"We are here to add what we can to life, not to get what we can from life..." -William Osler
How true! How many times do we go through life searching or waiting for something to happen? Why? It's stupid. Life is yours, so you have to add the substance. You want happiness in your life, you need to project it. You want adventure, go find some. You want peace, make it. It's all up to us. Very humbling and overwhelming, yet isn't it great? To have all that freedom and choice and ABILITY to make what we want for ourselves. You want to make a difference, than don't walk around unaware and ignorant of the strife around you. Frankly, it's goddamn liberating to know your life is truly YOURS. The day you are born and that cord is cut, you're on your own. Really, is that not the best gift?
Monday, July 20, 2009
Friday, July 17, 2009
A thought to ponder
Just when you think everything's idiot proof, someone comes out with a better idiot....
Tuesday, July 7, 2009
Getting there
Slowly but surely, things are getting done. After a marathon weekend with my dad and aunt and uncle, my apartment is painted!!! And it looks great if I do say so myself. But talk about exhausting! Everything hurt by the time we were and we were all so pooped on Saturday night that all we could manage was to collapse in heaps in my living room.
Monday the really annoying job became a priority. After waiting for about 4 hours in the Maryland Vehicle Association, I finally have a MD driver's lisence, am registered to vote in the state, and have registered my car with MD plates and everything. Very tedious task, but what a relief that it's now done! That was a chore that I had been dreading and I am thrilled that it's out of the way.
So what's left? Well, furniture for one. I have to get my bedroom set and my dining room table. There's some other stuff that won't be in until August so I'll have to sit tight until then. The biggest challenge is budgetting. Getting paid every 2 weeks has been sucking, espeically since one check goes almost completely to rent and the other 2 bills. So when I actually need to get something (like gas or food) it has to go on a credit card. Which then only results in more bills. It's a vicious cycle really. But one I am determined to break!!!
Monday the really annoying job became a priority. After waiting for about 4 hours in the Maryland Vehicle Association, I finally have a MD driver's lisence, am registered to vote in the state, and have registered my car with MD plates and everything. Very tedious task, but what a relief that it's now done! That was a chore that I had been dreading and I am thrilled that it's out of the way.
So what's left? Well, furniture for one. I have to get my bedroom set and my dining room table. There's some other stuff that won't be in until August so I'll have to sit tight until then. The biggest challenge is budgetting. Getting paid every 2 weeks has been sucking, espeically since one check goes almost completely to rent and the other 2 bills. So when I actually need to get something (like gas or food) it has to go on a credit card. Which then only results in more bills. It's a vicious cycle really. But one I am determined to break!!!
Wednesday, July 1, 2009
Weighed down
I've got a lot on my mind as of late. Beside my fam coming down this weekend and jumping through hoops to make the apartment livable for anyone but myself, there's also the usual financial concers, and my grandmother's health. All of this has gotten me feeling (and yes, I hate to admit this) a bit homesick.
I feel guilty as hell that I'm not back home to help my mom and my aunt with the responsibilities of my grandparents. Added to that, it's just uncomfortable for me to leave it up to them to handle when in all honesty, I have more experience in the matter than they do. Whenever it comes down to the serious health issues in my grandparents' lives, I step and take over. Not being able to do that now has me feeling pretty shitty about things. Plus I can't see for myself what's going on. I hear these horror stories of how swollen my grandmother is, to the point that her skin has torn and she's oozing. The open sores have now gotten infected, just to make it all worse. And when I talk to her on the phone, so much of the animation that's usually there is gone. It breaks my heart.
I would love to go back in time, when money wasn't an issue and neither was the health of my loved ones. But it's an impossibility.
For now I'll concentrate on the moment and do what I can from here.
I feel guilty as hell that I'm not back home to help my mom and my aunt with the responsibilities of my grandparents. Added to that, it's just uncomfortable for me to leave it up to them to handle when in all honesty, I have more experience in the matter than they do. Whenever it comes down to the serious health issues in my grandparents' lives, I step and take over. Not being able to do that now has me feeling pretty shitty about things. Plus I can't see for myself what's going on. I hear these horror stories of how swollen my grandmother is, to the point that her skin has torn and she's oozing. The open sores have now gotten infected, just to make it all worse. And when I talk to her on the phone, so much of the animation that's usually there is gone. It breaks my heart.
I would love to go back in time, when money wasn't an issue and neither was the health of my loved ones. But it's an impossibility.
For now I'll concentrate on the moment and do what I can from here.
Saturday, June 27, 2009
Procrastination
I am exhausted!!! Have no idea why, but my body is telling me that sleep is essential at the moment. It's a bit ridiculous because I've slept so much in the past few days (just not during regularly scheduled sleeping hours).
This need for unconsciousness is damned inconvenient, to say the least. There are a lot of things I need to do around the house, and the sleeping is really getting in the way. I'll be having 3 visitors next weekend, and I have to get rid of some boxes to make room for them to sleep. But where's my motivation?!?! Perhaps it's locked in the deep recesses of my mind, and that's why I need all this sleep because that's how I can get closer to finding it... Yep I think that's what it is. Gonna take a quick 15 min cat nap to muddle through the deep recesses...
This need for unconsciousness is damned inconvenient, to say the least. There are a lot of things I need to do around the house, and the sleeping is really getting in the way. I'll be having 3 visitors next weekend, and I have to get rid of some boxes to make room for them to sleep. But where's my motivation?!?! Perhaps it's locked in the deep recesses of my mind, and that's why I need all this sleep because that's how I can get closer to finding it... Yep I think that's what it is. Gonna take a quick 15 min cat nap to muddle through the deep recesses...
Tuesday, June 23, 2009
Nonsensical ramblings at 3am...
I'm at work and bored out of my mind, trying desperately not to fall face first on the keyboard in a narcoleotic stupor. Therefore, let me apologize in advance, because this entry is more for my entertainment (and yes, sanity) then it is for your's.
The PICU is a place meant for the adrenaline junkies, those who like action and function well under stress. In general, you think of a PICU patient as the sickest of the sick in the world of tiny tots and terrible teens. Why then, do I have 2 chronic patients with overbearing parents who are only to be disturbed every 4 hours? Doesn't that usually fit the criteria for a regular floor patient? My eyeballs are rolling around in my head with my efforts to keep them focused, I'm freezing because even my metabolism is telling me it's time to shut down for a few hours if I'm not going to be doing anything productive. It is quite the struggle to maintain your humanity at 3am in a quiet unit with lullabies in the background.
Now, I know that may sound harsh and a bit ungrateful, but I promise you it is only the ungodly hour and lack of stimulation that is making me cranky. I have even caught myself sneaking up on my slumbering kiddos hoping they'll have full diapers and give me something to do for a few minutes. Truly, I do love my job, dirty diapers and all, and I love my patients. They are wonderful children for all their faults, anamolies, and deformities. But for crying out loud, I am ready to stick the blunt side of a pen through one of my rolling eyeballs just to have something to do!!!
On that note, a quick change of topic. I must choose paint colors so that my dad has something to do when he comes down for a few days in July. Gotta make the man useful! Hmmm, should my room be a light brown, or a blue?.... Decisions, decisions. I think I just found something to do with my time!
The PICU is a place meant for the adrenaline junkies, those who like action and function well under stress. In general, you think of a PICU patient as the sickest of the sick in the world of tiny tots and terrible teens. Why then, do I have 2 chronic patients with overbearing parents who are only to be disturbed every 4 hours? Doesn't that usually fit the criteria for a regular floor patient? My eyeballs are rolling around in my head with my efforts to keep them focused, I'm freezing because even my metabolism is telling me it's time to shut down for a few hours if I'm not going to be doing anything productive. It is quite the struggle to maintain your humanity at 3am in a quiet unit with lullabies in the background.
Now, I know that may sound harsh and a bit ungrateful, but I promise you it is only the ungodly hour and lack of stimulation that is making me cranky. I have even caught myself sneaking up on my slumbering kiddos hoping they'll have full diapers and give me something to do for a few minutes. Truly, I do love my job, dirty diapers and all, and I love my patients. They are wonderful children for all their faults, anamolies, and deformities. But for crying out loud, I am ready to stick the blunt side of a pen through one of my rolling eyeballs just to have something to do!!!
On that note, a quick change of topic. I must choose paint colors so that my dad has something to do when he comes down for a few days in July. Gotta make the man useful! Hmmm, should my room be a light brown, or a blue?.... Decisions, decisions. I think I just found something to do with my time!
Saturday, June 13, 2009
WTF?!?!?1
As in my previous post, you all know that I had an incident at the grocery store with an old man yesterday. Like that wasn't bad enough?!?! My day just continued to get worse as it went along. Work last night was an absolute fiasco...
When I got in everything was fine, one patient possible admission, easy peezy. Around midnight, that admission came, teenage trauma questionable head injury. The kid himself was no problem. His family however, über bizarre. While talking with the dad I found out the kids are going to be entering foster care, which sent a little alarm bell going off. Fast forward an hour, and I'm doing the standard admission questions to get background on the patient. So when asked about abuse, the dad tells me straight out he abuses the kid, hence the SECOND round of foster care. Now I dunno if the dad is just plain stupid or crazy ballsy. Either way this admission triggered hours of phone calls to determine just what we were supposed to do with him at the bedside and if he should even be there. Not fun...
Finally, I got a break!!! It was time to eat lunch (if that's what you can call it at 3am) and the triscuits and fruit I brought just weren't cutting it after all this bs. So I run down to the cafeteria to get myself something a bit more substantial. Now it's 7 floors up to get back to the unit, so I take the elevator. No biggie, right? People do it everyday without issue. Me I get on the damn elevator that decides to have a schizophrenic break while I'm on it. It not only gets stuck, it gets stuck and then drops, goes back up and gets stuck again only to drop again. I haven't been that nauseated in a long time. After 15 mins on the ride from hell, I am able to get the doors open and jump the 3 feet to the floor. I look around and see I'm back where I started: 1st floor, and still 7 away from the unit. *sigh*
Seriously, WTF?
When I got in everything was fine, one patient possible admission, easy peezy. Around midnight, that admission came, teenage trauma questionable head injury. The kid himself was no problem. His family however, über bizarre. While talking with the dad I found out the kids are going to be entering foster care, which sent a little alarm bell going off. Fast forward an hour, and I'm doing the standard admission questions to get background on the patient. So when asked about abuse, the dad tells me straight out he abuses the kid, hence the SECOND round of foster care. Now I dunno if the dad is just plain stupid or crazy ballsy. Either way this admission triggered hours of phone calls to determine just what we were supposed to do with him at the bedside and if he should even be there. Not fun...
Finally, I got a break!!! It was time to eat lunch (if that's what you can call it at 3am) and the triscuits and fruit I brought just weren't cutting it after all this bs. So I run down to the cafeteria to get myself something a bit more substantial. Now it's 7 floors up to get back to the unit, so I take the elevator. No biggie, right? People do it everyday without issue. Me I get on the damn elevator that decides to have a schizophrenic break while I'm on it. It not only gets stuck, it gets stuck and then drops, goes back up and gets stuck again only to drop again. I haven't been that nauseated in a long time. After 15 mins on the ride from hell, I am able to get the doors open and jump the 3 feet to the floor. I look around and see I'm back where I started: 1st floor, and still 7 away from the unit. *sigh*
Seriously, WTF?
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