“If It Isn’t Fun.” – Medical School Journal Resumes Pt. 4
October 17, 1947
Senior surgery is over! After weeks of accumulated tension and terrible labors, I plunged into the general spirit of release and made the expected fool gyrations at the frathouse orgy Saturday night.
Our last Senior Block is a hash of plumbing and orthopedics, plus eye and ear. They try to make it routine for us to put on casts, pass sounds, and do all such mechanical maneuvers.
The ENT testing for labyrinthitis in clinic today was brutal. You spray ethyl chloride against the tympanum for a few seconds, causing excruciating pain. After a short lag time, nausea develops and nystagmus, with a quick component to the opposite side. This response is absent on the affected side.
I have received “Robinson Crusoe” and the poems of Whitman from the Classics Club, and separately, the first issue of “Motive “ and of “The New Republic,” both liberal periodicals. In “Sons and Lovers,” D.H. Lawrence has astounding insights into the sensations of youth, told with glowing, intimate description.
These days I need a calendar for my heavy schedule:
October 23: accident room duty.
October 24: my talk on Fat Embolism.
October 28: first season symphony concert;
November 10: Urology paper due;
November 17: Henry Wallace here;
November 18: Harold Stassen arrives for debate with Wallace;
November 26-30: Thanksgiving.
In the news, nationwide voluntary food restrictions have started for shipments to starving Europe: Now, Meatless Tuesday, Poultryless Thursday, and daily bread-saving are added to the already meatless Friday of New Orleans.