But some are more equal than others…

“Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal."
From the Declaration of Independence.

A TV interviewer was interviewing a random sample of people about what they knew of Samuel Adams. Samuel Adams, if you don’t know, was one of the founding fathers of the USA who signed the Declaration of Independence, 4th Governor of Massachusetts and a very famous brewer of exceptionally good beer (the Boston Beer Company – still excellent). Most people he questioned said they knew him as a beer maker: nothing else. Shocking. Then he decided to push a little and after the same response from his next interviewee, asked if they knew any other reason why Samuel Adams was famous. The man thought for a while and then said, “Doesn’t he now make a light beer?”

I will be very busy for the next two weeks, finals for this quarter, but then three lovely weeks in England with three lovely, lovely days at Wimbledon. Hoorah! I hope to get to see you all.

Here's a selection of pictures from the ballgame at the SF Giants stadium (AT&T park).

Every major food group: Dibs seller.


Justine eating a 'delicious' hotdog.













The best seat in the house?!




AT&T Park

The "Eh" Team

Canadians don't deal with the same kind of health care problems and traumas we face. They have a health care system based on treating hockey injuries and curing sinus infections that come from trying to pronounce French vowels.
P. J. O'Rourke

I arrived at Vancouver airport last Friday. Laura, her niece, Arja, and Arja's 9 month-old baby, Danica (an absolute poppet...you'll know why I say that later), were there to greet me. Full of chatter we headed to the car for the 2 hour drive to her house in Harrison; a picturesque small town quite close to the US border, built on hot springs, nestled in mountains on the edge of the Vancouver river, bursting with wildlife, seals, sturgeon, bears. It was a beautiful summer’s day. They got a little lost when they picked me up, even though they had a TomTom, and ended up at the aquaplane airport a short distance from Vancouver International. Naturally there was some playful banter and ‘ribbing’ in the car, especially as on the way back we were looking for a turnoff to a place called ‘Hope’; “Ignore Arja. She got us lost last time. Ignore the TomTom. It’s still on English time. We’ll just point the car and ‘HOPE’ we get there.” Etc, etc, chuckling to ourselves thinking how amusing we were.

Precisely one and a half hours after landing in Canada, most of which had been taken up going through Immigration in Vancouver airport, I was sitting in the car looking at a sign which said ‘Welcome to the United States’. The US Immigration officer came up to the car, “Welcome to the United States ladies, may I see your passports, please…”. As I was the only person in the car who was theoretically visiting another country, you can take an educated guess as to how many passports there were in the car. I think two hours through border control under those circumstances was fairly reasonable. Had a great weekend once I got there: lovely weather, fantastic spa day, great food, too many cocktails...


Harrison, British Columbia.

We have a new addition to the ‘725’ menagerie: L'il Jack (the 10 pound dog), sitting on sofa with Emma, Miss Goody Four Paws.












Finally, I had a lovely birthday. Joanna and Justine took me out for dinner and bought me a great stash of pressies. Thanks to all of you for my cards and gifts. My dresser was bursting with monkey cards!

I have a terrible confession…

Rock – as you know – always my thing. There’s barely anything else in my music collection. From Bowie I progressed to Led Zep, loved Ozzy, went to see Rush at 16 (Tom, Kathryn…2112!!!!!), discovered the eternal joys of Metallica: even my mellow stuff is Nirvana, Foo Fighters. At a club obviously I’ll shake my booty to, well, pretty much anything after a few beers as witnessed at Brian’s wedding; Sally and I could hardly walk the next morning. Most definitely I am straight on that dance floor to a bit of Aretha or Freda Payne (Band of Gold – one of my top ten songs of all time). Lucy and I painted Peru a definite shade of red in 2006 with our non-stop Abba/disco inferno showing those bright young things how the old girls do it. San Francisco Holly and I have discovered the joys of the BeeGees breakfast on occasions when I’ve slept over; and I do like cleaning to Take That. Oh the joys of the boys!

Here’s the confession…I seem to have developed a nostalgic love of Hall and Oates. It’s one thing to strut your stuff to, “…Whoo, ooh, here she comes, watch out boy she’ll chew you up…”, but “…When I feel cold you warm me, When I feel I can’t go on you come and hold me (Daryl hits that high note and I feel the tears welling in my eyes)…It’s you... and me… forever...”. It started as a joke between Justine and I when they seemed to be playing, “…I said your kiss, your kiss, is on my list…” every time we were in Safeway. But last week I found myself saying to her, “But Justine, they invented a fusion of rock and roll and rhythm and blues, a style which they dubbed ‘rock and soul’. They are brilliant." She simply said, “Milly they are not,” and she looked at me with such disappointment I realized I had gone too far; that my 80’s nostalgia had taken control of my senses. I put on some Sepultura and Rage against the Machine. I’m feeling much better now. Whoo,ooh (damn). That’s weight off my mind.

We have mid-terms next week and the week after. I’ve got a horrible physiology exam on my birthday. My birthday! I don’t even usually go to work, let alone sit an exam. I usually spend the whole day with Sally and a champagne picnic watching the Rome Masters. I’m feeling just a little grumpy. However, once exams are over I’m straight on a plane for a long weekend in Vancouver; my first time to Canada, and I’m looking forward to it very much.

This week's pictures: The Marina,Emma, with ball on the beach and a dogmate,shopfront:the Castro, the coast road.

"Presidents don't have power; their job is to draw attention away from it." Ford Prefect

The primaries are dominating the news here in the US. I’m not taking the ultra-left position (for a change), that elections are totally irrelevant and we should not vote as a matter of principal: although with alarming regularity I say to myself that we should refuse to collude in what ultimately becomes an organisation supporting multi-national business interest and generally failing in its responsibilties to vast swathes of its population. Obviously I wouldn't truly condone not voting: at certain times and in certain circumstances even a small difference between two parties or leaders may be a matter of life and death - people died for this right. But in this case, there are some candidates who are somewhat better than others, but is it really going to make any real difference? All sense of proportion seems to be lost in an election madness-frenzy.

Would I support one candidate against another in this election race? Of course - I always do - but only for the two seconds it would take to make my cross. What I really wish is that we had some real democracy - you know - the kind that demands direct action by people who take to the streets because of things they believe in (or perhaps City Hall - can you be a revolutionary pacifist?). If any of you are interested in the Presidential race here, I was sent this link to a quiz which assesses which candidate's views most represent your own: I thought it was interesting. click here

And for your perusal, a couple of snaps of SF: the view from Buena Vista, the grounds of the Palace of the Legion of Honor, sea lions at Fisherman's Wharf and the compulsory photo of Emma the lurcher.

Fat Lurcher

Further to last week's post, someone commented, and yes indeed, Emma is quite ‘large’ for a lurcher. In fact she is affectionately referred to as the ‘Fat Lurcher’ ( sometimes, in case she's feeling a bit weight sensitive, we call her the skinny lab)and we have written and dedicated a song which is sung to her on an alarmingly regular basis (Kate D-B you really started something with your song challenge last year). Obviously there's a few house jokes in there, but you'll get the drift and Emma loves it when we sing it to her. For my British friends, to the tune of the ‘Blackadder’ theme, after three…

Emma on the sofa with the TV remote

The sound of paws across the park.
Good folk, watch out she’s very nippy.
Beware the sloppy kiss and bark,
Unless you want to end up drippy.
Fat lurcher, Fat lurcher. A kiss is what she needs.
Fat lurcher, Fat lurcher. She's very good indeed.
Black. Her coat of silky hair.
Rough. Her tongue is long and scratchy.
Sweet. Her nature good and fair.
Shame. Her bowels are rather patchy.
Fat lurcher, Fat lurcher. Her gas fills us with fear.
Fat lurcher, Fat lurcher. Good job Laurie’s not here!

I'm having amnesia and deja-vu at the same time...

Blimey! That two week school holiday existed in a weird time/space continuum. Sorry I haven't posted for a while but I've had a few technical account difficulties: Milly/technology/problems...now there's a familiar story. It's frightening to think I have an MSc in Computing! I spent what felt like an eternity of this break, but was actually mere days, hanging out in the Castro trying to set up a new bank account. But, I discovered some decent cafes, one of which never closes and is therefore stored away in the 'potentially useful in the future' recess of my brain for the next sleepless night. I was racking my brain for something to write about and drew a blank as I didn't seem to do especially much apart from study last quarter: writing the blog was so much easier when I was travelling through Central and South America and every day was filled with a wonderous new place or snippet of culture. However, sitting in one of these many cafes in the Castro, I read an interesting piece of San Francisco history which may, of course, not be new to you, but was at least in detail somewhat new to me.

In 1977, gay activist Harvey Milk was elected to the Board of Supervisors. A fellow supervisor, Dan White, a former police officer, had been relieved of his position due to mental ill-health but on improvement of his condition had asked for reinstatement. Milk held the deciding vote and voted against his reinstatement. White promptly went to City Hall and assassinated Milk and Mayor Mascone. His defence was notorious and became known as the 'Twinkie Defense'; the eponymous confectionary and his generally toxic e-number-riddled diet having led to his diminshed mental state. This defence, as successful as the infamous 'South Park Chewbacca Defence' ("No! Ladies and gentlemen of this supposed jury, it does not make sense! If Chewbacca lives on Endor, you must acquit! The defense rests." Didn't you love South Park?!), led to a verdict of voluntary manslaughter thereby enraging the population of SF.

After the verdict was announced, one journalist wrote that they were surprised that Milk had not been posthumously charged with 'unlawful interference with a bullet fired by a former police officer.' City Hall was stormed, riots ensued: it became known as the White Night Riot. After serving his very short sentence, White was released and promptly committed suicide. Sean Penn is currently here in SF filming the story so that's one to look out for: myself, I tend to like a Sean Penn film. Also a reminder to me that this Friday was the 40th anniversary of the assassination of Martin Luther King.

I have done some very fun stuff: it's not been all studying. Joanna and I hired a car and took a day-trip with Emma the dog over the bridge heading north into the Marin Headlands (Stinson Beach, Point Reyes). It is really beautiful and exhibits the strangest manifestation of the already somewhat unusual SF weather system. In case you don't know, SF itself has a rolling fog, even in the summer, which apparently will usually burn off by lunchtime. I was standing on Stinson beach, waves crashing, looking out to a beatiful baby-blue sky. See below:


I turned around to talk to Joanna and this was the view directly behind her:



Justine and I went to a magnificent ballet performed by the National Company of Monte Carlo. In fact, there were so many dancers on stage I think only Prince Albert was still in situ. The costumes were designed by Jean-Paul Gaultier and there were some exquisite routines aided by beautiful lighting and music with some glorious gender-bending dance roles. All the way home we were babbling, "and that was brilliant", "and that was perfect". I love it when you go to see something live or a really good film and you can't stop talking about how wonderful it is!

I went down to LA for a few days to catch up with Dave, Arron and Jill. As usual I persevere with the CA shuttle service: at $45 each way, and almost door to door it generally seems like the best option involving no demands on people to pick me up from an airport. But this time...oh dear. It was bad enough that what is usually a 6/7 hour journey took 9 on the way down. Often I have also been blessed with a charming travelling companion in the adjacent seat. This time the person in the next seat spent most of the journey on the phone to every friend she had telling them in great depth, actually word-for-word, how she had 'like-dumped' her 'like-annoying' boyfriend and 'like-why' whilst eating excruciatingly pongy McDonalds. For the return journey they simply forgot to pick me up. 16 hours and one Greyhound trip later I collapse exhausted and, I don't mind telling you, fairly rank, into bed aiming to be bright and enthusiastic to start new classes in 5 hours time. I was greeted at 3am by the loving kisses of Emma the lurcher. Mark says I'm to post as many pictures of her as possible, so here's one of her on her bed guarding her treat stash.


And so to the title of this post...another quarter begins with Medical Terminolgy, the Fundamentals of TCM (at last!) and Physiology. The lecturer was talking about epithelium and cells and things I feel sure I learnt for an exam three weeks ago...I think I've forgotten all of this stuff before.

Lá Fhéile Pádraig Sona Duit

Happy St.Pat's. Back to that later...

I'm afraid that I do not have much to report from the Bay Area. I’ve just had finals so I didn’t really do much for weeks except sit hunched at a desk pouring over anatomy, psychology and chemistry books. I did really well (I got straight A’s), but seriously, I cannot continue to work that hard. I must get a life! I still have a lot of pre-requisite courses to complete (physiology, physics and biology) but I actually begin the history and fundamentals of Chinese medicine next quarter so I'm really excited about that. Not quite so excited about the prospect of learning medical Chinese. It will still be a while before I do any points and even longer before I'm let loose on the general public with needles: still knowing my tendency towards 'near-disaster' perhaps that's for the best.

David came up from LA for three days at the end of February and we had a lovely time wandering and NOT thinking about school at all! He thought San Francisco was 'the bridge' and that would pretty much about be it: so he was very pleasantly surprised. It's a very small city, 49 square miles, somewhat akin to the size of a park for us 'Larnderners' used to a whopping 650 square miles of city to explore, but it's very accessible, quite diverse and very pretty. I think he's a bit fed up with LA and the fast-paced sprawl. How does the song go? "LA is a great big freeway?”
David basking in the warm February sunshine on Chrissy Fields.
Someone kindly left a comfortable chair, pouffe and drinks table.

It was very strange waking up yesterday realizing that I had nothing to do. Well, nothing pressing at least. I still have to sort out a bank account which is pretty shameful considering I wrote that over 3 months ago. So care-free and without a thought of bones, muscles or cell mitosis in my head (which is unfortunately exactly where those thoughts have been for most of the term), I wandered into town for the St. Patrick’s Day parade. I think you only have to have been there on holiday to count as a paddy here. So having an Irish-American father and some great-grandparents makes me as good as born there.


One of the wonderful things about being abroad is that one loses one’s shame, among other things. So here you are…a picture from yesterday’s parade (me and the mayor of San Francisco, Gavin Newsome).