Despite initial thoughts of going away to celebrate my first golden weekend in four weeks, we ultimately decided to spend our time relaxing at home. We awoke early Saturday morning to revisit Haymarket to pick out some fresh fruits and vegetables. For just $15, we scored two pounds of vine tomatoes, a pound of mushrooms, a napa cabbage, cilantro, two avocadoes, a pineapple, a cantalope, nine kiwis, a tub of strawberries, and two tubs of blueberries! From there, we drove to Chinatown for dim sum, followed by a stop at the Chinese supermarket and bakery. With the summer heat finally here, we also spent the afternoon basking in free air-conditioning while shopping at the local mall. Back at home, we spent the rest of the weekend doing the laundry and cooking up a storm – with a big pot of noodle soup and a cornucopia of fruits and smoothies – all while enjoying a few episodes of 24, the new Fallout 3 expansion packs, and even Guitar Hero. Although we were late in joining the bandwagon, I bought a used copy of the game mainly to try out the rhythm genre. The game was entertaining and addictive as we dressed up our rocker hero and took to the stage. With The Beatles Rock Band on the horizon, we’re eagerly looking forward to some rocking times ahead.

As I had expected, my week on night float did little to perturb my circadian cycle, as I’m already prone to the night owl lifestyle to begin with. Despite working more than 100 hours last week, I experienced a good variety of stuff – a ruptured globe from a BB gun, a trauma patient with orbital compartment syndrome, a ruptured medial rectus, a few retinal detachments, and a patient with both Leber Congenital Amaurosis and Coat’s disease (two things we usually just read about in textbooks). I also got to repair a few eyelid lacerations and perform a canthotomy/cantholysis in the ICU at Mass General. I had little idea of what I was doing, but my senior held my hand like a little kid. The nurses were surprised by my enthusiasm, but they also remarked that it was only my first week – and still had plenty of time to become bitter and disillusioned. After emerging from my vampiric existence on Saturday, we had dinner at a new Chinatown joint that was disappointingly lacking in wok hay, then pulled out our bamboo mat to watch the opening night of Shakespeare on the Commons. This year, the company did The Comedy of Errors. My exhaustion set in half-way, and I fell asleep amidst the multiple dance numbers and barrage of slapstick humor. Nevertheless, I’m just glad to be returning to the land of the living.