Things I've learned in graduate school

1.  forgetting to eat is a bad habit

2.  forgetting to eat and washing down your day with three beers is a worse habit

3.  spending the evening vomiting bile because you are a Crohn and shouldn't be drinking beer in the first place is not ideal midterm preparation

4.  taking the most convoluted and poorly phrased midterm in the history of academia while hungover (from three beers) and exhausted from vomiting all night (from three beers) is even less ideal

5.   medical offices everywhere fail miserably at communication -- it wasn't just Kaiser.  no sooner did i escape the awful affliction of Mid-term-dom  than i received this call...

"Oh hai, btw: your Remicade appt tomorrow morning [Saturday] that you made with us 2 weeks ago?  Yeah, I'm gonna go ahead and cancel it because we don't know whether you have authorization through your insurance lolz!"

First of all, why did you wait until Friday afternoon before my Saturday a.m. appt to tell me that?  And secondly, my doctor's office was supposed to convey that information to you two weeks ago.  Who dropped the ball, them or you?  So two hours of my life were lost trying to figure that out (still dying of 12-hour-bilemania).  Ten minutes later:

"Oh haai!  Btw: you don't have authorization for your Remicade tomorrow so we have to cancel your appt."

Are you fucking kidding me?  I just spent two hours clearing this up.  You have the information in your system now.  Go ahead and turn your computer on.  Do it now while I'm on the phone so I can guide you through the process.  She's been checking that detail for the last 45 min... apparently their computers are made of bark.  Meanwhile...

"Oh hai there! Btw: your insurance wont be covering your Remicade appt because you were referred by your GI's office and not be the university health center!"

.................. is a referral by the doctor to whom I was referred by the university health center not by proxy a fucking referral?   I'm looking into it.  Because apparently their phones to other offices are also made of bark.  I'm sure I'll find out right after I get the bill.

6.  your PI and lab manager being in disagreement on the critical details of your new rotation project and failing to let you in on their decision 2hrs before your scheduled surgeries to use your mice for some other thing that came up... is just not cool.  serious demerits, y'all.

7.  TGI-take-home-midterm-F!