INTERESTING TIMES

The Map is not the Territory.
—Alfred Korzybski

Diagnostic Imaging II Midterm Exam Study Guide
Dr. Stecher - Winter 2009
( these answers not by me )

Nice table on DRUG INTERACTIONS here:
http://medicine.iupui.edu/flockhart/table.htm
( a little liver review )

Test your ability to tell the difference, thanks to the BBC, at: http://www.bbc.co.uk/science/humanbody/mind/surveys/smiles/index.shtml. I can tell that John McCain's smile is phoney, and so is the smile of Bill Richardson. I wouldn't mind politicians and their fake smiles to much if they weren't plastered all over. Hints for recognizing real and fake smiles are behind the cut( ---cut---. )

Well tonight I went to another yoga class, same studio, different teacher. I had not been to this teacher before and she immediately checked me for all the same pet peeves that the other teachers from this school focus on. Are my knees hyperextended? I made sure that they were not. Are my hips level? Yes they are. I passed the first 10 tests or so before we made it to the crux of the matter. At TYE I was taught to use the rhomboids to pull the shoulder blades onto the back to toward each other in the middle of the back. At Amrita the staff is in rebellion against John Friend regarding this teaching, and they are not teaching it. Rather than saying "melt your heart" they say to keep your back "broad" and not allow the pinching between the shoulderblades. Tonight I had a social work nurse and a physical therapist, both yoga teachers, try to authoritize me into believing that they way is right. I don't believe anything just because somebody said so! And I told them this. I tried to open the conversation about the anatomy involved. The main teacher of the class said that she thinks Americans overuse their rhomboids and in such is the essence of our postural problems. I so disagree with her. We did this partner stretch that involved having one person hold another person's wrists behind their backs and lean forward to open the chest. I was instructed to do this without my shoulderblades coming together. When I resisted the stretch and exerted my pecs to hold my shoulders forward, she was satisfied. When I allowed the pose to open my heart, my shoulderblades were too close and she was dissatisfied. I am so far not impressed with the level of awareness of this school. There is too much pedantry, too much authoritarian zeal. I will do what I choose based on what I decide based on the assimilation of teachings, studies and body knowledge. This is my yoga. One rebel school can disagree with one brand new master about the ultimate truth, and I will synthesize my own truth.

From now on I'm going to read through the lecture notes and post about it instead of going to Brons lectures. What I'm doing is simply looking up each item that appears on his powerpoint slides.

Quiz Questions:
1. Which hand muscles act to clench your thumb against your index finger?
2. Name the fibrous band which arches over the carpus making the CARPAL TUNNEL
(through which the Flexor tendons of the digits and the median nerve pass).
3. Which thumb muscle is deep to the other two?
a. Abductor pollicis brevis
b. Flexor pollicis brevis
c. Opponens pollicis
4. Which two muscles work together to allow us to flex the metacarpal phalangeal joints while we extend the interphalangeal joints?
5. Between which two bones in the hand do you find a saddle joint?
6. What kind of joint is found between the metacarpals and the phalanges?
7. Which muscles connect into the dorsal extensor expansion?
8. Damage to which nerve causes you to loose your power grip?
( answers )

Today at 8am I went into the lab and held in my hands a human heart. I have studied anatomy many times before. I have dissected a living pregant mouse, a frog, and a pelican whose gut contents did not reveal the reason he was dead on the beach. I have dissected a fetal pig, complete with colored plastic injected into his arteries and veins. I have held a cow's heart in my hands. I have studied the flows and construction of hearts. But holding a human heart is different.

( Heart notes from lab )