Blood on my pants

Today was a good, yet exhausting day. I did five surgical procedures involving lots of blood and even more water - like, 30 liters (yeah, metric) of it per procedure. Most surgeries were pretty difficult and taxed me to the limit. The way it works is that there's this old(er) guy standing behind me (groaning and moaning, generally heckling me), and whenever it is that I either do something really stupid (which hasn't happened lately) or just feel for myself that I've gotten in over my head (which happens regularly), he takes over (since he's been doing this procedures for, what, 20 years). 'This old guy' of course, is my supervisor/mentor/boss. That's the way it goes in post-grad medical education, all this modern talking about how fine scientific medicine has gotten etc., somebody has to teach you the surgical craft.

This is one of the aspects that I like best about my job - I am getting paid to improve. Incredible.

Anyway. I ended the surgeries of today with reasonable success- and a gargatuan stain of someone elses's blood on my pants. More stain than pants. I looked like a butcher.

Which was weird to realize.