A Chat with Dr. B and Pain!

Opening my eyes, I sighed at the upcoming day.  I rolled over to try and get to sleep, when suddenly I couldn’t feel anything in my right arm!  Groaning from the pain, I realized I rolled right out of my bed onto the floor.  Not the way I wanted to start out the day!  Not wanting to get up, I stayed on the floor for a good hour trying to get to sleep.  I finally got up when my back couldn’t handle the floor anymore.

I checked my e-mail and Dr. B wanted to meet me at noon before his other appointments that day.  He mentioned that he has no idea why my fob was not working properly, and that he would try and figure it out later that day.  I realized that I had overreacted a little yesterday, and was feeling a bit stupid at the time.  I was still worried about getting the research done in time though.

By his e-mail I assumed his first appointment was at noon, which would be in a few hours.  I went to the bathroom to get ready for the day and was done much sooner than I thought.  To pass the time I thought I would go and visit the staff at the Academy again.

Upon getting there I realized that only Dee and Rob were there at the time.  Dee had a picture to show me that she had taken while on vacation in Arizona.  It was a picture of a street sign that said ***** Street (my last name).  “Coo!” I said.  Dee beamed as she saw my enthusiasm.  I didn't tell her that I am actually planning on changing my last name when I get older because I thought that would be a bit rude under those circumstances. 

I went back to Rob’s office to chat with him for a while.  Rob is the craziest person that I know, and I can never tell when he is actually mad or being sarcastic.  That worries me a bit, so I am always careful with what I say around him.  I enjoy being around him though because he speaks his mind.  Also, a lot of his opinions are the same as mine, so I feel I can connect with him.

He asked me if I was working out over the summer, and I just gave him a look like “yea, sure.”  He laughed at me and asked why not.  I told him I was busy with research, but in all honesty that was just an excuse.  I could probably go find the time to go run, but it’s the "starting to work out" that is my issue.

He didn’t believe it either, so now I am supposed to go lift weights with him next week. LOL.  That’s fine with me, because I wanted to get back in shape again.  It is amazing what coming to the Academy does to people in terms of getting out of shape.  I’m definitely going to keep in shape this year though because…well I just want to!

I left at around 11:40 to make sure Dr. B and I had plenty of time before his first meeting.  It turns out his first meeting was at 12:30, so I sat outside his office for a good twenty-five minutes before he showed up.  I wasn’t angry or anything because in my opinion it is better to be early than late.

I sat down in his office and he asked what the matter with my fob was.  I told him about going around the building and trying my fob on every door, so he said that he would try and get it fixed.  He then proceeded to tell me that the rat brains needed to be finished within the next four or five days.  Ok, I’m going to have to work my butt off to get them done, but that was my own fault.

Once that project was finished he told me that we will be starting our next one soon.  Instead of cutting up rat brains for this project I will be taking care of rats!  Ok, so I guess it won’t be as bad as my current one, but I will still have to clean the cages and collect their urine/feces….awesome.

Dr. B gave me his fob to borrow for the next few days and I headed to my room to take a nap (well go to sleep actually) before going over to do research.   I woke up (this time on my bed!) and walked over to cut up some rat brains!

I walked into the lab and grabbed my head in pain from a sudden, splitting headache.  Knowing it was all psychological, I walked over to the cryostat and set my things down.  Listening to music while on the cryostat usually helped with my headaches in the past when working on the brains, but today my headaches were worse than ever before.

I am not a person to get headaches often and especially not this badly.  I thought about how amazing the “mind over matter” concept could be since I knew that my dislike for the cryostat was what was inducing my headaches.  I only was able to get through one brain before I decided that I couldn’t handle the pain any longer and headed back to my room.

I took two vicodins thinking they would help my headache, so I would be able to go back to the lab.  Instead, they made it MUCH worse.  I ended up watching a few shows on Hulu, which ended up helping a little, but not too much.  I’m going to lay down for a bit and hopefully get some rest.  I sure don’t know how I’m going to get these brains done now, with how bad the headaches are when I go in the lab.