Alcohol, my permanent accessory

Alcohol, a party-time necessity,
Alcohol, alternative to feeling like yourself -
Oh alcohol, I still drink to your health...

...oh, hello, didn't see you there. Bonus points for guessing the song and the artist!

It's been a crazy week. I've been following the FY1s who are on the ward I'm going to start on, trying to learn the ropes and how things work. I've met lots of nice people (I had heard that BCI was not the friendliest of places but everyone's been lovely so far, including all the consultants), everyone's really friendly and the two girls I'm working with are really cool, I think we'll get on well. There are some oddities about how things work in this hospital compared with University Hospital, but I think that would happen anyhere. And yes, I have got lost a lot!

Parking at BCI is extortionately expensive and there aren't really any alternatives to park - there's a housing estate close by in which you might get a space if you're lucky, but otherwise it's a bit of a nightmare. Thankfully I only live 2 miles away, so I've been walking there and back this week. I've actually really enjoyed it, I like the fresh air, the exercise, the fact that there are lots of trees on the roads I walk along, and the fact that I can have some free thinking time before the day starts. I'm planning to walk to work in August when we start as long as it's still light, except perhaps on late days. Or when it's chucking it down.

My ward is GI, which I was expecting, but what I wasn't expecting was it being only upper GI, and the fact that the vast majority of my patients are alcohol enthusiasts and look like a cross between Tweedle Dum/Dee and Homer Simpson! Alcoholic hepatitis is the order of the day for most of them, with a few scary alcohol-associated things which give me The Fear and involve a lot of management about which I know nothing. Oh, and just in case life gets boring, half of them have varices and like to puke their circulating blood volume all over the place. This has happened a couple of times this week, with one fatality and a couple of ITU transfers. I am pretty scared of this too. The only non-alcoholics have oesophageal cancer, which is not particularly cheerful either. Good grief, this was not quite what I had in mind. Must read some books before I start and the fate of these people rests considerably on my decisions!

Anyway, I'm still missing my social life but I've been really knackered this week and I still have a lot of stuff to sort out at home - still unpacking, oh the misery - and I'm trying to be realistic about it. I can't expect to make friends as good as my friends from uni in a week, but I've met some nice people and I've managed to get in touch with a few people at the church I mentioned before who are going to introduce me to some more people. All good. I am Joey, Networker Extraordinaire.

Right now, I'm going to try and do something about the dreaded unpacking so that I can actually see enough of my bedroom floor to hoover it!