Explaining The Awesomeness of Yesterday

So....yesterday - an amazing day and very eventful.

It started out at work (like all Wednesday do) and I was following up on a couple of patients that I had seen in the ICU a month earlier. They were on ventilators and had pneumonia so I was taking down their information. Today, I did a follow up on them in the burns ward. One of the boys that I saw intially was very close to dying - they were not sure if he would last the rest of the week. He was on a high frequency oscillating ventilator and when you are on this type of ventilator, you know that their condition is bad. Because of the frequency of the ventilator and his condition, it blew his body up and he looked at least twice his size. I saw him yesterday - he was a happy, healthy 18 month old baby. All he needs is one more graft and he should be all set. Need I tell you how amazed I was? I did not even recognize the child! The mother had to go somewhere and basically asked me to watch him. I sat there, for an hour, holding this child that, a month ago, was on the brink of dying. Obviously the child was a little bit scared of me because I was a brand new face and his mother had disappeared but I could not help believing that I was holding a miracle. It was not the treatment that saved him - the doctors withdrew treatment. Dr. Rhode told his mother that his name should be changed from Lorenzo to miracle man. It was such an amazing experience though, to see not one but both boys so healthy, smiling and laughing.

After I met with those two kids and went over their files to determine how they contracted pneumonia, I heard music playing outside. the Friends of the Children's Hospital raised money and put on a parade that went around the hospital for the little kids. It was a parade for easter so there was a guy dressed up in a bunny suit, lots of clowns, a horse drawn carriage, a little VW Bug carring people all dressed up and waving. There was also a contest to see who could make the funniest/ most creative hat. The children got their faces painted and had an easter egg hunt outside, along with one of those huge blow up things to play on. It was so touching, especially because most of these kids have never even seen a balloon...they have never even seen a lot of the stuff that they got that day. Dogs came in on leashes to see kids in the oncology ward. To see their smiling faces and look of surprise was priceless.

I had to leave work at around 3:00 so that I could be home for 3:30 in order to have an interview with Pfizer. I actually have two interviews with Pfizer (one of which I am waiting for right now). The one that I had yesterday was with a pharcokinetics groups and I would be designing a protocol to use RNAi to study, in a more indepth manner, what the drug actually does to the body. Not really sure the details or how it would work but I love RNAi so I thought that it would be cool.

Oh, to interrupt my train of though, I just had my interview with Joe from Pfizer. It turns out that it is the Joe that I used to take blood from all the time during my first internship with Pfizer when I worked with Paul. I was so excited that it was him! I loved him! Basically, with this job, I would be looking at heat shock proteins, specifically heat shock protein 90 I think and how it affects the lining of arterial walls in terms of obesity. So once more I would be on an obesity project but they are trying to purchase this brand new really cool technology for me to use. I am soo excited! I will find out next Monday whether I have the job or not. Joe said that the other candidates are really good so I am not sure...I think he said that my enthusiasm about the project would make his decision easier but the phone was kind of staticky so he could have said harder. I don't know but I am really excited! He said that Paul told him that he has to hire me. I said that I would totally understand if he didn't because there are much more qualified people out there but he stated that I bring enthusiasm, work ethic, passion etc. to the table. And he likes that I always want a lot to do and am always looking for more work to do. So, hopefully I got the job!

Anyways, back to yesterday, I had an interview with University of Maryland right after my interview with Pfizer. Last time I updated, UMD was saying that I would be put on the waiting list until I could have an in person interview with them and that although my credentials are very good, the committee was concerned about my GRE scores. I emailed Jeff (the graduate director), saying that it would be impossible to have an in person interview because I am not getting home until the beginning of May and that I need to make a decision regarding other schools prior to April 15th. Also, I explained my GRE scores to him, especially the fact that my SAT scores were only an 1110 and that score was not indicative, in any way, of my performance in college. Thus, if we are using that train of logic, my GRE scores will not be indicative, in any way, of my performance in graduate school. I also made the argument that the GRE tests your ability to take a test whereas I feel that I bring a lot of other aspects to the table such as my motivation, work ethic and passion. All of those combined make me who I am and I feel that there is much more to graduate school than your testing ability. So, after ranting and raving to my friends about how stupid the GRE's are and how stupid UMD is, I get an email saying that Jeff would be willing to have a Skype video interview with me on Wednesday at 4:30 my time (10:30 at home). I was really nervous yesterday and was all ready to be grilled during the interview, in order to show that my GRE scores really aren't indicative of my knowledge. The interview was not really even an interview. It was Jeff trying to sell the University of Maryland to me. Apparently they are in a brand new science building (a definite plus), told me all about the program and explained that he felt that the stipend was one of the highest (which it isn't since UConn would pay me $4000 more, to live in a cheaper area, I might add). Throughout the 'interview', Jeff kept hinting at giving me an offer but I did not really believe him. He never once asked me a scientific question, just what my interests were. I felt like I needed to ask questions so I thought of some random questions to show that I was interested. Then, at the end of the interview, he said that he really hopes that I do well in whatever I do but really wants me to choose UMD and I will be getting an offer from him shortly. I got the offer in about 1.5 hours. So, I am really excited because now I have options! I will probably choose UMD but the only thing holding me back is that at UConn, I would be closer to family and being in South Africa right now has really showed me how close I am to my family and how much I miss them. That is the only downside to going to UMD. Besides that, I need to do some research on what Uconn is working on to see if there are multiple projects I am interested in. I will go to the school that is doing the coolest research.

So all in all, it comes down to the fact that if I did not email UMD and fight them about the GRE's, I never would have gotten an interview and I never would have been accepted. That kind of makes me mad in a way but also makes me proud of myself. So, that is what has happened in the past couple of days. I am on a personal high right now and could easily jump up and down, screaming in a very high tone but I will save everybody the agony of hearing me go into an octave that only dogs can hear. Miss you all!