Alien weather

Cosmic Radiation in NewScientist

I would really love to get a meteorologist's take on the recent weather changes.

As the night breaks and the day falls

Rescue me from underneath the fluorescent sky,

the restlessness and the bleeding of time.

Deliver me into the darkness

for more than a flickering moment's

greater finality

in a destination for this train of thought to alight.

Rather than the relentless chug

that drives only to eventual exhaustion.

The depletion far more final.

The duration of rest unknown -

pray not that this time will be the

straw that brakes the camel's - bringing me

back into the nightmarish wreck

-age I tunneled out of,

only to return to

my deepest fear and my darkest longing -

brief respite

as the night breaks and the day falls

and fear of leaving lucidity farther and farther behind.

It's the heart that matters most

[Warning: as you may have discerned from the title, this will be a cliched and gushy, probably preachy post.]

Looking around at the doctors and doctors-to-be around me, I see people of all walks of life. There are the foul-mouthed swearing types, there are the jokers, there are the cold and distant types, there are the overtly caring ones, there are the ones who claim they don't give a damn.

But they do. We all do. The thing that binds us isn't that we're high academic achievers, or that we're competent, or that we've an all-consuming interest in what we do.

It's that we've got heart. Underneath our exteriors, whether hard and clam-like, or soft and welcoming, we feel for others. When we see another human being suffering, some part of us is fundamentally driven to do something, unselfish enough to care about it, and to want to make a difference.

If you're in the profession for anything else - whether it's the so-called glory or prestige, or the financial stability, or even for the intellectual gratification, you're bound to be disappointed. There's little real glory to be had - every other course from Politics to Culinary Skills, has its fair share of high-fliers. As for financial stability, there are easier ways to get that. You will spend a long time awaiting intellectual gratification, if that's what you're hoping for. Frustration is more likely, with all the loose ends and incomplete science.

The only thing that I can think of that makes us want to go on in this race is that we care. We care about our patients. We care about being good doctors. We care about each other.

A large nose isn't a godsend, it's a...

Ladies and gentlemen of the mockery, I give you the original nose on a stick. Paul Townshend is a guitarist whose large nose drove him to an incredible career in guitar.

[Historic relevance: Just in case you happen to be blind or short-sighted or dyslexic (or a stranger who doesn't know me), I have a rather prominent nose that used to be the subject of ridicule in my early adolescence, when it used to rather overpower my face.]