Tuesday, July 15, 2008

Let the Works That I Do Speak for Me When I'm Gone

On Friday night, one of my personal heroes died.

He lies in repose today in Houston's City Hall, the first man to hold such an honor in the city he helped define.

His legacy lives on in a million different ways. He invented the roller pump critical to heart-lung machines -- making open heart surgery a possibility -- while he was still a medical student. He helped establish the MASH unit and the VA hospital system. He used his wife's sewing machine to make a Dacron graft, which is now widely used to repair blood vessels. He developed artificial hearts and numerous heart assist devices, including the current pump which can be implanted into a small child. He pioneered the surgical procedure on aortic aneurysms, which later saved his own life at the ripe young age of 97. He helped build a world-class medical center with world-class surgeons, and trained many new generations to continue his work. He personally touched lives, having performed more than 60,000 operations in his lifetime.

Although there is no photographic evidence, I feel honored to have met the man and shaken his hand. But even more importantly, I feel even more honored to have worked with and worked on his inventions.


And still, his legacy lives on, as I am forever influenced by this great man to find ways to improve on his works.

Monday, July 14, 2008

Time Goes By So "Slowly"

OHEMGEE! IT'S A NEW POST! (Read: OK! OK! I get the hint! grumblegrumblegrumble :0) )

Apologies for not posting in the past few months.

Although there have been some ups....

Remember this?

Yeah. I totally got it.

...it appears my terrible, horrible, no good, very bad year is not over yet. The drama includes -- but is not limited to -- family, friends, relationships, research, being a graduate student....oh, and cars. In the past 2 months, my car troubles have included -- but are not limited to -- air bag indicator lighting up, headlight burning out, electrical failure...oh, and did I mention DYING IN THE MIDDLE OF THE ROAD WHILE I'M DRIVING? Yes, the car was still moving.

C'est la vie.

It also appeared I ran out of space on my laptop! Can't upload pictures that way! Requires a new external hard drive! (Read: ohemgee am I so not made of money! Good thing I went home...and my parents bought me a 1 TB external hard drive. If I run out of space now, someone please take my camera away from me.) But I did take pictures!

While everyone else was oohing and aahing over the fireworks July 4, I was getting excited over some silhouettes. I wanted to enjoy myself (Read: be lazy), so I opted to bring my compact point-and-shoot Sony DSC W-70, which resulted in lots of blurry pictures and lots of cursing at myself for not being able to set the aperture or shutter speed or being able to hold steady. I still like them anyway.

Leah, Ben, Tim, Nick, and Brian

It's like we're superheroes!
Nick, Ben, Me (Thanks, Salma!), Tim, Patricia, and Brian

Patricia and Linda

Linda being pensive