Can You Taste With All the Flavors of Gelato?

I began the day with the dramatic flourish of almost fainting.  The pig heart surgery that I was supposed to observe, originally scheduled for yesterday morning, was postponed until today at around 10:30.  As I put on my scrubs, which translates to pijamas in Spanish (adorable that they don't even try to cover up the fact that they're wearing pajamas, ain't it?) and stood, sweating, in the blazing heat of the surgical room, I started to get light headed.  There wasn't even any blood yet, just a pig strapped into stirrups and intubated.  And yet, there were spots clouding my vision and pins and needles everywhere.  I sat down, and the whole lab converged upon my pale, sweaty self.  I was taken outside for a walk (this reminded me of the 18th century consumption patients being taken to the country to cure their ills) and generally doted on, particularly by the women.  A liter of water and an apple did the trick, and soon I was back in the operating room.

[Note: the following image shows a surgery, so if you get woozy a la Tuesday Morning Jess, just skip ahead to the inevitable foodie section at the end]
The key to having fun in the operating room? Be besties with the head veterinarian.  Antonio handed me a menacing-looking spatula (for non-science nerds, not the cooking type, but a thin rod of metal with wider, flattened ends) and proceeded to have me cut/burn open the pig torso.

And when I got down to bone, he handed me a saw.  SO COOL.  Antonio, if you ever read this, know that I kind of love you for letting a 20-year old girl that you've never actually worked with take six months of research in her hands and apply a saw mere inches above the heart that you're trying to study.  Youdabest.

 Trying on goofy lab equipment

 Armed and dangerous

Other exciting surgery moments:

1. Learning to suture, and proceeding to suture and entire side of the heart membrane out of the way (this also lifts the heart up to make it accessible)
    (I did the ones on the bottom!)
2. The pig went into ventricular tachycardia, basically the heart beating so ridiculously fast that it's just quivering and not pumping any blood.  Antonio actually brought out paddles, looked at me with a grin, and said, "You thought we just used these in movies, right? We're going old school." But in Spanish, of course. [Note: the pig's heart started behaving at the mere touch of the paddles, before it was actually shocked.  Somebody knows who's boss]
   
3. Neus did some incredible imaging of the various arteries and the pressure in different parts of the heart, which involved x-rays and us wearing huge leather suits.  Picture a knight in shining armor, then take away the glamour and keep all the weight.  There's even a neck bib thing as a separate piece.
4. After all the tests were run on the heart, the pig was sacrificed with Propofol, the same drug that killed Michael Jackson.  The king and tomorrow's dinner, both merciless at the hands of chemistry.

After work, I went running with two other members of my lab, Ellie and Victor.  Together, we are a trifecta of decades: I’m 20, Victor is 31, and Ellie is 40-something.  To put things in perspective, though, Ellie is about to run a half marathon through the mountains with Grand Poobah Ignasi and is such a badass.  She runs all the time, and Ignasi had to tell us to have mercy on Victor.  The poor boy didn’t know what he was getting himself into, but we planned a shortened route and told him to bring his Metro pass.  And then we began the most glorious run I’ve been on in Spain.  We ran through Collserola Park, a nature preserve on the edge of the city and mere meters behind the hospital where I work.  We scaled dusty, rocky paths that laced back and forth up the mountain, clambered over sliding gravel, and gazed over the city spread out at our feet.

We passed wildflowers, fountains, cacti, bikers, runners, walkers, and a world splashed in glorious sunshine.  It was incredible, and I had a huge grin on my face during our entire ascent.  About a third of the way through our run, Ellie asked me if I knew what a “macho man” was.  In the middle of this paradise, there’s a steep section called “Matamacho,” or “Macho Man Killer.”  All the silly bikers try to go up it, despite the steep incline and rocky terrain, and it defeats a fair few of them.  Ellie asked if I wanted to do it.  Do birds have wings?  She told Victor to keep going straight and we’d catch up in a few minutes; otherwise, we’d see him at [insert rapid Spanish explanation of meeting point here].  Matamacho was disappointingly short, but it’s very satisfying to pass all the spandexed-out bikers on foot and wave cheekily as you pass.  Anyway, long story short, we lost Victor.  After about 20 minutes of searching for him (on our path and every other possibility), his bright orange shirt and pale, thin face were nowhere to be found.  Honestly, we still have no idea what happened to him as of the writing of this post.  I guess I’ll find out tomorrow.  Victor-less, Ellie and I bonded on the way back as we ran through groves of wildflowers and multicolored cacti.  Pretty darn good lab bonding time.

And, to round out the night, I met up with Naaman for the inaugural visit of the Taste Test Gelato Tour, Barcelona 2012.  We chose La Cremeria Toscana,

known for its 20+ homemade flavors and generous helpings.  It was wonderful.  The fruit flavors were light as air and tasted like real, natural fruit: apricot, strawberry, peach, raspberry, lemon… all were spot on.  I would know, because I tried them all.

Naaman took one for the team and tried most of the non-fruit flavors.  Obviously, we sampled each other’s flavors after receiving our purchases (only 3.20e, cheaper than most of the chains with their inferior flavors and smaller portions) and reveled in the many facets of the word delicious.

The TTG Tour has just begun and the possibilities are endless, but we’re probably going to be back here pretty soon.