year three: term one essentials

First of all, M E R R Y   C H R I S T M A S ! I hope you all have a lovely festive period full of good food and plenty of laughter :)

This term's essentials were quite random and it's weird being on placement all the time without lectures that involve the whole year group.

Stationery

This term was all about fountain pens when writing up notes and cheap biros when on placement on the wards/in clinic. Seen above are the ones that saw the most use (two of which have yet to be introduced on this blog - coming soon in 2016!) - Pelikan M400 Tortoiseshell, TWSBI 580AL in purple, Platinum 3776 Century Nice, Pilot VP Raden, Lamy Safari and Pilot Kakuno. 

On placement, these A6 notebooks have been invaluable. The Iconic essay books have plenty of capacity and are light enough (and small enough) to fit into a few of my clothes pockets. They also look super cute though it does mean I do get asked if I'm French from time to time (I'm not).

When it comes to writing up my notes, I use A4 notebooks and these Oxford ones are amazing. The paper is ridiculously good - they take fountain pen ink like a dream and they're not even that expensive. Perfect for students :)

Other

Having got braces, sweet things are a bit of a no-no (though I do occasionally cheat and then brush my teeth straight after) so I've taken to eating dark chocolate (a friend recommended the Sainsbury's one as the best dark chocolate he'd ever tasted) and two clementines a day. A great combo now that it's Christmas?!

Not the trendiest term when it comes to essentials but that's what happens when you get thrown in the deep end of clinical years as a medical student. ;)

Hopefully next term will be far more interesting! What's been essential to you during this autumn and winter?