... dead, that is. I kind of feel like I am, so maybe this is hell. I will be one happy little camper once July ends. Literally. Summer semester will be over, and I'm going camping with Mister. And his motorcycle. The very motorcycle that I fell off of a couple of weeks ago (fortunately, it wasn't really moving when that happened.)
Summer semester has not been fun. Nope. It's torture. So much to do crammed in a few weeks. Between now and July 31, I have one quiz, six exams, one more care plan, three journal entries, a paper, and six more clinicals to get through. sigh.
So, while the rest of the US was celebrating July 4th, I was working on a care plan. I did pause for a moment to go sit on a blanket in my back yard and watch the neighbors try to outdo one another in fireworks displays (the guy two houses down wins for loudest booms). Also, the town, once again, lit up the night with its county budget. This little community goes all out for fireworks. And the really cool thing is that all the proceeds from firework sales in the county go to benefit the local volunteer firefighters' association. I kid you not.
So I sat out on the blanket and waited to see how the pups would react to all the excitement. Baby Boy, the deaf one, tucked tail and ran for the house at the first big BOOM! Little Britches sat on the blanket with me and silently freaked out in her own special way with that wild-eyed crazy look she gets. And then there's Boo. He parked himself on the porch stoop and barked through the whole event.
Speaking of Boo ...
Everyone except him knows him as Milo, but he seems to only answer to Boo. He will lie still without budging while I'm yelling "Milo! Come on, Milo! Time to eat, Milo!" But the moment I say "C'mon, Boo!" he pops up and is on his way. It only took me 13 years to learn his name. Personally, I prefer to call him Bubba Magoo, but that only adds to the confusion.
Boo dog has added to a bit more confusion here at nursing school HQ - the other evening after Mister and I returned from dinner, Boo was there to greet us with his usual enthusiastic barking which led to the following:
Mister: Why does he bark like a hound dog?
Me: um... Because he is a hound dog.
Mister: No he's not.
Me: Yes. He is.
Mister: He is not a hound dog.
Me: Then why does he bark like one?
Mister: That's what I'm asking.
Me: It's because he IS a hound dog.
Mister: He IS NOT a hound dog.
Me: Right. He must have just picked up the accent somewhere.
If this is as bad as our disagreements ever get, then I can live with Mister thinking that Boo is some kind of 90-pound poodle with a hound dog accent.
Now, Mister does not have dogs, but he does have kids. I get to spend a lot of time with the two wee ones. And while I love every little candy-coated inch of them, I do want to take a moment to send a personal message to my dear, sweet mother: THANK YOU FOR NOT KILLING ME WHEN I WAS FIVE. I'm sure I deserved it, and I appreciate that you were able to hold back, especially since you had to spend every single day with me. Seriously, the kids are great loads of fun and I adore them, but they have given me a new appreciation for what my mother went through on a daily basis. They've also given me a new appreciation for valium.
Okay, time to get back at it. It's 1am and I'm still up doing school work. Why? Because it refuses to do itself.
>banging head against desk<
Monday, July 6, 2009
Monday, June 1, 2009
not dead yet
Well, hello, long-forgotten blog! Really, it's not that I forgot you at all, it's just that: 1) nursing school is a total time-sucker; and 2) because nursing school requires all of my time, I really haven't had anything interesting to say. So I apologize for not filling this space with lots of blah, blah, blah about how all I did today was study and write some care plans. But for some reason, today I decided I needed to jot down some stuff. Why? Because at this time last year, I was just embarking on this long, weird adventure. And now, here I am, still on the island and only 2 semesters to go. I might just make it out of here alive ... and about 15 pounds heavier.
I'm now in my first semester as a senior nursing student! And so far, the only invasive thing I've done to a real, living patient was a vitamin K shot to a shiny new baby boy. "Welcome to the world, little guy, and here's your first dose of reality. It's all down hill from here." Let me just say, it is counter-intuitive to stick a sharp, pointy object into a baby. I stood there holding the needle above his little leg so long that my instructor finally said, "Okay, do it. You both have to get this over with before either of you can leave the hospital" Like pushing a kid off the high dive, next thing I knew I was stabbing a baby.
I have done invasive procedures on my fellow nursing students. We are all in a panic at this point in our education because most of us haven't had the opportunity to practice any of our fabulous new skills on real people. So.... (whisper voice) we "borrowed" some tools of the trade and have been practicing starting IVs on each other .... shhhh. Apparently, it's a Very Bad Thing to practice procedures on fellow students at our fine CON, so we are all sneaking around, trying to find private places where we can clandestinely stick needles up each other's arms. And because we are all new at this business, we have bruised needle tracks all up and down our arms. I told Mister about this illicit activity and he just rolled his eyes and wondered aloud when he would have to bail me out of jail. Blog, you may or may not remember the last time I was here I had started seeing a law enforcement officer. Well, he's still in the picture. Fortunately, he doesn't have jurisdiction where I live.
Last semester, I had clinical rotations in Psych, Pediatrics, and Labor & Delivery. Psych was incredibly boring. Mostly we just sat around and put together jig-saw puzzles. Peds was fun. I seriously enjoyed that rotation, so much so that I requested the pediatric emergency department for my senior practicum. Labor & Delivery was awesome - it is an incredible thing to see a child come into this world. I loved working in the nursery. OH, and one more thing in case you're wondering: NO. I STILL DO NOT WANT TO HAVE CHILDREN. If anything, that conviction was validated. But, my utmost respect goes out to all those women who go through this process WITHOUT DRUGS.
This semester, I get to spend time with the oldsters and the general med-surg folks. We are just getting started so I'm not quite sure how I feel about it, yet. Generally speaking, I like the elder folk, so I'm optimistic that summer semester will go by quickly and relatively pain-free.
I'm now in my first semester as a senior nursing student! And so far, the only invasive thing I've done to a real, living patient was a vitamin K shot to a shiny new baby boy. "Welcome to the world, little guy, and here's your first dose of reality. It's all down hill from here." Let me just say, it is counter-intuitive to stick a sharp, pointy object into a baby. I stood there holding the needle above his little leg so long that my instructor finally said, "Okay, do it. You both have to get this over with before either of you can leave the hospital" Like pushing a kid off the high dive, next thing I knew I was stabbing a baby.
I have done invasive procedures on my fellow nursing students. We are all in a panic at this point in our education because most of us haven't had the opportunity to practice any of our fabulous new skills on real people. So.... (whisper voice) we "borrowed" some tools of the trade and have been practicing starting IVs on each other .... shhhh. Apparently, it's a Very Bad Thing to practice procedures on fellow students at our fine CON, so we are all sneaking around, trying to find private places where we can clandestinely stick needles up each other's arms. And because we are all new at this business, we have bruised needle tracks all up and down our arms. I told Mister about this illicit activity and he just rolled his eyes and wondered aloud when he would have to bail me out of jail. Blog, you may or may not remember the last time I was here I had started seeing a law enforcement officer. Well, he's still in the picture. Fortunately, he doesn't have jurisdiction where I live.
Last semester, I had clinical rotations in Psych, Pediatrics, and Labor & Delivery. Psych was incredibly boring. Mostly we just sat around and put together jig-saw puzzles. Peds was fun. I seriously enjoyed that rotation, so much so that I requested the pediatric emergency department for my senior practicum. Labor & Delivery was awesome - it is an incredible thing to see a child come into this world. I loved working in the nursery. OH, and one more thing in case you're wondering: NO. I STILL DO NOT WANT TO HAVE CHILDREN. If anything, that conviction was validated. But, my utmost respect goes out to all those women who go through this process WITHOUT DRUGS.
This semester, I get to spend time with the oldsters and the general med-surg folks. We are just getting started so I'm not quite sure how I feel about it, yet. Generally speaking, I like the elder folk, so I'm optimistic that summer semester will go by quickly and relatively pain-free.
Tuesday, September 2, 2008
big bang
School is off to a bang. Seems like this semester has already been forever long ... it's only been a week. *sigh* I'm not partial to starting off with a bang. I like to ease into things. This goes for swimming pools, rivers, lakes, the ocean, and baths. I like to slowly approach these situations, allowing one small part at a time to acclimate to its new environment. Once I'm in over my head, I tend to speed up a bit. This business of getting thrown into the deep end of classes right from the get-go is definitely intruding upon my comfort zone.
Pharmacology might become interesting if the instructor ever runs out of anecdotes regarding his wife's ill health. Apparently he is married to a medical marvel. I think this poor woman has every possible disease known to humankind, and probably a few that haven't even been discovered yet. The other instructor for Pharm merely reads the powerpoint slides to us at mach speed. Seriously, she sounds like an auctioneer. I wouldn't dare raise my hand to ask a question for fear of hearing "SOLD! to the confused-looking girl on row three!"
I think Foundations class is interesting, but I'm so distracted by the professor's haircut that I'm not sure. The first day in there I was having trouble focusing on the material because in my head I was picturing a new hair style for her. Currently, she sports a very harsh page boy, as in Capt. Kangaroo. I think if she kept the page boy, but angled it along the line of her jaw, it would be much more flattering and less distracting. Today, I couldn't stop picturing her as a cartoon. All that aside, I really like her and the class material. This is the Stuff Of Nursing.
Foundations Lab is fun in a sadistic kind of way. This class makes me feel like I'm in elementary school again. Friday morning (8AM!!!) we worked math problems, as in dosages & calculations. It's just evil to expect me to do math at that hour. The way the instructor was teaching this was completely backwards from what intuitively made sense. Fortunately, R was sitting beside me and offered up huge amounts of help on the conversions. We went from math problems, to making an occupied bed. I am the Queen of making occupied beds ... oh yeah! Then we went into this whole confusing tailspin called The Nursing Process. I was lost. But then I was found for a moment. But then I was lost again. I worked on this stuff today with E and K, and I think it's sort of starting to make sense ... maybe. I am kicking ass at the actual hands-on stuff of nursing, but some of the other stuff is currently alluding me. It seems to all come down to semantics. For example: apparently you can say things like "headache secondary to car accident" but you can't say "headache related to car accident" because in this universe that's just WRONG. However - and here's the tricky part - you CAN say something like "headache related to brain ooze". Why? Because you can do something about the brain ooze, but you can't change the fact that the car crashed.
The other class is online. Another wretched online class ... arrgh. This one is called Nursing Theory & Research. And so far, I am not loving it. It's just piles of useless busy-work. But apparently it's all the useless busy-work that sets the baccalaureate nurses apart from the rest, or at least that's what they keep telling us. Somehow I have a difficult time accepting that anyone out there in the "real" world away from university-land is ever going to care if we know the theories of nursing that were put forth by folks who have been dead for at least fifty years.
This past weekend I spent all day Saturday helping set up evacuation shelters with the Red Cross. For whatever reasons, approximately 500 folks from LA came here to escape Hurricane Gustav. Seems like they could have gone somewhere closer to LA, but maybe they wanted to make extra sure they were completely out of Gustav's reach. I loaded hundreds of cots, blankets and care packets onto a truck and then unloaded them at the shelters. Oddly, I had a good time, but only because of the company I was keeping. Conversations with A are always weirdly interesting and funny.
On Sunday, I played volleyball for about 3 hours outside on a sand court with 10 other of my fellow nurse nerds. It was fun, but very hot. I almost accidentally clocked Smarty-pants girl when we went for the ball at the same time ... that would have been bad. Smarty-pants girl is tiny. Her head is about the size of a small cantaloupe. If my fist had hit her melon instead of the ball, she would have been compost.
Pharmacology might become interesting if the instructor ever runs out of anecdotes regarding his wife's ill health. Apparently he is married to a medical marvel. I think this poor woman has every possible disease known to humankind, and probably a few that haven't even been discovered yet. The other instructor for Pharm merely reads the powerpoint slides to us at mach speed. Seriously, she sounds like an auctioneer. I wouldn't dare raise my hand to ask a question for fear of hearing "SOLD! to the confused-looking girl on row three!"
I think Foundations class is interesting, but I'm so distracted by the professor's haircut that I'm not sure. The first day in there I was having trouble focusing on the material because in my head I was picturing a new hair style for her. Currently, she sports a very harsh page boy, as in Capt. Kangaroo. I think if she kept the page boy, but angled it along the line of her jaw, it would be much more flattering and less distracting. Today, I couldn't stop picturing her as a cartoon. All that aside, I really like her and the class material. This is the Stuff Of Nursing.
Foundations Lab is fun in a sadistic kind of way. This class makes me feel like I'm in elementary school again. Friday morning (8AM!!!) we worked math problems, as in dosages & calculations. It's just evil to expect me to do math at that hour. The way the instructor was teaching this was completely backwards from what intuitively made sense. Fortunately, R was sitting beside me and offered up huge amounts of help on the conversions. We went from math problems, to making an occupied bed. I am the Queen of making occupied beds ... oh yeah! Then we went into this whole confusing tailspin called The Nursing Process. I was lost. But then I was found for a moment. But then I was lost again. I worked on this stuff today with E and K, and I think it's sort of starting to make sense ... maybe. I am kicking ass at the actual hands-on stuff of nursing, but some of the other stuff is currently alluding me. It seems to all come down to semantics. For example: apparently you can say things like "headache secondary to car accident" but you can't say "headache related to car accident" because in this universe that's just WRONG. However - and here's the tricky part - you CAN say something like "headache related to brain ooze". Why? Because you can do something about the brain ooze, but you can't change the fact that the car crashed.
The other class is online. Another wretched online class ... arrgh. This one is called Nursing Theory & Research. And so far, I am not loving it. It's just piles of useless busy-work. But apparently it's all the useless busy-work that sets the baccalaureate nurses apart from the rest, or at least that's what they keep telling us. Somehow I have a difficult time accepting that anyone out there in the "real" world away from university-land is ever going to care if we know the theories of nursing that were put forth by folks who have been dead for at least fifty years.
This past weekend I spent all day Saturday helping set up evacuation shelters with the Red Cross. For whatever reasons, approximately 500 folks from LA came here to escape Hurricane Gustav. Seems like they could have gone somewhere closer to LA, but maybe they wanted to make extra sure they were completely out of Gustav's reach. I loaded hundreds of cots, blankets and care packets onto a truck and then unloaded them at the shelters. Oddly, I had a good time, but only because of the company I was keeping. Conversations with A are always weirdly interesting and funny.
On Sunday, I played volleyball for about 3 hours outside on a sand court with 10 other of my fellow nurse nerds. It was fun, but very hot. I almost accidentally clocked Smarty-pants girl when we went for the ball at the same time ... that would have been bad. Smarty-pants girl is tiny. Her head is about the size of a small cantaloupe. If my fist had hit her melon instead of the ball, she would have been compost.
Monday, August 25, 2008
Party's Over
Classes started today. As much as I did not want this to happen so soon - didn't we JUST END summer semester? - it seems that time does continue marching forward regardless of my feelings about the matter. If it's going to move so fast, the least it could do is just jump ahead a year so that I'm staring down my last semester rather than my second.
What I did on my 3-week long summer vacation ...
As previously mentioned, I spent quite a bit of time playing at the river.
I saw a movie at the theater. T and I went to see Wanted. It was ok. Angelina Jolie is, as always, a total bad-ass in this movie.
I went to Dollywood. A nursing school friend and his wife have season passes to Dollywood, and they can get guests in for free. So E and I went with them and a couple of other folks. I'm happy to report that I do still have roller coaster stamina.
I met a guy. And went on dates. Of course, I did not meet this fella anywhere 'round these parts because apparently there's an extreme deficit of single, straight men here. E convinced me to try the online thing. She made a good argument. She pointed out that we have 3 weeks off from school,we live in a place where it's very hard to meet guys unless you like hanging out in bars, which I do not, and I didn't have to post my picture or name. Of course, all of this encouragement was very easy for E since she's married. There was no fear of me coming back with, "I'll do it if you do it." I'm convinced that singles sites would completely vanish if it weren't for peer pressure. So, I posted a profile, sans photo, with no expectation that anyone would contact me, but it gave me a chance to window shop and wink at a fella here and there. Seriously, it's very much like shopping on Ebay. I love shopping on Ebay. It's fun to go through and post bids on things knowing damn well that I will NEVER win the bid. It's like retail therapy without total annihilation of my checking account. But lo and behold if I didn't start getting contacted by guys. Most of them were just blatant, "You interested?" kind of messages (um, no, I'm not >delete<) but one stood out. His message was short, well-written and at the end he said, "Even if you don't respond to this, we may get a chance to meet someday if you go into flight nursing due to my line of work." Okay, I took the bait. I responded. "What is it that you do that puts you in contact with flight nurses?" State trooper. Damn! A COP! Just my luck. The one articulate, interesting nibble on my profile is a law enforcement officer. Don't get me wrong - men in uniform are HOT. But do I really want to date one rather than merely admire them all from a nice, long distance just out of radar? Oh well, why not? Dude could prove to be a valuable resource in learning how to avoid the po-po. So, that's been fun. I actually called him one afternoon as I was speeding down the interstate and asked if it was, in fact, illegal to drive bare-foot. It is not. All this time I thought I was exercising extreme passive resistance to The Man by driving without shoes, and it's not even a bad deed. I'll have to come up with something else.
Today, I had my first Foundations Lab. In this class, we will learn how to do a lot of things that I already know how to do. But we will also learn how to do the one thing I've been dreading since I embarked on this journey: Foley catheters. There is nothing I fear more. I know it's a basic and simple procedure, but ... ARRRGH ... the DREAD. Yes, I will be facing my fear this semester. We will also learn how to give all kinds drugs in all kinds of ways, except for IVs. That part comes later. Before we left class, we had to get more photo IDs made and stand in line to be issued a Lab Bag that contains all our gear for this semester. I came very close to starting a cadence. I'm not even kidding when I refer to this program as Boot Camp for Nurses.
What I did on my 3-week long summer vacation ...
As previously mentioned, I spent quite a bit of time playing at the river.
I saw a movie at the theater. T and I went to see Wanted. It was ok. Angelina Jolie is, as always, a total bad-ass in this movie.
I went to Dollywood. A nursing school friend and his wife have season passes to Dollywood, and they can get guests in for free. So E and I went with them and a couple of other folks. I'm happy to report that I do still have roller coaster stamina.
I met a guy. And went on dates. Of course, I did not meet this fella anywhere 'round these parts because apparently there's an extreme deficit of single, straight men here. E convinced me to try the online thing. She made a good argument. She pointed out that we have 3 weeks off from school,we live in a place where it's very hard to meet guys unless you like hanging out in bars, which I do not, and I didn't have to post my picture or name. Of course, all of this encouragement was very easy for E since she's married. There was no fear of me coming back with, "I'll do it if you do it." I'm convinced that singles sites would completely vanish if it weren't for peer pressure. So, I posted a profile, sans photo, with no expectation that anyone would contact me, but it gave me a chance to window shop and wink at a fella here and there. Seriously, it's very much like shopping on Ebay. I love shopping on Ebay. It's fun to go through and post bids on things knowing damn well that I will NEVER win the bid. It's like retail therapy without total annihilation of my checking account. But lo and behold if I didn't start getting contacted by guys. Most of them were just blatant, "You interested?" kind of messages (um, no, I'm not >delete<) but one stood out. His message was short, well-written and at the end he said, "Even if you don't respond to this, we may get a chance to meet someday if you go into flight nursing due to my line of work." Okay, I took the bait. I responded. "What is it that you do that puts you in contact with flight nurses?" State trooper. Damn! A COP! Just my luck. The one articulate, interesting nibble on my profile is a law enforcement officer. Don't get me wrong - men in uniform are HOT. But do I really want to date one rather than merely admire them all from a nice, long distance just out of radar? Oh well, why not? Dude could prove to be a valuable resource in learning how to avoid the po-po. So, that's been fun. I actually called him one afternoon as I was speeding down the interstate and asked if it was, in fact, illegal to drive bare-foot. It is not. All this time I thought I was exercising extreme passive resistance to The Man by driving without shoes, and it's not even a bad deed. I'll have to come up with something else.
Today, I had my first Foundations Lab. In this class, we will learn how to do a lot of things that I already know how to do. But we will also learn how to do the one thing I've been dreading since I embarked on this journey: Foley catheters. There is nothing I fear more. I know it's a basic and simple procedure, but ... ARRRGH ... the DREAD. Yes, I will be facing my fear this semester. We will also learn how to give all kinds drugs in all kinds of ways, except for IVs. That part comes later. Before we left class, we had to get more photo IDs made and stand in line to be issued a Lab Bag that contains all our gear for this semester. I came very close to starting a cadence. I'm not even kidding when I refer to this program as Boot Camp for Nurses.
Monday, August 11, 2008
doing the river dance
Oddly, it seems that now that I have a break from school I have less to say than when all I had to say was that I was studying for an exam. I did finally get my final grades: A in Health Assessment; A in Community Nursing; C+ in Pathophysiology ... what a freakin' GPA-buster. Oh, I also FINALLY got my summer school tuition reimbursement check. I picked it up last Wednesday and went to the bank with it, only to discover at 4:15 that the bank closes at 4. Apparently Corporate America was determined that I not have this money. On Thursday, I had to make a special trip all the way back into town just to put the damn check in the bank.
I've been spending time at the river with E and the dogs. I actually have tan lines for the first time in YEARS! And yes, I do use sun block.
One day last week I went to E's and we baked muffins using fresh blueberries she picked that morning. My contribution to this project was supplying the muffin tin and putting some batter into the muffin tin. E did the rest. She's very good at that sort of thing. I am not.
That same evening about 12 of us from the nursing program got together and played volleyball ... for 2.5 hours. I went from playing volleyball straight into boxing class. The next day I was able to identify every single muscle in my body and what each one actually did based on the level of pain associated with movement. Also, I had some crazy bruises on my arms - huge, purple, swollen bruises.
Tomorrow my plan is to turn in my paper work to the scholarship folks. Perhaps if they get started on it now, I'll have my fall tuition money by Christmas. In addition to giving them a copy of my fall semester bill and my class schedule, I have to turn over my report card. They are very curious about what kind of grades their scholarship recipients are getting. I hope to offer up something more impressive with my upcoming fall semester report card.
Also on the agenda for tomorrow is buying books for my fall classes. I do not want to do this. I want to continue on with my blissful denial of school ever starting again.
I also have to go by the financial aid office and see if they can help me track down some financial aid money. I applied back in February for this coming school year, but haven't really heard anything back about whether or not I will be getting money this time 'round.
And, since I will be in town, I may pop by the uniform store and get my scrubs. Because this semester? I actually get to go into the hospital and do stuff. With real patients. Scary.
I've been spending time at the river with E and the dogs. I actually have tan lines for the first time in YEARS! And yes, I do use sun block.
One day last week I went to E's and we baked muffins using fresh blueberries she picked that morning. My contribution to this project was supplying the muffin tin and putting some batter into the muffin tin. E did the rest. She's very good at that sort of thing. I am not.
That same evening about 12 of us from the nursing program got together and played volleyball ... for 2.5 hours. I went from playing volleyball straight into boxing class. The next day I was able to identify every single muscle in my body and what each one actually did based on the level of pain associated with movement. Also, I had some crazy bruises on my arms - huge, purple, swollen bruises.
Tomorrow my plan is to turn in my paper work to the scholarship folks. Perhaps if they get started on it now, I'll have my fall tuition money by Christmas. In addition to giving them a copy of my fall semester bill and my class schedule, I have to turn over my report card. They are very curious about what kind of grades their scholarship recipients are getting. I hope to offer up something more impressive with my upcoming fall semester report card.
Also on the agenda for tomorrow is buying books for my fall classes. I do not want to do this. I want to continue on with my blissful denial of school ever starting again.
I also have to go by the financial aid office and see if they can help me track down some financial aid money. I applied back in February for this coming school year, but haven't really heard anything back about whether or not I will be getting money this time 'round.
And, since I will be in town, I may pop by the uniform store and get my scrubs. Because this semester? I actually get to go into the hospital and do stuff. With real patients. Scary.
Saturday, August 2, 2008
Rockin' It Like A Rock Star
I have completed my first semester of nursing school! Only 4 more to go before I'm let loose on the world. I'm still not sure how I'm going to be magically transformed into someone with life-saving/sustaining skills in this short amount of time - this whole experience is kind of like boot camp for nurses.
E and I recently took Smarty-pants girl to the river. Smarty-pants girl is not exactly the outdoorsy type, but she did surprisingly well. No complaining or anything, well, not much complaining. It was pretty funny watching her gingerly make her way down the very steep trail that leads to the river while holding a cell phone in one hand and bottled water in the other and carrying a very large bag filled with ... what? I don't know. A laptop maybe? She was quite the trooper, though. She even endured being showered with the river water that our dogs shook off. This was probably the only time in her entire life that she will ever step foot in water that hasn't been purified, so I feel like I've contributed in some small way to making her a more well-rounded individual.
School is out for 3 weeks and I'm already puttering around the house wondering what it is I used to do before life as a nursing student. I figured cleaning my house was a good place to start, and in doing so I found my banjo! Ahhh ... a project. Can I learn to play the thing in only 3 weeks? Stay tuned ... Speaking of tuning, I totally broke a string trying to tune up the banjo, so my homeschooling on a musical instrument is postponed until further notice.
Today I got out my studio supplies and started playing around with some creative stuff! Mostly all I've managed to create is a huge mess in the middle of the floor.
Over this nice, long break I do actually have some things to take care of. First on the agenda is getting the school to release my summer school tuition reimbursement check. This needs to happen soon, like last week. Or there's going to be trouble. BIG TROUBLE. The kind that involves me asking my friends to post bail.
Next on the list of Things To Do is get my scrubs for next semester! They have to be embroidered ... at least until the Powers That Be change their minds. I'm totally going to try the Grey's Anatomy scrubs, because that material? It's totally fabulous! Unlike regular scrub material, the GA scrubs are made from a rayon blend and they actually drape. So instead of looking like I'm wearing frumpy pajamas, I'll look like I'm wearing silky pajamas. And that would totally rock.
Other things include stuff like getting my car checked out because it's making some weirdo noise, getting Puck's nails trimmed, and cleaning my lab coat. I wore my lab coat for all of 2 hours and now it's filthy ... how does this happen?
Grades haven't been posted yet, but I know I got an A in that wretched online class. And I made a 100 on my final skills assessment in Health Assessment class, I also made a 100 on the documentation part for the skills assessment, and I made a 96 on the final exam .... who's a rock star! (Just for the record, Smarty-pants girl made a 90 on the final exam. Seems the actual skills of nursing are a bit more challenging for her than Patho was ... nice to know there is balance in the world)
E and I recently took Smarty-pants girl to the river. Smarty-pants girl is not exactly the outdoorsy type, but she did surprisingly well. No complaining or anything, well, not much complaining. It was pretty funny watching her gingerly make her way down the very steep trail that leads to the river while holding a cell phone in one hand and bottled water in the other and carrying a very large bag filled with ... what? I don't know. A laptop maybe? She was quite the trooper, though. She even endured being showered with the river water that our dogs shook off. This was probably the only time in her entire life that she will ever step foot in water that hasn't been purified, so I feel like I've contributed in some small way to making her a more well-rounded individual.
School is out for 3 weeks and I'm already puttering around the house wondering what it is I used to do before life as a nursing student. I figured cleaning my house was a good place to start, and in doing so I found my banjo! Ahhh ... a project. Can I learn to play the thing in only 3 weeks? Stay tuned ... Speaking of tuning, I totally broke a string trying to tune up the banjo, so my homeschooling on a musical instrument is postponed until further notice.
Today I got out my studio supplies and started playing around with some creative stuff! Mostly all I've managed to create is a huge mess in the middle of the floor.
Over this nice, long break I do actually have some things to take care of. First on the agenda is getting the school to release my summer school tuition reimbursement check. This needs to happen soon, like last week. Or there's going to be trouble. BIG TROUBLE. The kind that involves me asking my friends to post bail.
Next on the list of Things To Do is get my scrubs for next semester! They have to be embroidered ... at least until the Powers That Be change their minds. I'm totally going to try the Grey's Anatomy scrubs, because that material? It's totally fabulous! Unlike regular scrub material, the GA scrubs are made from a rayon blend and they actually drape. So instead of looking like I'm wearing frumpy pajamas, I'll look like I'm wearing silky pajamas. And that would totally rock.
Other things include stuff like getting my car checked out because it's making some weirdo noise, getting Puck's nails trimmed, and cleaning my lab coat. I wore my lab coat for all of 2 hours and now it's filthy ... how does this happen?
Grades haven't been posted yet, but I know I got an A in that wretched online class. And I made a 100 on my final skills assessment in Health Assessment class, I also made a 100 on the documentation part for the skills assessment, and I made a 96 on the final exam .... who's a rock star! (Just for the record, Smarty-pants girl made a 90 on the final exam. Seems the actual skills of nursing are a bit more challenging for her than Patho was ... nice to know there is balance in the world)
Wednesday, July 23, 2008
Hello, Sunshine! Remember me?
Wow - it seems like it's been months since I've written, but it's only been a week and half. During this time I have taken 4 tests and turned in one big assignment. Not only did I make a 100 on that assignment, but my teacher wrote "Great job!" next to my grade. That's like getting a GOLD STAR! Apparently, I am very good at documentation. This is good since the prevailing mantra in nursing school is "If you don't document it, you didn't do it." And as much as I would like to think this notion gives me the total go-ahead to screw up so long as I don't document it, I'm guessing it doesn't actually work that way. All these little rules and nuances are so tedious.
One thing about nursing school that is starting to dawn on all of us is that the stuff covered in class is completely unrelated to what will be on exams. Exams are a total crap-shoot. And no one has come up with a magic formula on how to approach these things. It basically comes down to having a 1 in 4 chance of guessing the right answer - 1 in 2 if you can narrow it down that far. I find that I do much better on the guessing game if I DON'T narrow it down to 2 possible answers. Because if I have a 50/50 chance? I will ALWAYS choose the wrong answer. During my last Health Assessment exam I actually heard Clint Eastwood in my head asking, "Do you feel lucky, punk?" No, Mr. Eastwood, I do not feel lucky. In fact, I feel miserable and stupid so why don't you just go ahead and shoot me.
On the administrative side of things at the CON, there seems to be a serious failure to communicate ... or maybe just some heavy-duty crack-smoking. These folks sent out a packet of information to all the nursing students upon acceptance to the program detailing everything we needed to get, have, do, or have done to us. So most of us got on it right away and took care of business. Part of this business included getting a lab coat with the CON official patch on the left sleeve. This was a clearly stated requirement. So I got my super cool lab coat with its nifty patch (actually, the patch is pretty ugly), only to be told a couple of weeks ago that they changed their minds. Instead of the patch, they want the front of the lab coats embroidered with "CON BSN STUDENT". This proved to be a bit of an issue for those of us who already had the patch. Why? Because this patch is a weirdly shaped 4-pointed iron-cross type thing which means lots and lots of stitching. Which means lots and lots of holes if removed. So, those of us with patches were told to keep the patch AND get the embroidery. Now, I have the coolest lab coat in the world with an ugly-ass patch on the left sleeve and a pile of embroidery on the left front. All that coupled with my ID badge which also says CON nursing student kind of makes me feel like a walking billboard for my school. Only twelve more items and I'll have my 15 pieces of flair.
On the fun side of life ... oh, yes, there has actually been a little bit of fun in the sun ... I have discovered the river. Last week, E and I went around our little town to interview various folks in different health agencies for this ridiculous community assessment paper we have due this week. Our venture proved pretty futile, but then E mentioned that she and her husband found this cool place to get in at the river. We drove over and checked it out, and decided that the next day we would bring our dogs and play. I only took my girl dog because the boy dogs are way more interested in running off into the woods than playing in the water. The four of us dog-paddled our way down the river, and now my legs are completely banged up, bruised, and scraped from all those insidious rocks lurking below the surface. Oh, and my back got a bit red from overdosing on sunshine. BUT IT WAS GREAT!!! I'm thinking next time we need to score some inner tubes. And sunscreen.
I also ventured back home for an afternoon of volleyball and cookin'-out at J's house. It was great to see friends I haven't seen in FOREVER. It was just the soul infusion I needed.
Coming up, I have a final exam in Health Assessment on Monday, and the big skills assessment check-off next Thursday. So, I'm hunkered down studying my butt off as per usual. Hopefully, these things will go well and by next Thursday afternoon I'll be floating down the river again. And then I get TWO WHOLE WEEKS off before fall semester starts.
One thing about nursing school that is starting to dawn on all of us is that the stuff covered in class is completely unrelated to what will be on exams. Exams are a total crap-shoot. And no one has come up with a magic formula on how to approach these things. It basically comes down to having a 1 in 4 chance of guessing the right answer - 1 in 2 if you can narrow it down that far. I find that I do much better on the guessing game if I DON'T narrow it down to 2 possible answers. Because if I have a 50/50 chance? I will ALWAYS choose the wrong answer. During my last Health Assessment exam I actually heard Clint Eastwood in my head asking, "Do you feel lucky, punk?" No, Mr. Eastwood, I do not feel lucky. In fact, I feel miserable and stupid so why don't you just go ahead and shoot me.
On the administrative side of things at the CON, there seems to be a serious failure to communicate ... or maybe just some heavy-duty crack-smoking. These folks sent out a packet of information to all the nursing students upon acceptance to the program detailing everything we needed to get, have, do, or have done to us. So most of us got on it right away and took care of business. Part of this business included getting a lab coat with the CON official patch on the left sleeve. This was a clearly stated requirement. So I got my super cool lab coat with its nifty patch (actually, the patch is pretty ugly), only to be told a couple of weeks ago that they changed their minds. Instead of the patch, they want the front of the lab coats embroidered with "CON BSN STUDENT". This proved to be a bit of an issue for those of us who already had the patch. Why? Because this patch is a weirdly shaped 4-pointed iron-cross type thing which means lots and lots of stitching. Which means lots and lots of holes if removed. So, those of us with patches were told to keep the patch AND get the embroidery. Now, I have the coolest lab coat in the world with an ugly-ass patch on the left sleeve and a pile of embroidery on the left front. All that coupled with my ID badge which also says CON nursing student kind of makes me feel like a walking billboard for my school. Only twelve more items and I'll have my 15 pieces of flair.
On the fun side of life ... oh, yes, there has actually been a little bit of fun in the sun ... I have discovered the river. Last week, E and I went around our little town to interview various folks in different health agencies for this ridiculous community assessment paper we have due this week. Our venture proved pretty futile, but then E mentioned that she and her husband found this cool place to get in at the river. We drove over and checked it out, and decided that the next day we would bring our dogs and play. I only took my girl dog because the boy dogs are way more interested in running off into the woods than playing in the water. The four of us dog-paddled our way down the river, and now my legs are completely banged up, bruised, and scraped from all those insidious rocks lurking below the surface. Oh, and my back got a bit red from overdosing on sunshine. BUT IT WAS GREAT!!! I'm thinking next time we need to score some inner tubes. And sunscreen.
I also ventured back home for an afternoon of volleyball and cookin'-out at J's house. It was great to see friends I haven't seen in FOREVER. It was just the soul infusion I needed.
Coming up, I have a final exam in Health Assessment on Monday, and the big skills assessment check-off next Thursday. So, I'm hunkered down studying my butt off as per usual. Hopefully, these things will go well and by next Thursday afternoon I'll be floating down the river again. And then I get TWO WHOLE WEEKS off before fall semester starts.
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