Shopping!
So today was grocery day.
Thought I'd try out a few different places to see what they had.
Hess
-all right, this is actually a gas station, but you can't but groceries if you can't get to them
-used the "Gasbuddy" app on my android phone to find the lowest gas station prices near my location
-had a lot of trouble with one of the pumps.
Aldi (8261 Coral Way, 33155)
-far away
-spent about $26 here
-only thing they had significantly superior prices on was skinless boneless chicken breast and some lemons
-Overall: probably not coming again unless im driving to Hess to buy cheap gas as well
Amigos (2460 SW 27th ave)
-spent $3
-run of the mill corner shop, mostly canned goods
-bought some chickpeas and made a killer hummus
-seriously this hummus is so smooth you could pour it into a waterbed and sleep on it
-and then eat it in the morning
-well assuming it hasn't gone bad
-most of their fruit looked sad and poorly nourished
-Overall: great for canned beans?
Milam's (2969 SW 32nd ave)
-somehow prices everything at double the average store, yet remains popular
-nice decor, especially the liquor section
-if you are a poor/cost-conscientious student, avoid like the plague
-remember to also avoid actual plagues
Publix (located everywhere)
-pros: very close
-most of the high prices are restricted to the meat and the groceries, which leaves...well, household stuff i suppose. and boxes of cereal
-good cereal selection, now that i think about it
-expensive hummus
-probably isnt anywhere near as smooth as mine
-has the specific kind of milk I buy, and is the only place that seems to carry it
-surprisingly has decent prices on bananas, but theyre always oddly placed
Overall: buy bananas and Lactaid milk, maybe cereal and peas
Costco (somewhere near the airport)
-cons: far away
-amazing prices on bulk frozen strawberries and mixed berries
-very good prices on nuts
-great mixed salad
-great oranges, but surprisingly small selection as far as produce
-holy hell thats a lot of eggs
-Overall: buy nuts, salad, eggs, frozen berries, whatever fruits as looking allright. find friend with membership
GFS
-chicken breast is not as well priced as Aldi's per pound, BUT claims to be antibiotic and hormone free, which is always nice
-great frozen veggies
-much closer location-wise
Despite grocery shopping, I seem to have had trouble finding a decent store that sells quality (damnit Amigos), affordable (no Publix, you don't know what that word means), individual (goddamnit GFS and costco, I dont need 20 onions) fruits/veggies. I've heard there's a place near hear that might have potential. Must scout it out next week.
Sunday, 30 March 2014
Friday, 14 March 2014
Fat Hacker Alarm!
My weight loss continues! I'm almost 35 lbs below my heaviest weight that occured during my final Step 1 studying days. Since then I've been on a calorie restriction diet that alternates (depending on what my body tells me) between i) having 3 light meals each day ii) skipping one meal but having 2 full meals. This has been averaging out to a loss of 2.3 lbs/week. I used an app called MyFitnessPal religiously for a few weeks to estimate my daily calorie intake, until I had a better sense of which of my meals were too high-cal. While I occasionally use that function these days, I mostly just use the app to keep track of my daily weight. I measure at roughly the same time every morning for consistency.
As of ~2 weeks ago, I am no longer in the overweight BMI category. As of today, I have reached my average weight in high school (which, I realize in retrospect, still had lots of love handles).
The two biggest obstables I have faced have been i) the 3 day drive down to Miami ii) my first on-call patient at 2am. Between the fatigue and the irregular hormone levels associated with staying up all night, I ended up breathing in 2 or 3 muffins and a few other complimentary bagels because damn, I felt like I was starving. A rage-ful hunger, if you will. Ended up gaining a consistent 4 lbs in that one night, which took a few days to gradually wear away. But yeah, just remember that there are always small setbacks, but don't forget that gradual calorie restriction works, and that its the goal in the long run that matters. Also...skipping breakfast (and substituting with coffee) is much easier, but having an early and light dinner seems to be more effective as far as hitting the scales goes.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
On-call: So, my attending doctor is on call about half the month, which means I'm on call about half the month. He gets alerted via beeper whenever there is a case, and then he text messages me to come join him. This works well except while I'm sleeping, because text message beeps on android phones (Nexus 5 in my case) are not exactly loud. I slept through the first message, but thankfully my colleague was awake when he received the same message and called me up.
I ended up installing SMS Alarm from the google play store. Its not the most full featured program out there, but its free, and doesn't require learning German, so it'll do the job for now. Namely, sounding a loud alarm whenever my attending sends me a text message.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
On to the next topic: the success of my sleep adjustments after utilizing the electronic timer switch.
Or rather, a lack of adequate data points.
My first night, I got a call at 2AM, and worked till 1PM. Then I had to start working on a powerpoint presentation. Slept soundly this night.
The next night, I had to work well into the night to continue improving a powerpoint presentation that was having some unfortunate software problems (damnit Libreoffice, convert to .PPT more smoothly!).
The night after that, I was sleeping soundly until 4AM, when Google alerted me at via my phone that a hacker in Nigeria was trying to get into my e-mail account. Password changed, all active sessions were ended, re-enabled 2-step verification, and reviewed my password recovery options. Sleep adequately screwed up.
And finally, this morning, my neighbour's retarded dogs feel the need to bark in the mornings. And they're still barking. Just shut up dog. Such loud. So wow.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Oh, turns out TD rejected my visa card application. Apparently I need an income, which is a valid reason, but you would think someone would have explained that in the hour it took me to get through the application.
As of ~2 weeks ago, I am no longer in the overweight BMI category. As of today, I have reached my average weight in high school (which, I realize in retrospect, still had lots of love handles).
The two biggest obstables I have faced have been i) the 3 day drive down to Miami ii) my first on-call patient at 2am. Between the fatigue and the irregular hormone levels associated with staying up all night, I ended up breathing in 2 or 3 muffins and a few other complimentary bagels because damn, I felt like I was starving. A rage-ful hunger, if you will. Ended up gaining a consistent 4 lbs in that one night, which took a few days to gradually wear away. But yeah, just remember that there are always small setbacks, but don't forget that gradual calorie restriction works, and that its the goal in the long run that matters. Also...skipping breakfast (and substituting with coffee) is much easier, but having an early and light dinner seems to be more effective as far as hitting the scales goes.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
On-call: So, my attending doctor is on call about half the month, which means I'm on call about half the month. He gets alerted via beeper whenever there is a case, and then he text messages me to come join him. This works well except while I'm sleeping, because text message beeps on android phones (Nexus 5 in my case) are not exactly loud. I slept through the first message, but thankfully my colleague was awake when he received the same message and called me up.
I ended up installing SMS Alarm from the google play store. Its not the most full featured program out there, but its free, and doesn't require learning German, so it'll do the job for now. Namely, sounding a loud alarm whenever my attending sends me a text message.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
On to the next topic: the success of my sleep adjustments after utilizing the electronic timer switch.
Or rather, a lack of adequate data points.
My first night, I got a call at 2AM, and worked till 1PM. Then I had to start working on a powerpoint presentation. Slept soundly this night.
The next night, I had to work well into the night to continue improving a powerpoint presentation that was having some unfortunate software problems (damnit Libreoffice, convert to .PPT more smoothly!).
The night after that, I was sleeping soundly until 4AM, when Google alerted me at via my phone that a hacker in Nigeria was trying to get into my e-mail account. Password changed, all active sessions were ended, re-enabled 2-step verification, and reviewed my password recovery options. Sleep adequately screwed up.
And finally, this morning, my neighbour's retarded dogs feel the need to bark in the mornings. And they're still barking. Just shut up dog. Such loud. So wow.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Oh, turns out TD rejected my visa card application. Apparently I need an income, which is a valid reason, but you would think someone would have explained that in the hour it took me to get through the application.
Saturday, 8 March 2014
"Never let HR interfere with your education" - Arthur
It has been a long few days. Very frustrating, hair-pulling, bikini-waxing, administration-calling, landlord-yelling, traffic-negotiating few days.
Let me start with the first success I've had here.
First off...some of you may remember that on the island, I had difficulties sleeping. It took me months to find a setting in my first apartment that produced a good nights sleep occasionally, and during my fourth semester I never caught a wink of sleep. My grades, energy, and mood suffered enormously. For those that have studied well, its common knowledge that sleep and depression are tightly linked. A person that develops depression often starts having sleep disorders, and a person that develops sleeping disorders may start developing depression.
So when I came down to Miami and started having sleep difficulties again, I was worried. I noticed the pattern suggesting I only woke up between 4-7am. I quickly tried testing out my old theories on the cause of my own sleep problems.
a) noise levels caused by the mini-fridge & window A/C in my room
b) as the temperature rises, it kicks off my physiological 'wake the fuck up' routine.
What tools did I have now that I didn't have on the island, though?
1) Amazon.com
2) credit card
I wanted to order a timer switch (in addition to books and a shiny new case for my shiny new phone) that has programmable hours. Downstream devices turn on and off only within the hours I set. However, having used mechanical versions of these timers before, I knew they themselves could be annoyingly loud. So I found a silent electronic version (this model) and set it up last night.
I woke up at 8 am this morning. First full 8 hours of sleep in weeks. This is a promising result!
So there you have it.. I prevented depression for $17. Now if I can just write this down as a hypothesis and record some data points, I can write a research paper.
Other one-offs:
1) tap water in miami tastes really wierd. i dont usually use bottled water, but this is the first time I don't feel particularly bad creating plastic waste.
2) Frank's Red Hot Sauce is basically just red sauce. There is no hot in your hot sauce, Frank. I am disappointed. Still tastes decent though.
3) My car's air-conditioner broke again halfway through my 3-day trip to Miami. Arthur, I am disappointed at your attempt towards a repair job. Maybe next time I will use the actual spray I was supposed to, instead of just grabbing something from my garage >.>
4) At target, I saw 2 lbs of chicken breast sell for $10. At GFS near my hosue, I saw 10 lbs of chicken breast sell for $20. Guess where I bought a months supply of chicken :D
5) I have a tendency to over-salt my chickens while they fry. or bake. or boil. I have yet to broil chickens.
6) I dealt with a nice young man working in the American TD bank that helped me get a credit card. He somehow managed to print the wrong information out four times that I caught by reviewing the application. How do you type a name wrong when you are literally copying it off a driver's licence? Hell, the application only had 14 fields you could input. Not surprisingly, I received a notice yesterday stating the application was rejected because I needed to supply more information.
7) CHS. Center for Haitian Studies. Basically, the organization that handles a large majority of the Ross and AUC students rotating in South Florida. They have 5-6 administrators between then juggling hundreds of students and paperwork, often leaving students in extremely shitty situations. I refer to CHS as the Titanic, because they are one iceberg away from leaving hundreds of students floundering. Also, because CHS lacks lifeboats. And also because I'm in the mood to watch Titanic again.
Yes Titanic, I kind of noticed that you knew my scheduled location for a month and didn't tell me until the last possible day, after everyone had already rented a place to stay that may be up to 2 hours away from their clinic. Thanks a lot, dickweed.
Yes Titanic, I kind of noticed that it takes you six weeks to issue a hospital badge for a rotation that lasts exactly six weeks. Or 2 weeks. or 3 months. Not cool brah, not cool.
I know the five administrators at CHS are working hard and on limited resources. But they are over-leveraged and have the potential to create extremely poor learning rotations as a result. One student confided that during his IM rotation at CHS, his physician was on vacation for 5 weeks, so he was told to study at home. After the physician returned, she saw about one patient per day. And that it took him 3 months to get his hospital badge. This is bordering on fraud on the part of CHS. Accepting money to schedule students for a medical education while failing to provide either is about as fraud as it gets.
As for the badge....jesus, what a cock-up. Medical education in the U.S. seems to be 95% liability and 5% signing paperwork.
I have updated the maxim "not allowing his schooling to interfere with his education," oft attributed to Grant Allen or Mark Twain, to modern times. It proudly sits atop this blog post as the title.
8) I have loads more I can write about (read: complain, whine, praise, suggest, waste both your time and mine) but I should get working! And also I finished eating breakfast 30 minutes ago.
Let me start with the first success I've had here.
First off...some of you may remember that on the island, I had difficulties sleeping. It took me months to find a setting in my first apartment that produced a good nights sleep occasionally, and during my fourth semester I never caught a wink of sleep. My grades, energy, and mood suffered enormously. For those that have studied well, its common knowledge that sleep and depression are tightly linked. A person that develops depression often starts having sleep disorders, and a person that develops sleeping disorders may start developing depression.
So when I came down to Miami and started having sleep difficulties again, I was worried. I noticed the pattern suggesting I only woke up between 4-7am. I quickly tried testing out my old theories on the cause of my own sleep problems.
a) noise levels caused by the mini-fridge & window A/C in my room
b) as the temperature rises, it kicks off my physiological 'wake the fuck up' routine.
What tools did I have now that I didn't have on the island, though?
1) Amazon.com
2) credit card
I wanted to order a timer switch (in addition to books and a shiny new case for my shiny new phone) that has programmable hours. Downstream devices turn on and off only within the hours I set. However, having used mechanical versions of these timers before, I knew they themselves could be annoyingly loud. So I found a silent electronic version (this model) and set it up last night.
I woke up at 8 am this morning. First full 8 hours of sleep in weeks. This is a promising result!
So there you have it.. I prevented depression for $17. Now if I can just write this down as a hypothesis and record some data points, I can write a research paper.
Other one-offs:
1) tap water in miami tastes really wierd. i dont usually use bottled water, but this is the first time I don't feel particularly bad creating plastic waste.
2) Frank's Red Hot Sauce is basically just red sauce. There is no hot in your hot sauce, Frank. I am disappointed. Still tastes decent though.
3) My car's air-conditioner broke again halfway through my 3-day trip to Miami. Arthur, I am disappointed at your attempt towards a repair job. Maybe next time I will use the actual spray I was supposed to, instead of just grabbing something from my garage >.>
4) At target, I saw 2 lbs of chicken breast sell for $10. At GFS near my hosue, I saw 10 lbs of chicken breast sell for $20. Guess where I bought a months supply of chicken :D
5) I have a tendency to over-salt my chickens while they fry. or bake. or boil. I have yet to broil chickens.
6) I dealt with a nice young man working in the American TD bank that helped me get a credit card. He somehow managed to print the wrong information out four times that I caught by reviewing the application. How do you type a name wrong when you are literally copying it off a driver's licence? Hell, the application only had 14 fields you could input. Not surprisingly, I received a notice yesterday stating the application was rejected because I needed to supply more information.
7) CHS. Center for Haitian Studies. Basically, the organization that handles a large majority of the Ross and AUC students rotating in South Florida. They have 5-6 administrators between then juggling hundreds of students and paperwork, often leaving students in extremely shitty situations. I refer to CHS as the Titanic, because they are one iceberg away from leaving hundreds of students floundering. Also, because CHS lacks lifeboats. And also because I'm in the mood to watch Titanic again.
Yes Titanic, I kind of noticed that you knew my scheduled location for a month and didn't tell me until the last possible day, after everyone had already rented a place to stay that may be up to 2 hours away from their clinic. Thanks a lot, dickweed.
Yes Titanic, I kind of noticed that it takes you six weeks to issue a hospital badge for a rotation that lasts exactly six weeks. Or 2 weeks. or 3 months. Not cool brah, not cool.
I know the five administrators at CHS are working hard and on limited resources. But they are over-leveraged and have the potential to create extremely poor learning rotations as a result. One student confided that during his IM rotation at CHS, his physician was on vacation for 5 weeks, so he was told to study at home. After the physician returned, she saw about one patient per day. And that it took him 3 months to get his hospital badge. This is bordering on fraud on the part of CHS. Accepting money to schedule students for a medical education while failing to provide either is about as fraud as it gets.
As for the badge....jesus, what a cock-up. Medical education in the U.S. seems to be 95% liability and 5% signing paperwork.
I have updated the maxim "not allowing his schooling to interfere with his education," oft attributed to Grant Allen or Mark Twain, to modern times. It proudly sits atop this blog post as the title.
8) I have loads more I can write about (read: complain, whine, praise, suggest, waste both your time and mine) but I should get working! And also I finished eating breakfast 30 minutes ago.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)