Andrew Potter and the Order of the Pharmacy

Dear Diary,

Yet another day down… time seems to fly but yet at the same time it feels slow too. Yes, that statement does not make sense. However, that’s the feeling. The weekend seems to draw closer but at an awfully slow pace. Yet I know that in a twinkle, my role as preceptor will be over in a just about a week. This is not a logical expression but if you feel it in your heart, you will get what I meant. =)

Had lunch with my students at Ichiban Sushi today. Yes, that isn’t a grammatical error. It is plural. Apparently, a fellow preceptor has asked that her student be attached to me for a 3-day stint. So I took her in. Quite interesting… at least now, I can just leave my student alone knowing that she will not lapse into “loneliness”, haha… Anyway, we had that $5 after-3pm Japanese lunch sets which we had to gobble up after realising how long they took to serve our meals and how short a lunch break we actually had. Another of their classmate from another training institution joined us for that meal too. I upsized that meal by adding an extra $3 to include the Chawanushi (a bowl of steamed egg with mushrooms and meat) but still it wasn’t very filling.

Over the two days on Tuesday and Thursday (which is today), did a massive revision for the two students on Over-the-counter (OTC) products, P-Medicine products… yup, also showed the attached student how to listen to the Korotkoff sounds with a stethoscope for the auscultatory method. Even had to sacrifice letting my fingers get pricked for the blood glucose test after my own student did not want to be pricked by her classmate… hmmm… good practice for the attached student since she hadn’t tried pricking with the lancets before. Ouch, it was painful, haha… Got pricked by 3 students over a 3-month period and I am quite sure who did it most professionally with the least pain inflicted. ;-) Anyway, am pleased that my own student seems to be able to remember her stuff very well! Yeah!

Oh yes… yesterday, I worked in another branch with my student. Work ended at 3pm and I took a long walk to visit a former classmate at his pharmacy. Had a pretty long chat with him and was surprised by some dramatic developments in his life. After which, I took a trip down to Tiong Bahru Plaza. There, I caught “Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix” movie with another old friend. It must have been more than 2 years ago since I last caught a movie in Tiong Bahru Plaza. Nostalgic feeling. Even eating dinner at the Thai Express was like reliving the past. Remembered two pharmacy juniors giving me a treat there probably about a year ago, in exchange for advice and as a way of thanking my help during their university years.

The movie was surprisingly quite good. Maybe my expectations have been lowered drastically with all the poor reviews I got from my sister, my student and many other friends. Voldermot did not seem as invincible and as scary as the previous movies had made him out to be. Looked like a common villain if you ask me, haha… The movie ended and I bought some chicken pies which I ate on the public bus secretly. My friend and I purposely took a longer trip home as we chatted and ate those pies. There is always that thrill when you do things you are not supposed to do… like eating on the bus… haha... Then again, I was considerate and discarded my rubbish at the bus-stop after I alighted, okay! Haha…

Tomorrow, Friday, is “stocking-up the shelves” day. Good to have two students to help me out! Gave up trying to convince my student about how interesting a pharmacy career is. Don’t want to be a hypocrite anymore, haha…

God Bless,

Andrew