On the road again

I'm still here! And still writing. I know a missed a week - despite what I talked about in my last post, I didn't miss a week because I had nothing to write about. Quite the contrary, this post has been delayed because I was so busy with school that I didn't have the energy to write anything.

Last week I had originally hoped to do some preliminary data collection for my study. Unfortunately that had to be postponed until September due to participant availability. The data collection was going to take place in one of the university's paramedic simulation lab (in Australia, paramedicine is an undergraduate program). While I didn't have undergrads available, I still used this opportunity to fully try out all of the equipment in the lab. And there is a lot of it. Not only does the paramedic lab house the gamut of paramedic and ambulance gear, it also has a full audio visual set up that allows for recording of paramedic scenarios. It even has projectors with speakers to change the background scenes to make things more realistic (eg. beach with ocean sounds, backyard with birds chirping, gas station at night, etc.). Since I didn't have undergraduate volunteers, I dragged Justin to the lab with me on Monday & Tuesday so he could try out the "simulated paramedic tasks" I have been carefully crafting over many, many weeks.

So for two days, myself, Justin, my supervisor, and a whole host of my supervisor's other undergraduate students went to the lab. We went over all the paramedic equipment, Audio visual equipment, and paramedic scenarios. I always genuinely forget how much paramedic-specific knowledge I have. Justin & I spent a lot of time demonstrating equipment and explaining things. It was one of those simultaneously exhausting, rewarding, and frustrating situations that reveals exactly what you need to do next. My supervisor & I were debriefing at the end of the second day, and at one point he remarked that he couldn't believe it was only 2 pm on Tuesday. It felt like we had already worked a full week. Overall though, it was time very well spent. There were tons of lessons learned, including making sure the microphone input on the AV set up is turned on, so that you are actually recording sound. That was me. I forgot to turn on the audio input. So now two of the six videos I recorded have no audio. But I will never make that mistake again!

The days in the lab also demonstrated how hard it is to do research on humans. Legitimately, it is way harder than you would expect. I'm not sure why - if its the technology you have to use, or the amount of coordination required, but somehow using live human subjects is a huge hassle. Even in our very controlled, low stakes environment, I ended up missing a heart rate measure that I thought was recording. I think its something about how many transition points there are for the data you are collecting. You have to hook the participant up to the technology, start the recording, end the recording, download the data. When you write it out it sounds straightforward, but its actually very hectic in real life. You are constantly hoping that everything stays in place, is picking up the right signals, and hasn't been interrupted by anything, etc. I'm already not excited for how complicated my full data collection protocol is going to be.

In the week before my time in the paramedic lab, I hit another Australian milestone: driving. Over Easter weekend we had rented a car to get out of the city. But Justin drove the whole time because I was too nervous. It wasn't that new to him - during our backpacking trip, Justin drove on the left while we were in Ireland. Even though I have my full license here in Australian (they reciprocate Canadian licenses without any testing required as long as you have 3 years driving experience), the thought of driving was very intimidating. But I knew it was something I needed to just bite the bullet and go for, and that the longer I waited the more nervous I would get. I think I mentioned that I have started doing science outreach in some local high schools around Melbourne. When I started, I was taking cabs (with vouchers from Monash) to get to the schools. But the person who runs the program told me the the university has a pool of cars that you can use for instances exactly like this. So last week, I picked a school that was relatively close by, and booked a car.

My presentation was in the morning, so I decided to book the car the night before. That way I wouldn't feel rushed with pickup in the morning. Of course I told my desk mates about it, and they were eager to watch the adventure unfold. One of them gave me a ride to the pick up spot, and another came along with me as I drove from the main campus to the campus I work at (they are about a km apart). As it turns out, driving on the left side of the road is not that hard to adjust to. But sitting on the right side of the car - that part is weird! Especially once you are traffic, its not hard to stay on the proper side. But I kept forgetting that I had to orient myself in the lane via my right hand side, not my left hand side. It felt like I was way too close to the center line. I had to keep double checking that I was actually in the middle of the lane. And the turn signal was on the right side instead of the left, so I kept on accidently turning on my wipers instead of indicating a turn. But I made it back to my campus, and then home. That night, Justin & I took the opportunity of having a vehicle to drive to a restaurant for dinner and then hit up the local hardware store for some odds and ends.

The next morning, I left extra early. Luckily, my route was against the regular flow of morning traffic, and was essentially a straight line. I successfully made it to the school and back without anyone honking at me, without needing to stop and check where I was going, and without accidently turning on my windshield wipers. Overall, its a total win. I actually had another one of the presentations tomorrow morning, so again I booked the car the night before. I talked to the person who runs the program and asked if she minded if I run local errands when I have the vehicle. It doesn't bother her at all. So this evening Justin & I did a massive grocery shop and picked up all kinds of bulky non-perishables (toilet paper, fizzy water, giant bag of rice, etc).

I still have the story of Australians trying a NS Kitchen party to talk about, but I feel like that deserves its own post. I will try to get that up sometime this week, before even more exciting things happen!