This has been a very

This has been a very busy week, and it is about to get busier. I am officially done with my second year! I had my last test on thursday, after a very weird week of studying and wondering how time could possibly have gone by so fast. Actually the biggest stress of the week, actually the whole past month, was not the test on thursday, nor even finishing the year, but the event that took place on friday. Last night.

It has been an OHSU tradition for some time now for the second years to put on a show at the end of year. Its called The Follies, and it is called that because the entire production consists of making fun of everyone and everything related to the medical school experience. There are skits, videos, gossip, news, music, and dance performances, which all amount to one gigantic inside joke about our collective experience at OHSU. For some reason I ended up co-organizing the entire thing, writing and producing 2 videos, participating in 3 live skits and a dance performance, and hosting the show as one of the two MC's.

It ended up being way more work than I ever expected, and trying to pull it all together during the last couple weeks of school was a bit of a challenge, but it ended up being so awesome that it was all worth it. But man, was I worried. We had a dress rehersal on thursday night which was a complete disaster. Nobody was prepared, nobody was paying attention, nothing seemed funny or even interesting, and everybody (including me) was exhausted from just having taken the final exam a few hours before. It really had the potential of sucking very very badly. But I stayed at school until 12:30 that night (I had been there since 8:45 in the morning) so that Cody, my fellow co-host, and I could map out the entire show and plan directions for everybody involved, including the witty banter that we would used to transition between skits.

I have never been much of a performer, or really much of a leader for that matter, so I was incredibly nervous for the entire event. Coordinating things like microphones and costume changes and skit set up was hard enough, but being on stage for almost the entire night as a host who was supposed to be funny and entertaining while keeping the entire show running smoothly? I didn't know if I could do it.

But it was awesome. It went so well, so much better than I ever thought it could. And the audience loved it. It was so incredibly gratifying to hear people laughing at things that I had written while attempting to study. The 2 movies that I had made, and that Mike helped me edit - one about the Lord of the Rings Interest Group (LOTRIG) - went over really well. At the after party, people were actually quoting one of my lines! And even people who weren't students, like Mike and Ritchey, who graciously agreed to attend, said that they had a good time. It was just such an exhilerating, awesome, rewarding experience. A good way to end the year.

Oh, but its not over yet. Tomorrow I start studying for the boards. And by that I mean cramming for 10 hours a day for three weeks straight for the hardest, most important test that I will ever take in my life. Bring it on!
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