Delegation for The Control Freak

This article is too good that Twitter nor Facebook is enough and I have to dedicate a whole post for it, lest I forget about this issue in the future.

"But when it comes down to it, the work needs to be done by the person who’s in the best position to make that happen, right now."

"Of course, we bring the big decisions before the whole group and make sure no one gets left out of the loop—we are, after all, in this together."

"Finally, the good sort of flexibility also means knowing when to ask for help and when to jump in to assist your co-founders when they need it. And there are times, like launches, when it really is all hands on deck."

Kat Minshew
A Control Freak's Guide to Delegating

CTE

I am not the gentlest of owner and there are multiple scratches and bumps on this poor phone of mine from being dropped to the hard ground too many times. Recently it has developed this habit of getting back at me by going inactive just like that. I leave it alone anywhere without stimulus and suddenly without any notice, it will go inactive like this.

And I will not know any better until I feel like checking up on it maybe at the end of the day and realize it is inactive and wouldn't know since when! It is worst than having the battery dead. From the history, the provisional diagnosis of my phone is chronic traumatic encephalopathy.

Cursing is frowned upon. Nothing bad should be coming out of your mouth and you should be istighfar-ing instead. But when this happens again today and lands me in deep sheet trouble, I am dedicating all the bad words in the world to this effing phone of mine. 

Stupid. Junk.

This is Quinsy

In a case of peritonsillar abscess (quinsy), when the fever gets hectic, pain is throbbing, edema is pitting and aspiration brings out pus, incision and drainage is indicated. The patient is in agony and immediate relief comes when you incise the bulge that is causing him so much pain and drain out the collected pus.

Relief him off his pain first, then proceed with whatever you want to do next.

I think when a girl cries because of any problem, it is the equivalent of incision and drainage. It is immediate relief but the problem is still there. Solution still need to be found, work still need to be done and over with.

In the case of quinsy, the solution to the problem is antibiotics and antipyretics. And since we have this mantra "Once quinsy, always quinsy", the patient is rid of any future problems by surgically removing his tonsils a month afterward. Done and over with.

So if we apply the same principle to this.. predicament that leads me to writing this post and the sudden urge to jump off the Nile, I should cry, think of a solution and then get this whole thing done and over with.

A sound plan.

Only when you're emotionally retard, crying is really hard to do. The last time I cried I scared off my sanguinous roommate into silence haha. Thus I usually resort to something else. And that was after a blow from a respected person to my intelligence and life-priorities (and I was hormonal).

But all aside, the 'better' I feel after crying is slightly different than the 'better' I feel after any physical activity. Crying has its clinical value, I believe.

When you have something bigger to take care of, your own heartbreaks and psychological well-being can be put aside.

Updated:
Ops! I forgot I read and loved this one article before, silly me :P Don't Even Think About Giving Up Until

Reading Yahoo! for the Comments

I know I shouldn't be blogging with the mountain of medicine yet to study plus some other pestering stuffs but I was having my lunch while reading some articles so yeah I just feel like sharing something.

First there was this World's 20 Most Powerful Moms in Forbes and they acknowledge the fact that it is hard to balance a family with a strenuous career, but all made possible with the support of a husband or parents. "The mother’s work at home is incredibly important. Often, it paves the way for her daughter’s work outside it."

Case in example is number 19 on the list, Anne Sweeney; mother of two and co-chair of Disney Media Networks and president of Disney-ABC Television Group. Her mother was an elementary school teacher and she was “smart, strong-willed and inspirational.”

“I remember when I was a kid, she really pushed me hard. I was studying for a Latin test, and I looked at her and I said, ‘You think I’m smarter than I am.’ She said, ‘You don’t know how smart you are.’” 

“It was such a great thing for a parent to say that,” Sweeney continued. “Because it’s motivating, and you sit back and think, ‘Well, maybe I can do this. Maybe I can do more.’”

All praises be to God for my parents as my parents. Their support and trust, belief in me are immense. I think I gave them too much trouble to be worth it, but I will do my best to be an asset for them here and thereafter.

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Second we have this poor quality sports article because it's more of a relationship piece of advice from a sports person than anything really sports. Ronda Rousey told how she dissed off an ex who only contact her after she got famous. Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned, yeah.

But that's not the highlight of the article for me. This article is on Yahoo! and the most interesting, winning part of a Yahoo! article is the comments.

HAHAHAHAHA!

Okay so it's not good to laugh at homosexuality jokes, but it was too funny how the Americans portray their distaste in Obama's recent approval of gay marriage.

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If you want good sports article, you can trust Adrian Wojnarowski. His piece on how Kobe Bryant is coping with the Lakers's lost is a stunning winner. My heart cried yesterday reading to this. (Okay so last night I had a sissy attack, but that's not the point. This article really is touching.)

Good day, y'all.

My Ambition Is To Win

Negotiation is a dialogue between two or more people intended to reach an understanding, resolve point of difference, or gain advantage in outcome of dialogue. The aim is to produce an agreement upon courses of action, to bargain for individual or collective advantage, to craft outcomes to satisfy various interests of the people involved in negotiation process.

Negotiation is intended to aim at compromise. And the number one step in negotiation is communicating.

My preferred mean of communication will have to be up front but when that is not likely, second best choice is in written form because I don't like to talk to someone I cannot see. The downside is that written form is easier to be forgotten or overlooked. Or worst, purposely ignored.

Exactly what my mom did to me just because she disapprove of what I wanted to negotiate about despite the severity of the matter at hand. No wonder I am difficult, it was genetic. Hahaha..

Anyway, that is why video-calling was revealed to human.

Ain't that a mess.

Make mom happy and return home for the summer.
Make Hyde happy (??) and celebrate together all three of his events.
Make Haru happy and don't make her miss a week of class.
Make Miru happy and buy her Temmy's granola bars with papaya.

Negotiate. Compromise. Make everyone happy. Everybody wins.

Shocked

Dr. Solah knocked on the door and since earlier this morning he gave us our shock exam, we were like teetering and gasping "Another shock exam?"

He came into the class, hugged and kissed Dr. Ali's cheeks and turned to us, smiling.

"I want to ask you a question. What is the management of shock-"

My mind was running, 'Complete bed rest with head low, diazepam, IV fluid or fresh blood transfusion, argh what's the fourth?'

"-exam?" he finished his statement.

The class laughed :))

"Resuscitation." Dr. Ali answered while sipping his Pepsi.

---

Exam season leaves you edgy and jumpy. Haha.

Why Enjoy A Stand-up Comedy

Apparently my companions were wondering how I end up with them that night because according to them I am a goody-two-shoe kid and that I join u***h (lol this is comedic in itself) and despite not being the biologically youngest in the pack, I do appeared 12 years old when compared to the more vogue and chic guys and girls.

I tweeted this before I went out of the house to meet them that night.

Semoga dapat pahala bersaudara, belajar benda baru dan macam-macam lagi kebaikan. Go!

Well I'd say as long as you have something bigger to achieve, what is the harm of a night out with them? And my intentions that night were:
1- spend time with Kak Elle and maybe charm her into treating me to her infamous Mee Udang.
2- expand my circle and catch up with the other guys!
3- do something For The First Time
4- learn something new
5- macam-macam lagi kebaikan (lol)

FIRST

It was Kak Elle who was so excited at the prospect of meeting her Abang Jobrani and she invited some of us to join her. No one replied positive to that group message (not even me. I'm not familiar with stand-up comedy) that Kak Elle had to ask again.

Obviously I have soft spot for her (ecece) and I knew that bitter feeling of having to put out your passion because you're the only one in it, so I asked dad for permission. Granted, I replied yes to Kak Elle despite knowing nothing to expect from that event. Let's just say I was blindly following her to the abyss of the end of the world haha.

The others followed suit after some coaxing from the pestering persistent Kak Elle XD

Actually what I really wanted was her Mee Kuah oh Tuhan sedapnyeeee~

SECOND 

These people are not in my everyday circle of people I meet (they are seniors and Ain Shams students) plus they are famous chic vogue people which I am not. Why not go make merriment, hang out and spend time together? I will definitely learn new things and see different perspectives and God knows maybe I can be of great insight to them as well, haha :P

Turn it into a field trip and it will be most beneficial for my anthropological observations! Life is an experiment! (I am such a nerd :B )

This is Acap and Kak Elle told him to babysit me. He is a cool rather quiet guy thus I was left to play on my own :( LOL

THIRD

This is my first time attending a live stand-up comedy. I didn't even know who the comedians are, what to expect, etc. Technological development granted everything the ease to be Googled and Wikied and Youtubed nowadays but that is too much of a bulk information for a newbie like me.

So I resorted instead to asking people and like Kak Elle, the only person this friend knew from the list of comedians was Maz Jobrani and I was like, why is this Iranian so famous? and my answer was this video. Despite the fact I was trying hard not to laugh because he was making fun of Ahmadinejad, I succumbed because his words really were funneh and made light to serious topic such as homosexuality!

This video came next, nailed it and I was sold to stand-up comedy! Because tomato juice really sucks. I tried it once on board a flight in German and it was like chugging down the tomato puree you use to make bolognese, urgh..

I was then rubbing my palms, all excited to listen to these guys in person, haha.

FOURTH

This is all said in the previous post. Sort of like in debate, where understanding the issue at hand will promise you a more enjoyable time extorting your brain and thrashing people. Somewhat applies to stand-up comedy as well :)

How To Enjoy A Stand-up Comedy

1. Have great company
2. Get front-row seat  

3. Understand the issue/situation being played at 

4. Understand the language
5. Hear the enunciation well  

6. Get the inside joke of said issue/situation
7. Agree that it is a justifiable laugh  

8. Can relate to the issue/situation played at

TODO Stand-up Comedy Weekend, second show 5th May 2012

FOUR OUT OF EIGHT

If it stuck at Number 4, well this is why Rafeeq commented,

"Hana, masa Egyptian comedian tu asal monyok semacam je." 

Haha. I am severely lacking in Arabic language, I felt trashed in the auditorium. I grasped what the Egyptian comedians were making fun of, but because I didn't really understand their language obviously it was hard for me to get the joke.

Plus Bassem Yousef made fun of all the Egyptian presidential candidates and I don't think you should play on people's personalities.. 

I am too nice? Urgh.

We're on countdown till the start of the show!

SEVEN OUT OF EIGHT

If it gets stuck at Number 7, I will just grin and laugh probably.

Angelo Tsarouchas commented on the drama of being raised Greek

"You know the Egyptians were beating the sheet out of their kids? I was at Jeffrey's and his mother sent him to his room to have a time out. 

Jeffrey asked me if we have time-outs and I said, 'Jeffrey, I am Greek. We couldn't have time-outs when we were having black-outs'."

and his mother who was your classic drama mama. I bet his mother is a Melancholic always guilt-tripping people, and Kak Elle again blogged sufficiently about him so you should just head over to her post for it. Thankfully my mother is not doing that or I would have been ambivalent about her, but I do have some acquaintances who rather enjoy guilt-tripping and putting me in a hard situation.

I suppose some part of me was still naive, decent and childishly adamant with my principle in that I couldn't justify making fun of people as a source of genuine amusement. That's why I couldn't bring myself to really laugh when Dean Edwards was imitating the recently-departed Whitney Houston, Rihanna, Lady Gaga, Beyonce and the like.

Except for his statement that Rihanna "made songs from a string of vowels". Now that's a real tickle :))

Michael Winslow appeared and he was the most amazing sound effect machine ever! He amazed the person on my left so much my companion cursed in excitement!

I on the other hand, could not help but to want to meet him afterwards and ask him to come down to the ENT outpatient clinic so that we can have a direct laryngoscopic view of his vocal folds when he was making that amazing Star Wars scene reenactment.

Winslow parodied the scene with Han Solo, Princess Leia, Luke and that beast and they were just under attack. Everyone ran towards the weapon control room but Winslow changed the script for Princess Leia and she was like "I need to pee!" during the whole commotion!

EIGHT OUT OF EIGHT

When all how-to's are covered by the comedian, that is when you will hear me really laugh and give him an applause.

Thus why Kak Elle commented I only really laughed at the end during Maz Jobrani's appearance, in which he made sharp jabs at Egypt post-revolution, his Arabic vocabulary which was restricted to "Assalamo alaikum, waalaikum salam and shawarma", Egyptian kids upbringing and their lack of sleep train, and more!

"An Egyptian came at me and said 'Assalamo alaikum' and I was like 'Waalaikum salam' and he thought I can speak Arabic so he went on *made jibberish sounds* and I was,

 'Shawarma'?"

For me Jobrani was the best act that night since the ability to make the audience (me) relate to the joke without actually offending any issue was a real winner. He made us laugh simply by sharing his opinion and what-he-would-do in the raised issues, which was really admirable.

His take on Anderson Cooper covering the 25 January got me laughing real hard, shawarma definitely was the word of the day!

"man i was watching the news on television when they showed that anderson cooper got attacked during the Jan 25 revolution and I was like 'Say something in arabic! Say something in arabic! Say SHAWERMA! Say SHAWERMA!' " 

as blogged by Kak Ellina

Then he went on and told us how many kisses on the cheek Arabs were giving to each other according to their land of origin. In Egypt it is two. Jordan we have three.

Iran we have two and three, depending on the person's stand of the Iranian Revolution. Two before the fated 1979 and three after the revolution.

"So we would go like one, two, three kisses and the one being kissed will abruptly pull away and stomp 'WHAT! I can't believe you supported that regime!' "

ROFL ROFL You really need to hear them yourself! 

Playtime

is over, but tonight only I'll give myself one last final exception :P

With a month left for our first final written paper (Community Medicine), this line fits the situation.

Now success was on everyone's minds and work was the order of the day.

leafygirl
The Art of War

Coincidently, supposedly we wouldn't be seeing each other in a while. Remember from the Moscow Rules, one sighting is an accident, twice is coincidence, three times is enemy action.

((Did I not enjoin upon you, O children of Adam, that you not worship Satan - [for] indeed, he is to you a clear enemy.)) 

Surah Yaasin verse 60

All ze best :) 

Trust Without Depending

Dr. Ashraf demoed to us the procedures for a cortical and radical mastoidectomy using a computer simulator program. It was very neat. Three of our friends got to play ENT surgeons today and may that be a small spark towards a successful surgery career in the future.

The delicate thing with this surgery is that the mastoid cavity is so near the dura of the middle cranial fossa and the facial nerve. One wrong move and you might hit the brain or hit the 7th cranial nerve and the patient will have facial nerve paralysis.

Facial paralysis on the baby's right side thus the over-functioning on the left side.

"Of course, you should never attempt surgery if you don't know your anatomy," the doctor said as he proceeded to explain some of the preventive measures to protect the facial nerve during the surgery.

One of them, is having an experienced nurse to put her hand on the patient's cheek. The slightest twitch in the general-anesthesized patient's face is a sign of stimulation of the facial nerve, meaning the surgeon is too close to it for comfort. "Back off now," the nurse will warn and the surgeon will stop for awhile to review his anatomy.

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Surgery, or medicine in general, is a team play. The doctor is the leader and there is always a team with him for the management of any case. Be it just one other nurse or a resident, it is a team when it has more than one person in it. Even House when he fired off all his subordinates, he brainstormed with the janitor. That goes to show the significance of teamwork in medicine.

And that team spirit is what we should nurture from now on.

It is easier said than done. Terribly tough when you are a head-strong Choleric like me who generally give no heed for others but trying to change for the better, and you could die trying when you feel like that hard, ego-busting effort to teamwork with people is in vain...

"The only thing women want is to know that their faith in you is valid. That you value the relationship as much as they do."

Cynchick
Will of Fire

Anyways, I surmised after two incidents that it is not wrong to trust people but it is wrong to depend on them in any way. It hurts when you become dependent and outbursting "I thought I could trust you" and in the end, you can only blame yourself for expecting anything from them in the first place.

Teamwork is the thinking of an idealist. I still believe in a one-man army in the slightest tinge of reality.

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And as always, interesting people are the ones reminding me of someone or something. In Dr. Ashraf's case, he reminds me of Peter MacNicol :P

Thanks for the confidence, kid

Yesterday my cards were shown to you. It is escapism if I say it wasn't me who authorized the message even if it is the truth, but I take that it was my number so I should be held accountable.

Good thing is that I know your cards back in response. Bad thing is that the exchange of cards were done forcefully, akin to a slapping down and jolting the table instead of "showing" each other's cards.

At least that's how I think my part was revealed. It wasn't my choice of words.

I took a rain check for my usrah yesterday because I was afraid I couldn't get back to Cairo in time for today's (presumably early) morning (like 7 am maybe) engagement. Coupled with the fact that I already will be missing on the weekend's daurah, it left me.. unstable. For a very good reason.

I don't know what your usrah is to you, but to me it's a lifeline reminding me of the reasons I am still alive. Usrah is analogous to filling up a full tank at the gas station. You fill up and you continue down the highway. After a week the gas ran out and you refill before hitting the road once more.

If you're constantly on the move but there's hardly any refills, how do you move along? Other cars will leave you far long behind. The bandwagon of dakwah is moving fast and what importance do I have for them to wait for me?

And it was painfully glaring that

Call me drama queen, but ask around and you'll know teary emotional breakdown is unheard of from one Haru. (Okay this one sounds very berlagak. I should be shot.)

So when I did so in front of Roy after a stake out at the Nile, she probably freaked out to an extend and remarked with a "Kalau enti perempuan dah lama ana suruh enti tidur. Bangun pastu lega."