Anticipating Summer

The warming weather with the end of the semester in sight can mean only one thing: summer is near. I can't stand the cold. I often wear nothing more than jeans and a short sleeve t-shirt during the winter. Mostly because that's what I'm comfortable with, but also to spite the cold. With summer comes long motorcycle rides, hitting up Provo's many pools and enjoying the freedom that inevitably coincides with the season. Yet, summer's freedom can begin to bother me. Sure, the freedom is great for the first few weeks but I can't help but feel that I'm wasting time by not progressing. It's this feeling that's had me in summer school full time since I began college. This summer will be no different. I'm undecided so far as to the specific classes I'll be taking, but it's looking like it will entail Organic Chemistry II and Cell Biology. Both beastly classes. I'll also be studying for the Pharmacy College Admissions Test (PCAT). To be perfectly honest, I'm a little bit anxious to start summer school. Not because I don't enjoy freedom. No, I enjoy freedom as much as the next person. I'm anxious because I can finally start to see the light at the end of the tunnel. While still a faint light that requires the eyes to focus to be able to pick up, I'm excited nonetheless. In reality I still have a full year of undergraduate work ahead of me plus anywhere from 3 to 5 years on top of that depending if I decide to get my MBA alongside my doctorate. Either way I'll have student loans that will rival most mortgages.
As hard as last summer was, I had a blast. Microbiology was one of the funnest classes I've ever taken. How many classes can you take where bringing your poo into class is a requirement? I found myself being a little disappointed when we were instructed to skip a few chapters due to time constraints. I really felt like I was missing out on something by skipping those chapters. I believe 4 people out of 40 ended up getting A's and I was one of them. I spent 30 hours a week studying for just that class, but I was sad when it ended. This current semester hasn't really challenged me. I rarely to go to any of my classes anymore, and yet the lowest grade in any of my classes is a 94%. This summer will definitely be a challenge.
Aside from school I'm excited to go on the trips that always seem to pop up during summer. I plan on learning to wakeboard this summer. I wouldn't mind going skydiving again, but the last time I went wasn't that big of a rush for me. A bit of a letdown actually. Maybe hit up Zions. Who knows. Trips like that are usually more sporadic than planned so we'll see what happens. Either way, I'm excited for summer!

Spring Break 2008

Went down to St. George with one of my friends from school. We wanted to go golfing, but had some difficulty getting a tee time. The courses were either holding tournaments or were full. We finally got in through a waiting list. It was a beautiful course, and much more importantly we got to play in our shorts!

We then decided to go to Zions to hike to the waterfall of Court of the Patriarchs. While not an "actual" trail, it's the most fun of any of the hikes at Zions. The waterfall was a mere trickle, but coming off a 500 foot cliff still made it quite impressive. The way back down was a bit fun as we bouldered down the river.

The following day we went back up to Zions to hike Angel's Landing. The landmark of this hike is the 1400 foot cliffs that you stand atop. Not the best place for one timid of heights, but still fun.

After words we went to Texas Roadhouse. One of the guys that we went with was having his birthday. We informed our spunky waitress, and a few moments later she came back with a horse saddle on top of a child seat. She made the birthday boy sit on it, then proceeded to hop on our table and put a spotlight on him and then had the entire restaurant give him a YEHA! Fun times.

Delayed Sleep Phase Disorder (DSPD)

It's 4am. I've been in bed now since 11 and I haven't managed to fall asleep. My mind is racing, thinking about anything from how to break down a zone defense to how to correctly spell supercalifragilisticexpialidocious. I have to wake up in two hours for seminary and after school I have basketball practice.

I had to endure the above situation countless times during high school and to some degree I still do. Out of desperation I once took 6 tylenol pms to help push me into sleep. It did nothing more than make it difficult to wake up the next morning. (And having weighed about 125 pounds at the time I'm lucky to have woken up at all) I would still toss and turn for hours on end. When I would finally fall asleep I'd have to wake up an hour or two later. You'd think it'd be easy for me to fall asleep the following night after having such sleep deprivation, but it wasn't.

While this would typically be classified as being a detriment under normal circumstances it proved to be an asset in others. In the Marine Corps they force sleep and food deprivation. The food deprivation was new to me, but I was all too familiar with sleep deprivation. Somehow my body keeps working at near 100%. There were many times in Iraq where we were on "alert," where no one was permitted to sleep the entire night. On one specific occasion we were in what could be described as Iraqi's Eastern Desert. We were well beyond the range of artillery and were essentially all by ourselves. There were about 100 of us and the nearest unit of 100 was about 1/2 an hour away. Not the best of conditions during war. We received word that a tank battalion with upwards of 60 Russian tanks were heading in our direction. For those who are unaware, when infantry goes up against tanks one side gets slaughtered. Other than a handful of missiles to shoot at them we were pretty much defenseless. We dug our fighting positions (or fox holes) as deep as we could. You see, a common technique used to tanks to kill infantry is by putting their tracks above the fox hole and spinning the tank. If the hole isn't deep enough, the man in the fox hole is no more. So obviously we dug our hole deep and couldn't fall asleep all that night. In the still of the night just about every noise sounds like distant tanks. Morning came and our unit of 100 men relocated behind a canal while a couple of A10 Warthogs flew over and took out any tanks that were nearby. As a result of our "relocation" our company commander lost his command. All in all, the first 30 days of the war I got about 30 hours of sleep. Most of the time we were bunched in the back of a moving truck with our knees in our chest. It was heaven when we were finally able to sleep horizontal!

Last semester I was taking a heavy load of classes and working 40 hours of graveyard. I was getting about 2 hours of sleep on average a night. I would often come home and not be able to fall asleep before I'd have to be up some 2 hours after I got home. While I'm able to get more sleep now, I usually still have trouble falling asleep, despite the sleep deprivation.

Casually looking through Wikipedia I came across Delayed Sleep Phase Disorder. It is often developed in late childhood or early adolescence and never completely goes away. It is often misdiagnosed as insomnia. The difference is those who have DSPD are able to get a full night's sleep once they fall asleep but are not able to fall asleep until much later than normal. It is believed that a delay in melatonin production is the cause. Melatonin is secreted through a gland in the brain in very minute amounts which causes drowsiness. It also is a very potent antioxidant. Your body does not produce melatonin in the presence of light and this knowledge has put working grave yards on a list of potential carcinogens.

I've been taking oral melatonin ever since I self diagnosed myself. That seems to help a lot. Which is good, because who likes carcinogens?

Time Off

We live in a world full of monotony. My life is no different. With few exceptions my life consists of three things: Work, School and what 9 out of 10 doctors describe as sleep depravity. As necessary as monotony is to sustain a regular life, it is paramount to break from it to keep one sane. That is exactly what this week is about. Yesterday I went indoor surfing. Odd as it may sound, it's quite the experience.

I'm heading to St. George for the rest of the weekend to enjoy, among other things, playing golf in my shorts! Californian's have been wearing shorts since... well, rarely does the weather keep those in California from wearing shorts. I am definitely out of my element when I have to scrape snow and ice off of my windshield every morning. We're also going to spend a day or so at Zions. Although I'm deathly afraid of heights, Zions is among my favorite place to vacation. Such a fun place. So here's to keeping me sane this weekend

March 11th

I've taken 3 tests in the past two days. I'd love to say that it was quite the accomplishment, but it really wasn't. This semester is one of those "too good to be true" sort of things. I promise I've pinched myself several times already. Still haven't woken up. Today I took my macroeconomics test. Haven't opened the book since our last test about 3 weeks ago. I got to school and got a text message from a friend I hadn't seen for a while. He was in a study group with some of my other buddies preparing for their Organic Chemistry II test. I don't know what it is about those guys, but when I'm around 'em I just get going. We were laughing and having a good 'ole time. Nearly forgot I had a test to take... Nearly.

I departed for the library to begin my macro studying. When I got to the library one of my other friends was studying for the Organic Chemistry II test. By the time I got done talking to her it was 3:30. I had an intramural basketball game to go to so I had to be done with the test by 7:30 at the very latest. Again, hadn't yet opened the book. So I absolutely whizzed through the material. Not to say it was easy material. Quite the contrary. I just started skipping stuff. I gave myself about an hour to take the test, but that wasn't enough time. 7:25 came around and I still had about 10 questions left. So.... I guessed. 86%. I was a little disappointed though. That test dropped my grade all the way down to a 113% ;) lol

Our intramural team is horrible. There's so much more to basketball than talent. There's an intellectual side to it that is very much under appreciated. I would love to coach one of these days to instill that intelligence into others. Over the past couple years I've instilled this intellect into one of our players and he's improved a ton because of it.

Spring Break is.... well, now. I'm going surfing up in Ogden, and then I'm heading down to St. George to play golf in my shorts! Very excited about that. Not such a big fan of the pants lol