Good and Bad

Good: today, I cut open a living, breathing (anesthetized) human being. I got to wield a scalpel AND the bovie. What a rush!

Bad: when I came home this evening, I was so exhausted and hypoglycemic that I cried because my husband didn't answer his cell phone to come pick me up and I had to take the bus home AND I WAS SO TIRED, DAMMIT.

This represents my love/hate relationship with surgery. She is a cruel, cruel mistress, crushing you and beating you down, then giving you a little exhilaration just when you think you're giving up, dropping that retractor, taking off your mask so you can breathe, and getting the hell out of that OR.

Funny point: Most of the urologists I've met think that ENT work is disgusting. "Ugh, working with the MOUTH, with saliva and all the germs!" shuddered my attending.