| First Full Week |
[20 Sep 2009|04:52pm] |
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This fall I'm working fewer jobs, more hours. I got the full time post at Quincy College, so that's 30 hrs/wk (though, in the quirky world of nursing school, I'm actually required to be there 34 hrs each week -- the school mandates 6hr/day, 5 days/wk, and doesn't make any changes in light of the fact that our two clinical days are 8hrs each). Nice to be a real employee somewhere, with health insurance (and dental! woo-hoo!) and stability. Weird to now be officially supposed to not just care about, but participate in, office politics. The job itself isn't much more than what I was doing as adjunct -- about 9 lectures/semester, two clinical days a week, and various exams. But now I also have office hours (in other words, I'm officially being paid to talk to the students, instead of just lingering after class volunteering the time, and I have a desk an everything, and a place to do grading and class prep other than at home on my own time) and get to be on college committees. Oh, boy.
But it still doesn't pay enough to let me only do it (in nursing, it's generally accepted that "retirement" means "cutting back to just one job"), so there's another nice school, Mass College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences that had me do clinicals last year and wanted me back again. So I'm doing three days a week for them. Yes, I am officially working 8 days a week. The Beatles made it sound cooler, though. The way it actually works is Mon & Wed are Lecture or Office Hours or exams. Tues & Thurs are double clinicals -- both schools' clinicals are at the same hospital (same units, even), so I just stay for a double (7a - 11p) and the students change mid-afternoon. Each school gets one day and one evening shift, for maximum range of experience. Friday is Committee meetings and office hours, and Saturday is another clinical day. Sunday? Sunday I get to sleep in. And when my temp agency calls to ask me to work, I get to laugh maniacally and hang up.
This is actually a pretty sweet setup. I enjoy lecturing. I love clinicals. I adore the state mental hospital we go to, and had fun returning there and seeing all my old friends -- staff and patients alike. The only thing I would change is which unit we're on, since I miss 9North, but Saturdays we can go down there as well. The only downside is, obviously, the sheer number of hours -- a minimum of 55, 6 days a week, an hour commute each way every day.... I do worry that I just won't have the energy to do it. The first week was just Quincy, without clinicals yet, so it wasn't that bad. The week of 9/14 would be the first full-on week, the first test of do I have it in me.
And my body decided to preemptively say, Nope, you don't. The previous Friday I started feeling sick, and by the time I got home, I pretty much needed to just collapse on the couch. Stayed there all weekend. Called out Monday, canceling my Office Hours; no biggie, except I'd planned to be prepping my clinical handouts. Didn't matter, because I couldn't make it to clinical Tuesday, either. I've never missed clinical, and the very first day is orientation and vital, but it gradually penetrated my fog that if I have a temp of 102 and a cough, they won't want me there. Also cancelend Wednesday -- switched lecture dates with the other instructor for this course. I did make it in to the office that day (they all promptly told me to go away), finished up with HR for insurance and got my clinical papers. Thursday I finally got up early and went to do the real work for the full day -- all 16hrs of it. Damn near killed me, but I got through it. Friday, called out. Saturday, made it in for clinical.
The scary part was being so sick for so many days that I really forgot was healthy felt like. I could barely grasp walking upstairs to get a robe when I was shivering with fever; the idea of being on my feet and talking and thinking and active for a whole day had become utterly inconceivable to me. Now the memory of health is back, and most of the actual health. I still have a bothersome cough, but it's manageable. I must say, though -- if this was the Swine, it is very much worth getting the shot (which apparently is a nasal spray anyway). Do whatever you can to avoid this -- seriously.
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| Sweeney Todd Day this weekend |
[20 Aug 2009|11:46pm] |
We're back from Alaska. It's way hotter here. And the chickens are way bigger. So, while the work of processing them is hardly appealing for a hot day, we really can't postpone any more. The poor guys can hardly move (except the two who mysteriously can still get over a 2 ft fence).
So, as before, anyone interested in observing or pitching in on the process of chickens becoming meat, let us know. We'll be starting some time midday this Saturday (8/22) and continuing until done -- six chickens, so a few hours at least.
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| Home Again |
[27 Jul 2009|01:58pm] |
Got home last night. The stuff needs unpacking, the house needs cleaning, the garden needs weeding (good thing I put a fence around the tomatoes -- they would have engulphed and eaten the house by now if hadn't). I left the rabbits up at camp for an extra week, in part to be able to do improvements in their room. And my course coordinator wants me to write the syllabus with her this week.
Also, da White Boyz aren't very large -- this hatchery apparently has the more slow-growing variety. So, we'll be having a Potluck this weekend, all are welcome, but it won't include processing the chickens. We'll do that in about a month.
Still hope to see people Sunday -- RSVP if you can. Starts 2ish, earlier for those wanting to see more of Jillian -- I think she & Roxxy will get down here around noon.
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| Second Annual Sweeney Todd Party |
[24 Jul 2009|02:48pm] |
It's that time of year again, when the extra birds rounding out our chicken order ("da white boyz") need to be moved from the yard to the freezer. Not for everyone, we know, so the festivities/activities will be divided as followed: Morning: Chicken processing. Anyone who has wondered exactly where their meat comes from, or seeking to validate their vegetarianism, or just wanting a really detailed avian anatomy lesson, you're welcome to join us. Depending on how many people we have and how well-shared the workload is, you could even take home some ethical meat. Call for best estimate of start time, probably around 9am. We hope to finish and clean up by 2pm, at which point we will transition into.... Afternoon: Potluck Barbeque! Come enjoy our yard, our company, and everyone's food. We will have a grill, some assortment of food (including, of course, disturbingly fresh chicken), and a desperate need to socialize with friends. (Not due to the morning's work, more due to the last several weeks I've had up here at camp. Feel free to change the subject if I start wallowing). And this will segue into.... Evening: More socializing! Possibly watching Sweeney Todd, or gaming. Place: 518 S. Main St, Mansfield, MA. Right off of 495 (southbound). Call if you need directions, or a pickup from the train station. Date: Sunday, 2 August Time: Depends on what you want to do... Before 2pm, likely to have birds still in process. After two, less so. After four, should be safe for the squeamish crowd. If you're very anxious, know that the work will be segregated, so one can easily avoid it if your timing is off. Bring: whatever you like -- food, games, just yourselves... I really am desperately craving people, in any form. Oh, anyone with instructions for divination by entrails, please let us know. RSVP: Please, if possible (if not, spontanaeity is also okay). 508-339-5152, with a prediciton of when you'll arrive, so we know who to expect for what. Looking forward to seeing folks! Bhadrika & Steve & co. |
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| Chicka Chicka Boom Boom |
[16 Jun 2009|08:06pm] |
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This year's chicks have arrived. I got 2 people from the Crazy Chicken Lovers Web Site to sign up in advance and choose the breeds they promise to take after camp is done with them, so we have (those with * we're keeping, one of each):
2 Grey Dorkings, which look like silver-edged chipmunks
2 Spitzhaubens*, which look like scruffy dirty chicks, with yellow and black mixed fluff. When they grow up, they'll be white with black spots and have head feathers shaped like the traditional German Spitzhauben hat.
2 Feather-Footed Cuckoo Marans*, which will be black/white striped and lay dark brown eggs (chocolate eggs).
1 Buff Orpington, which will be totally golden.
2 Jersey Giants, one black, one white
1 Dominique, which will be black/white striped
1 White Cochin Bantam Frizzle, which will be tiny and have feathers that curl backwards
2 Americaunas*, which could be any color and will lay blue/green eggs. We started with six, and are down to three, so want another to increase the number of nifty colored eggs.
1 Welsummer*, which will lay chocolate eggs
1 Russian Orloff*, which will be brown with white spots, and stand very vertical.
1 Turken, or Transylvanian Naked Neck. the name says it all -- it's like a chicken crossed with a vulture.
1 Lavendar Guinea, which is not a chicken. It's incredibly cute now, and will only go downhill as it grows into a ugly cousin of a peacock.
7 Cornish Rock Crosses, which will grow very big very fast and be slaughtered for meat in August.
So, those who didn't find the open invitation to see our poison ivy all that alluring are now encouraged to come see the cute fluffies instead. We're all around until about 6/26. The meat birds aren't going up to camp, but they aren't as cute, either.
And the Second Annual Sweeney Todd Party will happen the first weekend of August. Let us know if you're interested in coming, and we'll tell you the details.
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| Home Again, Home Again, Too Tired to Jig... |
[30 May 2009|06:07pm] |
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Some random thoughts:
Room 3106 at Norwood Hospital is for people from Mansfield. Me, first night's roommate and second night's roommate were all from Mansfield. More specifically, the window side bed is for people from our house, since it's the exact bed Steve was in recently. Oh, and my nurse? She's our next door neighbor's sister.
Having your face explode is scary.
Being scared in the ER makes your blood presssure go up.
Having a high BP reading on admission makes them order a Cardiac diet.
Cardiac diets exclude caffeine.
Caffeine withdrawal causes headaches, which are easily confused with Scary Complications of Facial Explosion.
A strong cup of tea does wonders for the above problems.
Conclusion: The British were right, after all.
Hard to tell whether Dr. Jerk has pointed lack of respect for women, for nurses, or for patients. Looks like I get a triple whammy. But it was helped by the subtle indications that the nurses there all hate him, too, and then as an added bonus, the general doctor looked not just bothered, but actively scared of him. So I could at least entertain myself by tweaking this by trying to get her to come in at the same time as him and watching her struggle to find a legitimate reason not to. And then, later, I got her to write a prescription, suggested by my nurse, treating my infection in a way that assumes that we're all right and Dr. Jerk is wrong regarding the underlying cause. Just because it makes me happy to do so, even if he never sees that he's been effectively undermined (and certainly doesn't have any way of knowing how many of use contributed to the undermining). Oh, and because I really think we are right, and there'd be no downside to this treatment. So, what happened to my face? Well, last February, I had a swelling under my eye. Went to the ER, got Keflex, and when it didn't help much, went back to the ER and got IV clindamycin and a week's worth of Bactrim. Last week, after not using it since that infection, I took out and used my sinus flush bottle to deal with increasing allergies. A few days later, I awoke with swelling under my eye.
I quickly (Dr. Jerk might say precipitously) concluded that the sinus rinse was the cause of the infection, which most likely travelled up the tearduct connecting my right eye and sinus. Perhaps the reusable bottle is hosting a nasty bug, perhaps I squirted it too hard, perhaps the duct on that side is particularly vulnerable. In any event, it seems a no-brainer as to the cause (and everyone other than Dr. Jerk promptly agreed) and the immediate goal/need was to make it go away. So I started the Bactrim again (advantage of the job). The swelling when I woke up Wed was way bigger, faster than it had been in February, but I was already planning to head in to the ER for the predicted bag of IV clindamycin.
Then it moved off-script, as this ER doc immediately stated they would be admitting me, explaining the dangers of such an infection moving into the actual eye, and from there having access to the brain. He also started a different IV antibiotic, but I don't know Abx well enough to compare. So I called to cancel work for the next day and inform various people. Up on the unit, I met Dr. Jerk, got a CT scan of my head to see if the infection was heading into nasty areas, had visits from Willa & Jeremiah, Wolf, Steve, and the lawyer processing our mortgage refinance (we signed as scheduled, just in a different venue), wqatched a lot of TV and got a few more bags of the Oxycillin and also started bags of IV Gentamycin, which I could actually feel working on the infection, so it was worth dealing with Dr. Jerk since he's the one who added it.
The next morning, Dr. Jerk said I'd have to stay another night since it wasn't improving enough yet. I was very upset and bummed, since that evening was my students' Pinning (nursing school graduation ceremony). But then I went to the bathroom and realized I looked like Quasimodo fighting off leprosy, and decided it wouldn't have been great to go, either, even if it felt silly to stay in a hospital just because I needed an IV hooked up every few hours (after all, I have abundant people in my life who could do that for me).
Friday morning it looked and I felt much better. I had that glorious "oh, so this is what having energy feels like, now I remember" feeling. Everyone agreed, and I was sprung by noon. Did some shopping on the way home, took Wolf grocery shopping (her birthday party this weekend), and by evening was tangibly remembering that I was actually just getting over being really sick. So, not too spiffy on the energy front, but still, improved and improving. The skin around my eye is still quite red, and dry, and sagging from being so distended.
So that was my week.
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| The Sense God Gave Chickens.... |
[30 Mar 2009|02:04pm] |
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I'm doing grades today, which means I flit from little unnecessary task to task in a frenzy of procrastination. I see a stale waffle, and decide I have to give it to the chickens at once. I go to the back door, to find our little back stoop filled with chickens. I had let them out this morning to roam the back yard, but when it started to rain, faced with the prospect of returning to the cozy and spacious coop in the back of the yard or huddling together on the cold, barely non-damp concrete of the stoop, all ten* decided to crowd together there. They scattered when I came out, and fortunately followed me when i ran back to the coop and threw the waffle in there. I decided to lock them in, given the liklihood that they'd all come back out into the rain.
*That's ten of the eleven we currently have. Number eleven is staying in the coop, gone "broody" -- this is when a hen hunkers down, determined to hatch a clutch of eggs, lack of fertilization be damned. Well, except for the fact that I collected the eggs she was hording, so now she's trying to hatch... the empty nest box, apparently.
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| If I Were Prince Charming.... |
[16 Dec 2008|06:32pm] |
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Sleeping Beauty would probably get to snooze a bit more.
But it's not for some rumored princess, it's for my Orchard, so I stuck to the task, which in turn stuck to me.
I took advantage of a few days of freakishly good weather to expand our backyard by reducing the wilderness. I just started at the edge with a set of clippers and got to work on the tangle of... whatever it is. Wild roses, I thought, based on the leaves and the prevalence of thorns. But not just roses, also mixed in was a healthy amount of some long vining thing that spreads with underground root runners, so that was popping up all over, twining the roses and making them both hard to get ahold of. Plus the fact that I often couldn't tell which I was grabbing until it grabbed me back.
The second day I only had about an hour between job interview ("Yes, we'd love to have you, don't want to interview the next candidate, and would you like a full time position, not that we have one, but if I could somehow find one for you?" Would that I loved them as much as they love me...) and taking kids to orthodontist (... not that I can afford to be picky, Life hastens to point out). My previous day's work had been noticed, though -- the moment I arrived, a vine lashed out and gouged me at the based of my thumb, managing to spear the vein there and cause an impressive dime-sized bruise. Still, I struggled in... I just ordered $200 worth of heriloom varieties of apples (and some peaches of equally unusual parentage), and saw that they need to be planted when they arrive -- even if it's January (apparently that's one of the many many reason why our other apple tree is so pathetic -- they need to be planted while still dormant. They want to fall asleep in dirt and wake up in dirt). So I need the area clear.
I fought my way up towards the gnarled, twisted little tree on a slight rise... and discovered that the "roses" (if that's actually what they are) arise from this ancient creature. At this point I started to get worried. I knew the plants were mean, but looking at the twisted trunk with it's viscious offshoots, and judging by the way it grabs and attacks (and where it tends to grab), this plant isn't just difficult, it's evil. An ancient, evil, creepy old man of a plant. And I'm clearly pissing it off. Still, I cleared another swath, and resolved even though the trees won't be here or planted yet, I'll drink a wassail and pour some cider on the proposed planting areas for Solstice, in order to start getting some gods on my side in case this Old One tries to take even more active retrbution.
Today, I cleared it almost all the way to the two trees I was planning to potentially take down as soon as I can borrow a chainsaw. I say was, because once I got close enough to the tree to survey the assorted vines going up it, I noticed another scary plant -- a hairy root over an inch in diameter, quite possibly from a great-grandpa of a poison ivy vine. Creepy, the way the hairiness makes it look like it's moving, turning to look at you... So I went out and bought an industrial-size keg of RoundUp and saturated the root with toxins. We'll just keep the orchard a few yards away until that little infestation gets resolved, shall we?
Jazz came out to survey the cleared area, and took a hatchet to the remaining piece of Old Man Many Thorns, a trunk about 6 feet high and 3 inches across. He felled it, and now it peeling the bark off to make... something. He hasn't decided yet. I think having my son use the branch as a staff or whatever should pretty clearly establish my security from the Evil Plant.
I didn't dig the holes, but I hope it will be fairly doable to plant the trees now when then come. I think I might let them get established for a year before I set up the beehive... Or maybe I'll start that this spring, too. Of course, there's also the mountain of spikey cuttings to get rid of. Sigh... later.
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| Poison Ivy Update |
[16 Jun 2008|02:12am] |
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Exposed 16 days ago. Much of forearm still reacting, with some areas looking like they'll finish soon, while others only just started in the last week (complicated by the fact that I get itchy bumps for other reasons).
For a while, I coated it with prescription steroid cream (for other bumps), and then wrapped the entire arm (which intensifies the steroids, makes everyone ask what happened to my arm, and made it very warm, but at least kept me from clawing at it.)
At alumni weekend, I got some more recommendations and information, so Monday I spent some time researching/fact checking what I'd heard.
From what I could gather, there are many substances which would likely work as well as the recommended product -- things which dissolve oil and close pores (ie, acne washes) first among them, but that none of them would do much at this point, when the urishol had fully penetrated the skin and it was now my reaction to contend with.
But there was an intriguingly counterintuitive suggestion. The poison ivy reaction, like all allergic dermatitis, is mediated by histamines. These are the same chemicals that make hives and bug bites itch, and which cause your skin to redden when hot (increasing circulation in order to cool you). For this reason, people are told to keep an allergic area cool, because warmth will make it itchier (and my arm wrap was proving that point daily). So the suggestion to flush the area with HOT water seems totally backwards, until you think about it a moment -- you flood the area with heat (not warmth, heat -- as hot as you can stand it), for several minutes. The cells respond by releasing histamine (and the itching increases, but it's barely noticeable in the pain of scalding yourself). After a few minutes, the itching fades because the cells have completely depleted their supply of histamine. And then it takes them hours to make more. Hours of being blissfully itch-free. Ahhh.....
So, it's frustrating that it's taking this long to clear, and I don't always remember to go boil my arm at the first sign of itching, so there's still some scratching happening, but generally, I can deal.
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| Grouse, grouse |
[04 Jun 2008|05:09pm] |
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They cancelled my shift -- not uncommon, since Agency nurses cost about twice as much as their own, so if someone's willing to work the shift, they switch them in. But then they called, needing me after all, when I'd planned and prepped a nice dinner. Sigh. So I went off to nap, and left Steve to fry up the pre-chopped food.
Had trouble falling asleep (so unlike me), but did get about three hours of napping in. Took Steve's computer in to work since mine is on the fritz due to a close encounter with a glass of seltzer (anyone with advice/skill in cleaning/repairing such thing? I'm bringng it to Alumni Weekend in hopes of tapping the communal brain), with plans/hopes of spending a chunk of the night shift writing exam questions.
But then -- the nerve of them! -- I actually had to work while at work -- the whole time. Petty to complain, I know, but still, half the reason I work night shifts is that there's reliably at most two hours of work to be done over the eight-hour period. But I had two and a half admissions to do, plus the fire alarm going off for half an hour (during which time we have to stand by the no-longer-locked doors and try to reassure the patients that the building really isn't on fire), plus a doctor on call who didn't take the "on call" (ie, able to be found at all) very seriously....
Then home to work on the exam, which wound up taking me until noon. It's really hard to construct multiple choice questions that aren't too hard and yet aren't embarassingly easy, either. Plus, I almost feel guilty when I do it well -- when I anticipate the pitfalls and line them up for hapless students to fall into. It's hard -- I'd love to just ask them to freely define "herd immunity" for me, but instead I have to come up with three plausible but wrong definitions (which, if I'm in the mood, can feel like a fun game of Malarky), and I don't need the spectre of them whining afterwards about something being "tricky."
And then as I sent the test off to the head instructor, I also had to reply to the questions passed on by her from the students about the last test. the usual "you said A but they thought B was right, so can you check and verify it in the book?" I was in a bitter enough mood to reply "As for the prophylactic eye ointment -- are the students ever encouraged to look it up themselves? It's right there on the bottom of page 157 of the Maternity Nursing Text, if they just took a moment to look for themselves instead of asking us to show them." I figure I can afford to be a bit snarky -- I haven't really enjoyed teaching the LPN students (more the instructor, and the fact that I'm putting in well over 20 hrs, between travel, prep, and lecture time, for just six hours of pay -- this is why adjunct sucks), whily they and the instructor appear wild about me.
So then to bed, when I again could't sleep. Got up after just two hours, and now we're into the driving kids all over portion of the day -- Jazz to orthodontist, Wolf to gymnastics. I'm tired.
And yet... life is persistently, pervasively, exquisitely sweet.... I've been acutely aware of this lately. The back yard is massively green, the veggie garden growing almost as I watch, various plants flowering, birds crowdng the feeder, chipmunks and squirrels and rabbits and foxes abounding, I'm reading several really fun books and have watched and discussed interesting movies and TV shows and baked and cooked yummy things and have marvelously cuddly cats and fascinating friends & family and there's eggs to collect and the bathroom has reached the point of reconstruction after months of deconstruction and there's games to play and camp soon.... So, grousing, and tired. But still mostly smiling.
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| Oh, all right, I'll write.... |
[02 Jun 2008|11:31am] |
I decided at some point that LJ would hold the other end of my comment/post karmic balance with SWAPA. In SWAPA, I write, but haven't commented in years. So LJ, I'd comment, and not write.
But as life speeds up, I read other people's notes and think it would be nice, on occasion, to post a little tidbit, too small to remember until the next SWAPA collation. Since a speedy life is often full of tidbits, and not so much the coherent deep thoughts. Not that I've been terribly deep, or even coherent, in SWAPA of late.
But then there's the worry of taking the time to make it look all nicely formatted and everything. Perhaps I'll be able to work on that at camp, or from work on occasion. But not today. Today is about ust dropping a quick note. About dropping future quick notes. The only tidbits I have for today is that my arm is itchy with poison ivy and that I'm mad at an anonymous State Trooper for causing me $125 of flat tire. But I don't want to start out grousing. So notes, later. Formatting, later.
Meanwhile, it's time to go format the bathroom a bit more.
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bhadrika's journal