl group at age 14 and then decided to be a theater major at Emory...

Because then I'd have a better chance at being more like Keri Hilson.


She's a 26-year-old singer-songwriter from Decatur, Georgia - her debut solo album was released about a month ago, and four of her songs ("Hero" from Nas's quickly untitled album, "Energy", "Turnin' Me On", and "Knock You Down") have been on the Billboard Charts in the past year or so.

Since it's too late and too unlikely that I'll ever get close to being more like her, let's hope she might be a part of Emory's "Art of Songwriting" panel again in the future, so I could at least meet her one day...

I'm feeling knackered right now, but, I think I may need to re-figure things out soon. In the words of Keri Hilson's songwriters (Louis Biancaniello, Rico Love, Sam Watters, and Wayne Wilkins), "I can't afford to slip much further from the person I was meant to be."


*Lyrics from Keri Hilson (ft. Kanye West and Ne-Yo)'s "Knock You Down" and "Energy", respectively.

You could be happy.*

5 Random Things that Make Me Happy...
... because writing out 100 things would take too long, and no one would want to read all of them. But mostly because grand endings and amazing new beginnings call for a little bit of nostalgia.

1. 1 psuedo-made-up word: imeem. It's the concept of YouTube (by the public for the pubilc) combined with the intuition and originality of Pandora - a.k.a., a music lover's heaven. It's where I found Elliott Smith's cover of Jimmy Eat World's "Half Right", one of my all-time-favorite songs, and Leona Lewis's cover of Snow Patrol's "Run".
2. Discovering new music. Recent favorites: Adele, Laura Izibor (I found her and her songs before VH1 did... her song, "Shine" was in the credits for the movie The Nanny Diaries about 2 years ago), and acoustic versions/covers of popular songs (sometimes they sound better than the originals - like the piano version of "Pokerface" and Lily Allen's cover of "Womanizer").

3. Celebrating noteworthy occassions with friends and food. Some memorable and delicious places from this year (and previous years): Baraonda, Chow Baby, Fogo de Chao, and Sun Dial (they have a live jazz trio on Wednesday nights!).
4. Finding answers to questions. If there's a problem, I like figuring out a solution. If there's a blank crossword puzzle, I have this unstoppable urge to write in all the correct answers... "soupcon" was definitely a soupcon.
5. Doing (or making) nice things for other people. There's an argument that no one's truly altruistic and all of us just do nice things because charitable acts make us feel better about ourselves. Sometimes, it's what you do, not why you do it - if it makes me happy to make you happy, why question the motives? (See photo collage below as an example. Also, if you have access and/or a subscription to The New Yorker - or Google Scholar - check out "The Gift" by Ian Parker, from August 2, 2004. The first time I read the article was in high school, but it's still just as mind-boggling today as it was then.)

*Purposeful reference to Snow Patrol.

Biscuits with butter bring bliss.

Recently, Alabama (my hometown, specifically) was in an article of the NY Times - surprisingly, for something positive: biscuits. Not just any biscuits, but buttermilk biscuits that taste homemade and "Parker-style yeast rolls [dipped] in real butter."

From fluffy buttermilk biscuits for breakfast to yeast rolls with lunch and cheddar biscuits served at dinner, biscuits (and rolls) have become a staple of American cuisine, and not just in the South.With graduation coming up in less than a month, I've started thinking about my favorite memories of college, and how most (if not all) of those memories involve food, friends, and family, or some combination of those things. That being written, here are my top three biscuit-related picks for graduation weekend brunch: (hopefully, they'll include family and/or friends, as well.)

1. The Flying Biscuit: My all-time favorite order is the turkey meatloaf, with horseradish cream sauce, served with pudge (mashed potatoes with sundried tomatoes, basil, and olive oil). It doesn't hurt that you also get the best biscuit ever with cranberry apple butter on the side. It's pretty crowded on the weekends, but it's totally worth the wait.

2. Bobby & June's Kountry Kitchen: Don't let the cute misspelling fool you - this place has cuisine with a kick (or should I have written, "kuisine with a kick"?). It's probably one of the only places in Atlanta that you can get a Southern-style breakfast with eggs, bacon, and sausage (and biscuits, of course), and then come back for lunch to have BBQ with a homemade chili sauce tang.

3. Java Jive: I've never been here in person, but apparently, this restaurant ties with the Flying Biscuit for the best homemade biscuits - plus, they have a nice ambiance, complete with great jazz and 1950s decor.

The weather has been really weird in Atlanta the past few weeks - I can't really tell if it's winter weather or starting to become summer, because the temperatures have been fluctuating so much. But, as the Russian author Anton Chekhov** once wrote, "People don't notice whether it's winter or summer when they're happy." And, as soon as I get biscuits, I'll be too happy to pay any mind to the weather.

*Photo taken by S. Arora; from an impromptu celebratory dinner at Panera - i.e., food, friends, and great memories.
** I've been reading Chekhov for my English class; an explanation for the seemingly random insertion of a quote by a Russian author.

P.S. This post was written on my new MacBook =) I branched out a bit and got a case that's not black or white (part of my unofficial campaign to put more color in my life).

My First (and probably only) Top 13 List.

So, I'm sitting in the computer lab, trying to come up with brilliant ideas for the final paper I have to write for my senior biology seminar on ethics & genetic testing, but I just can't seem to concentrate on the task at hand.

For once, though, I can say that my inability to focus is not completely my own fault; the French-American couple at the table ahead of me is to blame for my lack of productivity.

Typically, I would hesitate to stereotype an individual (or pair of individuals) - especially when they're just a few feet in front of me. They seem happy enough together, so maybe there's something I'm missing. Maybe he treats her differently when they're not in public, maybe he's not being serious when he makes fun of her personality, and maybe he's just as nice to her and she is to him. But from the hour or so that I've been in the same room with them, most of what I've seen points to a classic "nice girl dating a jerk" scenario.

It happens all the time, especially on college campuses: attractive and/or perfectly nice girls date not-so-nice guys. And it only leaves me wondering - why???

And that is the reason I have come up with this list - because it's easier than doing my work and because it's more fun than doing my work, too. That being written, here are a couple explanations, albeit overly-generalized, not always true, and not really all-inclusive, that might shed a bit of insight on this inexplicable phenomenon.

The Top 13 Reasons Why Attractive Girls Date Jerks

No. 1. Low self-esteem.
Sometimes, really attractive (and/or talented) girls don't realize how attractive and talented they actually are, so they settle for guys that are jerks.
No. 2. The fear factor.
Let's face it - deep down inside, way too many of us are afraid of not having a significant other at all in our lives, so much so that we're willing to date someone who doesn't treat us well enough.
No. 3. Physical attraction.
If you don't want a serious relationship but you do want to have fun without the emotional entanglements, then dating a jerk is definitely the way to go.
No. 4. Inexperience.
The simple and unfortunate truth of the matter is that some college girls just don't know any better at this point in the game.
No. 5. The enigma factor.
It's hard to explain, but, for some reason, some girls like it when guys have something to hide - it's as if the less a guy says (no matter how much of a jerk he actually is), the more a girl is attracted to him. And then, there's...
No. 6. The surprise factor.
You know when you're watching a really great, action-packed film and you think you have the personality of the "bad guy" figured out, but then the he does something that completely surprises you 10 minutes before the end of the movie? (Slumdog Millionaire is a perfect example of this.) Makes a girl think - there's always the possibility that your jerk of a boyfriend might surprise you in the end, too, right?
No. 7. Potential for change she can believe in.
Despite copious amounts of evidence to the contrary, you can't change a guy if he's not willing to change himself. You can try and try and try, but sometimes when a guy is a jerk once, he's always a jerk. Some things never change, like a person's...
No. 8. Reputation.
A lot of the time, guys who are jerks can get away with it because they have other things going for them - an IQ that parallels Einstein, a musical ability to sing Bob Dylan like no other (like one of my favorite female artists, Adele), or an athletic talent to throw 3-pointers better than Marcus Jordan.
No. 9. Less pressure.
(Something Michael Jordan's son probably never experienced in his lifetime.) If you're not dating someone who's nice to you, there's less of a reason for you to be nice to them, too. Not to mention, if things don't work out between the two of you, no one will fault you for breaking up with him. Although, that's not to say some girls can't handle...
No. 10. More drama.
Dating a nice guy is just oh-so-boring - they're always complimenting you, giving you way too much attention, telling you how beautiful you look, etc., etc. If you date a jerk, though, you can complain 24/7 to all your friends and get a lot more attention.
No. 11. Deviations from the norm.
There are, at times, however, those rare moments of kindness, when he doesn't degrade you or belittle your every action; those exceptions to his general tendency of being a jerk, the niceties that are few and far between - they're just enough to keep you in a suboptimal relationship.
No. 12. He used to be nice.
But as soon as he started dating a girl as attractive as you, he started to take it for granted and turned into a bona fide jerk. I guess, when that happens, a girl can always feign...
No. 13. Apathy and/or affinity.
Sometimes an attractive girl just doesn't particularly care if a guy is a jerk, and other times, she's actually attracted to a guy who treats her like she's worthless - a sentiment that might stem from a multitude of factors (the most common of them being some sort of dysfunctional relationship between her father and mother, which left her thinking that all guys were jerks and that all relationships were supposed to hurt).

It's true that sometimes jerks do get the girl first, and nice guys end up finishing last. But, at least the nice guys get the nice girls in the end, right? For the betterment of humanity, let's hope so.

Maybe eugenics is only a good thing if scientists happen to discover a gene for niceness and parents selectively choose to have offspring with that gene... that's an idea I could actually use for my paper.

Better later than never?

Over the past month or so, I've been reading V.S. Ramachandran's Phantoms In The Brain (along with about a dozen or so other books for my English and music classes), writing too many papers, tutoring more students than I can keep track of at the Writing Center, and stuffing in as much socializing as my stressful senior-year-second-semester schedule permits - it's still hard to believe that graduation is right around the corner.

What little free time I've had in between has been spent learning about blue people (in my course on ethics and the human genome) and preparing for Emory's 5th Annual Barenaked Voices A Cappella concert and Relay for Life this upcoming Friday night - two amazing events for two very different, but incredibly worthy causes. If you're interested, you can make a donation to the American Cancer Society (ACS) and help my team reach their goal at this site: Woodruff Against Cancer.

In other news, I'm getting my first-ever laptop this weekend. I'll be transitioning from my current desktop to a new MacBook by the end of the semester. It's made with arsenic-free glass, no brominated flame retardents, no mercury, and no PVC - I guess if I ever have to toss it out, at least my actions won't be environmentally-unfriendly (MacInTouch Review).

Oh, and awhile back, I cut off about 14 inches of my hair and donated it to Locks of Love. The morning I went to the salon, the weather changed from rain to sleet to snow as I sat in the salon chair. Crazy weather in the month of March, even according to Atlanta's standards.

I also officially (and definitively) decided that I'll be attending Rollins School of Public Health at Emory next fall, which means I'll be staying near Atlanta. Congrats to all the other Emory students who'll be staying here after graduation - whether it's for med school, grad school, work, or anything in between - and congrats to everyone else who's finalized plans elsewhere, too. Maybe we won't all be in the same place, but hopefully we'll see each other again down the road*. Better later than never, right?


*Last photo (of snow near Emory) taken by my friend, A. Rawat.

February, found free.

The backstory

This past weekend, on January 31st, I took the dreaded MCAT. The night before the test, I tried to go to sleep early, but it was nearly impossible to do so while visions of electrical circuits and resistors floated annoyingly through my head. I'd take sugarplums over physics any day.

When I went out to my car the next morning, all my windows were iced over, and, even with my defrost setting and heat on full-blast, I had to wait for what seemed like an interminable amount of time to be able to see through my windshield. Luckily, I arrived at the testing center safely, albeit slightly sleep-deprived and cold, and made it through the entire exam without any major content-related issues or technical glitches.

After months of investing time, energy, and emotion, my long-term relationship with the MCAT finally ended at 12:34 p.m. I'll find out whether or not the tumultuous commitment was worth it when my scores come out on March 4th. I celebrated the sweet end of the MCAT era fittingly, in the sweet company of close friends and the even sweeter comfort of peanut butter mousse-layered chocolate cake from Cafe Intermezzo. Then, I did the one thing I hadn't been able to do for the longest time - I slept peacefully, sans physics, chemistry, or anything remotely academic cluttering the corners of my mind.
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The punchline

I don't remember what things were like before the MCAT was a part of my day-to-day schedule. Now that I'm free to not study, I've found myself filling every available "free" time slot with an event or meeting or errand, because the thought of unchartered territory, of having nothing at all to do, is worse than having to follow the most meticulously-planned schedule in existence.

It would be interesting to see how many of us constantly complain about having copious amounts of academic or professional work because we find those responsibilities socially restricting; but then, when we're finally given freedom to do whatever we want, precisely what we coveted, we end up running away from it rather than embracing it.

It's February, and, although it wasn't easy, I've finally found freedom - freedom from the MCAT and from the stress of once not knowing what I would be doing after graduation. But it might take awhile longer before I can learn how to really be free.

New Year, New Places, People, and Music.

These are what have made my January memorable and enjoyable (so far, at least).

No. 1. Yoforia.

A tasty twirl of heavenly frozen yogurt, with fabulous fresh fruit. Oh-so-good, and oh-so-good for you. Definitely worth the sphenopalatine ganglioneuralgia (a.k.a. brain freeze) on a 15 degree winter evening in Atlanta.









And the refreshing picture is compliments of...

No. 2. kajatl's photos on Flickr, Broderick on WordPress.
http://flickr.com/people/kajjers/
& http://broderickphoto.wordpress.com/

When it's dark almost 18 hours of the day and you feel as though you haven't seen the sun in awhile, his photography will remind you of the optimistic light at the end of the tunnel (and prove to you that it's not always a train). I'd post my favorite photo of his, but a) I have too many favorites, and, b) I'd rather not get sued for copyright when he becomes famous. Hopefully, I won't get sued for the photo above, either, because, at the moment, I only have $2 in my bank account.

Though, it's good to know that talent like his still comes from my once-upon-a-time hometown of Cleveland Heights, and that, sometimes, the best coincidences are the ones you discover for yourself. Like...

No. 3. Kiersten Holine.
Singer, songwriter, and surprisingly sensational. I stumbled upon her covers of the Beatles and Ingrid Michaelson on YouTube, and then decided to pay a visit to her MySpace. Check her out the next time you're in need of some soul-searching and silence just isn't setting the right tone.









The aforementioned won't help me break my target score on the MCAT, boost my chances of getting into grad school, or guarantee my fall-back science journalism internship in D.C. next year; but, at the very least, it's kept me sane through the drudgery of studying and winter weather. And maybe, just maybe, all these things will make your January more worthwhile, too.