A Day in the Life of a Surgery Med Student on Overnight Call:

4:25 AM - BEEP BEEP BEEP.  *snooze*
4:30 AM - BEEP BEEP BEEP.  stumble out of bed, try not to wake up hubby.  assemble all items needed for the next 30 hours, including money / food for the next 4-5 meals
5:00 AM - leave for hospital
5:40 AM - park, go to call room, deposit belongings
5:45 AM - meet for rounds.  round on patients with appendicitis, gallbladder problems, intestinal obstructions, abscesses, etc. with the surgery team.  Accidentally get in the way of the attending and fellows.  Apologize profusely.
7:00 AM - review important x-rays and CT scans with the team
7:30 AM - scrub into first surgery
7:40 AM - realize you forgot to pee before scrubbing into first surgery
1:30 PM - finish first surgery. run frantically to bathroom, then to call room for 20 minutes of lunch and not standing on feet
1:50 PM - scrub into next surgery.  get asked numerous questions such as "between what 2 layers of the abdominal wall is Camper's fascia found?"  Get numerous questions wrong.  Attending rolls eyes at dumb medical student.  Apologize profusely.  Make note to read about that topic once you get home.
3:30 PM - scrub into next surgery.  try to take suture scissors off of tool table and get yelled at by scrub tech.  Apologize profusely.
5:00 PM - meet with team for afternoon rounds
6:30 PM - begin checking in on patients who had surgery that day
6:45 PM - first consult.  ER is requesting that surgery team come to evaluate a patient with a burn / distended belly / child abuse suspicion.  Repeat 7-8 times in rapid succession.  Includes poking at children's bellies, screaming babies, asking about poop color, cutting through burn blisters, and trying to make children stay in C-spine collars because of a neck injury.  Consume a Cliff bar at some point.
11:30 PM - finish last consult for the time being, and resume post-op checks on patients who had surgery that day.  get angry looks from parents because you are waking their child up at 11:30 PM.  Apologize profusely.
12:15 AM - try to think of a way to sneakily ask resident if you can go lie down for a few hours without looking lazy.
12:20 AM - give up on the not looking lazy part and ask resident if you can go lie down for a few hours.  Apologize profusely as you slink away.
2:30 AM - TRAUMA STAT TO THE ER!!!  run run run downstairs, prevent death, stabilize patient, write trauma note.
3:15 AM - return to sleep
3:45 AM - wake up. start recording vital signs in preparation for morning rounds.  add the 7-8 consults to the list of patients on surgery service.
5:30 AM - pre-round on patients with the resident
6:00 AM - meet team for morning rounds.  get in trouble for not asking appendicitis patient if he threw up.  Apologize profusely.
7:30 AM - finish rounds.  leave hospital.  try to drive home without falling asleep.
9:00 AM - arrive home.  pull out textbook to read about the question you got wrong in the OR.  fall asleep immediately.

Repeat overnight call every 4 days, for 6-8 weeks.  Shifts in between overnight call are 10-14 hours.  Good gracious I cannot wait until I am on the 9-5 schedule of primary care.