This is an unintentionally nerdy post related to studying. Feel free to skip this one, unless you happen to want to know about the revelation I had at midnight the night before I am to take my first exam in my neuroanatomy course. As noted yesterday, I'm not what you'd consider a "model" student. I've been struggling this semester to figure out how to study properly for my two classes, especially neuroanatomy. I've been finding neuroanatomy to be exceedingly dull, despite being rather fascinated by the lump of brown substance in my head that makes me tick.

My friend Dr. Vina offered me the following sage advice: MEMORIZE, BITCH! Which is exactly what I've been trying to do, but have been failing spectacularly. I realized tonight exactly why that is: as I sit here learning about the Pyramidal Tract, the Primary Motor Cortex, and the decussation of cranial nerves, it occurred to me that what this class, and indeed many college courses lack, is a real reason to want to know this shit.

I'm not sure, but I suspect that the people who discovered how the brain functions did so because they wanted to know why we did certain things, or how certain things worked in the brain, or perhaps what parts of the brain made worked when we performed different tasks. I'd put money on the idea that few, if any, of the pioneers of anatomy sat around and thought to themselves, "Hey, one curvy part of the brain is interesting. Let's find out exactly what it does."

I realized this when I was sitting and going through my notes, and I suddenly understood more about anatomy tonight than I have this whole semester so far. Perhaps this is a sign telling me that I would do better to not attend class and treat the course instead as an independent study course, because the lectures serve mostly to confuse me, what with my professor sitting and reading the slides to us a la Ben Stein in Ferris Bueller's Day Off style. Even though I still don't have about two-thirds of the vocabulary memorized pat for the exam (we're on a first-name, recognition-based acquaintance), for the first time, I'm getting a clearer idea of how it all works and fits together.

If you've actually managed to read this far into this entry, I'd like to take the opportunity to say that your gray matter is incredibly sexy.