Day in the Life:Tori

I had a big bowl of fruit, some oatmeal, and green tea.  I started the day, though, by going to yoga with Yesha, and was finally able to hold the crow pose.

Surgical Interventions + Biomedical Engineering

Yesterday, we put artificial joints in chicken bones, and I thought that was pretty cool, but I might have liked what we did today even better. Our instructor, Elaina, just finished her PhD at Boston College and she presented her dissertation research this morning. Then, in the middle of her presentation, we moved into the lab and replicated her research. My lab partner, Assad and I nailed it! We reshaped the cornea in a model eye just like Lasik surgery, but then applied Elania’s new process of measuring the cornea’s reaction to puffs of air to determine the elasticity (how much movement or flexibility) and predict the patient’s potential for corneal diseases.

I went up to my room before lunch, tossed some clothes in the washer, and grabbed my playing cards. At lunch today, I got soup and grilled cheese. I think it’s my favorite food combination. My table played cards while we ate, and I won … again. 

Surgical Interventions + Biomedical Engineering

We’ve formed teams to design our own stents to clear clogged arteries.  We’re going to be testing them out tomorrow in these stent machines.  Too little liquid goes through and you’ve killed the patient.  But if you don’t catch the clot, the patient can die because of that, too.

We did house challenges today. We are enthusiastic, but right now we’re stuck in the middle of the rankings and I have this feeling that this may not change, but Gabi, our RA, keeps on saying we’ve got to play to win.

Signed up for the trip to MIT.   We took a tour. The number of things invented there is unbelievable. Learned about all the hacks MIT students do including the car they put on the dome and making MIT letters come out of the ground during a Harvard football game. Our guide was clearly letting us know that even though there may be a lot of STEM geeks here, they have a sense of humor.

Got there just in the nick of time.  Went to Clover Food Lab and got the chickpea fritter platter.  Apparently this place started as a food truck at MIT and was so popular they wouldn’t tell people where they would be because the line was so long. Now they have a bunch of restaurants and the menu changes every day.

Because we were still coming back from MIT, we missed living group check.  But Akari and I talked what to go to when we got back.  We debated whether to go to karaoke night or go out to Munger meadow to play volleyball.

We ended up going to Munger Meadow for a little while and then came back and caught the tail end of karaoke.

Gabi went around tonight and asked us each to tell what the best part of the day was.  I said reshaping the cornea. Some of the girls in other courses said they couldn’t believe I did that and it was my favorite.  Other people talked about blocking scenes for acting and other things like designing a building, and someone else said winning at parliamentary debate. There are so many different things going on here and I love hearing what people are up to.  I also found out that Akari and I are going on the Chocolate Tour this Saturday.  I love this place.