Goin' to Church.

David Church, that is.

We had a bunch of clinical scenarios given to us today by Church to work on in small groups. Honestly, they weren't easy. I did them with two friends instead at home (mostly because I'm poor and didn't want to stay and pay for lunch).

At the end of the day (3pm), we all got together as a class and Church took us through each of the scenarios.

First of all, he is kind of a difficult lecturer. Difficult in the sense that he will hardly ever give you the answer that he's looking for. This is good, though, because it prompts us to think and actually speak up when we have an idea. Learning process and all that, ya know?

Second of all, nothing is ever as straightforward as it seems. The first clinical scenario was about a 6 month old Mastiff, and it was all over the place. But somehow, between him and all 200+ of us, we got down to the cause of it all.

Of course, once we got there, I spoke up and wondered why the original problem occurred in the first place. He was hysterical; apparently for this first scenario we (as a class) followed the exact progression of signs/things that he did in the slides, and my question couldn't have been better if it was rehearsed (cue excessive blushing, because he asked me my name in front of the class and I meekly told him).

Oh, have I said that he was one of the interviewers for my RVC interview?

Anyway, for lack of a better point of this post: I really wish more lecturers were like this. I like being challenged almost to the point of frustration, because it pushes me to think past the edges of the box. While a lot of veterinary practice is about pattern recognizing, we have been told over and over that pattern recognizing is NOT a good thing to do, and to not get caught up in fitting clinical signs to what you think is the problem. And Church does EXACTLY that.

One more day of class! Going out to dinner tomorrow and then watching Hunger Games. CANNOT wait. It's kind of for my birthday, since no one is (ever) here for my birthday. My actual birthday will be spent studying, possibly watching a movie, and then making myself chicken enchiladas for dinner. Yum.