Monday, Monday

My weekend with the new company went fine, I took patients and an admit yesterday. It was OK and it kept me busy. I know that I didn't do everything perfectly but that's what an orientation is for. When Susie got home last night she informed me that the address we had put on to the wedding invitations was wrong!! I didn't know she had already sent most of them out this weekend so I wasn't too upset and thought I could just have them reprinted but unfortunately his family mailed theirs out this weekend. Anyway It sucks because it is my fault because how the wrong address got on there was I had printed up a trial wording of an invitation several months just as samples for Susie to choose from and I didn't have the addresses right in front of me so I just guessed at the address. When we finally were doing the invitations I only remembered that I had guessed at the reception address, not the wedding address so it was the only address we changed. I am so frustrated with myself and have been beating myself up this morning. Anyway if you are planning on coming to the wedding ceremony the address is really 10600 not 10400. Susie is taking it well, I just don't know how well Micah's family is taking it as their side will have the majority who are coming and who got the wrong address.

I went and got a new tire today (to replace my blow out) and went ahead and replaced the other front tire. Sam's Club replaced the one tire per their road hazard policy so I just had to buy one tire. I then went to a couple of junk yards for a new wheel cover but neither facility carried any so I just bought a new set from Auto Zone.

All of the multitude of "ought to be doings" are calling me, so I better close for now. Hope your day is filled with joy and worthwhile projects.

Howdy everybody. I spent my first day at an inpatient unit today. They didn't have any admissions, discharges, transfers or deaths so it was a quiet day as they only had 6 patients. I had some trouble getting to work this morning though. This particular unit is around 28 miles from my house, luckily most of it is freeway. anyhow, right after I traveled from the I-17 to the I-30 there was a white panel van screetching and weaving off the side of the road and it appeared that his drive train had fallen down on to the road. I said a little thank you that I was not 10 secs ahead of time and thankfully not right next to him. (He managed to get the vehicle stopped) Then about 8-9 more miles up the road, I heard something spin off the right front tire and ping and bang under the car. I had not seen anything in the road and I guess I could describe the sound like a metal bolt (it sounded metallic and not too big). there didn't appear to be a problem, so I kept driving and as I got closer to my exit I started to move over lanes to get into the outside lane. when I got into the next to last lane I found myself next to an old beatup 1980's van. There started to be a strange noise and I thought it was coming from that old van, but as I passed him, I noticed that I now had a noise and a vibration and I thought "That van could have been making a noise but it wouldn't make my car vibrate. I quickly moved into the outside lane and started braking. Within a second or two my tire blew out but I was able to get into the emergency lane on the shoulder and get stopped. I was really bummed because not only was the tire shredded but my hubcap was no where to be found. I called Marvin who was not sympathetic at all. I called my son-in-law who unfortunately had gone camping with his brother. So it was going to be up to me. I opened the back door where the little jack and wrench were and got those out and I knew that the spare tire was mounted under the back of the car. I noted how low to the ground that the car sat and tried to invision me trying to wiggle under it to unbolt a tire (How low can you go??). I then thought about how black and filthy the tire was and I knew that I would not be able to go to work once I managed to change the tire because I was wearing white pants and I would be Filthy!! I remembered that my insurance policy had a towing benefit, but I didn't think it was also roadside assistance but I gave them a call anyway and guess what! no problem!! Yes it was covered and they would get someone right out to fix it. So after 35-40 mins he showed up, got the tire changed. the spare was pretty flat but he had a small tank of compressed air and got it full enough to get to a gas station and top it off. And ta-da! By the way, the spare tire is unbolted from the floor inside the car, there was no crawling under the back of the car to get it out. Anyway I made it to work and now safely home again. It is time to hit the hay as I also have to work tomorrow. I will be caring for some patients tomorrow and will be learning HOV's charting. Hopefully we will get an admit so I can see that process. LOVE and KISSES to all.

a link to some pics of Susie and Micah

I just went to the web site of Micah's cousin who took pics of them a couple of weeks ago and she has some of the pics posted in her blog. To see them go to www.pangburnphotography.com and click on the BLOG tab.

Monica came over today to help with the wedding stuff and try to keep me on track. We did get some things done but not enough. I kept leaving what I was doing to check out what she was doing!! But every little bit helps. Today is my Holly-Dolly's 25th birthday. Wow a quarter of a century old!! I can hardly believe it! I also have a terrible time believing that I have a child who is 37!! In fact it is hard to believe that I am 56 years old. Time is racing by and seems to be speeding up. I have wasted a lot of it in my life and unfortunately continue to indulge myself in nonproductive activities.

Tomorrow I will be doing a shift at an HOV unit and so will get to see the inpatient process first hand. I think that caring for the patients and the family education pieces will be mostly the same but it is all the little things, who do you call to get what. how do you know which dr. is on call. How do you get DME, meds etc. What is everything you have to do to make sure the pt is properly admitted or discharged. How does the home team like to be notified. etc. etc, etc. I also have to work Sunday, which I don't like but I have to work the schedule of the preceptor. Plus even with Sunday, my manager only has me working one other day next week so I will be only getting 24 hours next week and 28 hours this week. the following week I will be getting my 36 hours but I still do not have a schedule for beyond my orientation. I did speak to my manager again and reminded her of Susie's upcoming wedding on the 24th and told her I could only work either at the beginning of that week or maybe not at all that week, so we'll see what she comes up with. Wow then it will almost be JUNE!! "Summertime and the livin' is easy!" I still remember seeing "Porgy and Bess" on TV when I was very young and loved that song. I think it was Lena Horne who sang it. I just went on you tube and listened to the song again. It wasn't lena Horne on the version I saw but of course she may have sung it in a different one. Just watching diffent clips of the musical makes me want to see it. Maybe it will come to town sometime and I will go. I have also heard such great things about the musical "Wicked" so that would be fun to see also.

Susie was given an extracredit assignment to "earn" rice to fight world hunger by building her vocabulary. Susie, Monica and I had fun trying to figureout the meaning of the words. By looking at the prefixes and some roots in the word we were able to figure out a good percentage. It is quite addictive you can check it out at www.freerice.com

Susie just got home from work so I had better go and get busy on the wedding stuff.

I am still orienting for my new company, I had a day of orientation yesterday and another tomorrow and then I will orient on the unit this weekend. luckily I was dismissed from jury duty this week without having to go downtown so I can get all of my orientation done. I didn't have to work today and with Susie's wedding coming up so fast I should have been sewing, but instead I read a book. It was called The Twelve Little Cakes and was a memoir of Dominika Dery a young woman who grew up in Czechoslovia. Her parents were dissidents and the "party/comrads" always made her dad's life very difficult, but despite all of the difficulties because of the love and strength of her parents she still had a happy childhood.

I should really get busy but now my eyes are so blurry I can hardly read, and I even wore my glasses while I read. (Probably why everything is so blurry since I took them off!) It always takes a while for my eyes to readjust from close work/reading so I hope it clears up soon.

Holly has been reading a lot lately and posts her book reviews on Goodreads. I haven't done that yet but I am getting excited about reading again. I haven't read much the last couple of years, so I have quite number of books stacked up waiting for me to read once the wedding is over. I hope that I can keep the TV off and start doing some creative activities as well as more reading. I didn't used to have a problem with too much TV but it sure seems that it has been my veg drug of choice this last year. I didn't turn it on today however(once Marvin went into the bedroom this afternoon), so tonight I had to go online to see who was booted off of American Idol. I was surprised by the choice. I really thought it would be Jason or Brooke, I usually vote on Tuesday but I didn't yesterday because I really feel that their isn't much competition for David Cook. He seems to be in a league of his own, He really is so much more accomplished. I have to agree with Simon when a week ago, Simon said that David Cook's performance was so good "it was like coming up out of Karyoke Hell" the professional (you could have recorded this performance) was such a contrast to the arrangements that the others did. Don't get me wrong, I like David A. and Brooke but they had the same opportunity to create a polished professional arrangement and their performances did seem thinner, less filled with that "total package" that Paula refers to. Well so much for AI fluff.

I am still thinking about the book I read today and I am just blown away knowing that the author was only 29 when she published her book and it wasn't even her first!! plus she has other accomplishments. What I had at 29 was 6 kids!! I'm not complaining I would not trade my children for anything, they have brought such joy into my life. And I am not dead yet and can still set goals. I just fight with my lifelong sedentary solitary habits.

Well my eyes are less blurry so I had better do a little something and then get to bed. Since I have been working the night shift for the last 8 months it's hard to get up early in the morning for orientation. I have to leave by 710 am which isn't all that early it just seems like it when you can't get to sleep at night cause your used to staying up. I will be working day shifts this week end and next week so I'll have to leave the house around 6 am to get to the unit where I am orienting. The only positive is that I will be traveling against the rush hour traffic to get there.

Day 4 of orientation

Home from another day of orientation. 8-9 hours of sitting is tireing in and of itself, I am really happy to have an actual orientation and all the education and reminders of why and how we care for pts and their families. Today was the last day of "general orientation" and tomorrow I start an orientation specifically for inpatient nurses. I am supposed to attend two more full orientation days next week. HOWEVER, I am also "on call" for Jury duty nest week. Now instead of day of jury duty, you have to call in each evening to see if you are needed the next day for an entire week. I have no way of knowing whether I will be able to attend the orientation next week or if I will have to be downtown waiting to see if I get picked for a jury. I HOPE NOT. I really don't like confrontation!! And I don't want to have to be involved for days or weeks. I guess we don't have a choice though.

After work yesterday I went to Mesa and went not only to the temple to do a session but also to the visitor center where I viewed the Photographic exhibit "Reflections of Christ" I forgot the photographer's name but he was featured in the last Beehive newpaper. He is an Arizona photographer who came up with the idea of recreating Biblical scenes of Christ and/or stories and then photographing the scenes. It was all exceptionally well done, moving and actually looked a lot like paintings.

I'll sign out for now.

April 15, 2008

Wow tax day and I acually did my taxes two weeks ago. I am sure glad that I did since I am working all days this week. 2nd day of orientation went well and I talked with Barbara briefly about my schedule which she is still "tweaking" because two of the shifts that she had available were on the same night so she is trying to get some one else to switch so that she will have two days for me.

I just watched American Idol and still really like David Cook. I'm sorry to say that I am pretty bored with Brooke. It seems she just has one niche and while I do like her sound, It just doesn't have much variety. In fact, I'm pretty bored with everyone except David Cook. I will admit after moaning for weeks about why Kristy Lee Cook wasn't eliminated, she has surprised me the last two weeks and has shown the most improvement.

Susie is writing a paper and so I'm going to free up the computer for her so good night and sweet dreams to all my family.

1st day of work/orientation

Today was my first day with Hospice of the Valley. It was day one of general orientation. What a contrast so far, while HOV is mindful of cost and spending, the focus so far has been on the patient and family and HOV's commitment to 100% satisfaction rather than always "the bottom line" (at my previous hospice verbally we were told the pt came first but the pressure was always on cost. Tomorrow is also general orientation and then Wed, and Thur. will be nursing specific and Friday, inpatient specific. I am hopeful that I can find joy and satisfaction in this position.

Next week I am on-call for jury duty, I have to call in each evening to see if I need to go in the next day. I hope that I can still get my 3 days of orientation in on the unit.

Today I recieved my "How-To" book for working with my Adobe Photoshop elements program. Now to A. find the time to practice and learn and B. figure out why all the new programs don't load/work correctly on my computer.
I had also ordered a trilogy book which I had read and completely and throughly enjoyed appx 30 years ago. It is called "Kristen Lavernsdatter" by Sigred Unsted. It won the Nobel Prize for literature in 1927. I have never forgotten the impact that this book had on me and I had been wanting to reread it so I had been thinking about it and looked for it on Amazon and low and behold there it was!! I'm afraid it will have to wait until after the wedding but then....don't look for me for a week as it is over 1100 pages long in small print.

Last week I also succumbed to one of those 1/2 hour paid programming commercials and I ordered one of those weight loss programs that is always being advertised and it arrived today also. I'm sure that Marvin will have plenty to say to me about getting two packages today!! It will cost the same as I have been paying to the gym that I have gone to a total of 4 times and will be paid for in 6 months and not be never ending payments. So I am cancelling the gym and will see if Michael Thurman can motivate me. I'm hopeing that with the change in jobs and in emotional outlook I will find new determination to increase my activity and decrease my intake.

I need to go to bed so I can be bright eyed for orientation tomorrow. So Good Night.

Stake conference

Last weekend was general conference and then this weekend was stake conference and while we didn't have any general authorities visit we had some inspiring talks. I wanted to share some of what inspired me. Last night's session had a general theme of the importance of families. One story really stood out to me, it was from a talk by Suzanne Smith.

"There was a kind merchant who was traveling by foot to a distant city. Around his neck he had secured his funds, seven gold coins which he had strung onto a string. After traveling most of the day, he came upon poor man who was begging at the side of the road. The good merchant took pity on the begger and took from his neck the gold coins and gave the man six of his gold coins. The compassionate merchant then continued on his way with his remaining one coin. After traveling all day, the merchant was exhausted and as the shadows deepened the merchant lay down under a tree at the side of the road to rest. While he slept the begger came upon the merchant and finding him asleep, stealthily stole the merchant's last gold coin".

When she finished this story, I felt violated, how could someone who was the recipient of such overwhelming generousity from a kind benefactor be so unfeeling as to then turn around steal the man's last coin.

She then said, imagine then that God was the merchant and the coins are time. The Lord has given us six days to use as we will and has only kept one day. We however have stolen that last day as well. She continued to share the importance of keeping the sabbath day holy. She reviewed the history, and the emphasis placed upon it by the Lord. She shared some general guidelines about what should or shouldn't be done on the sabbath and especially how to help children honor the sabbath.

This morning, the topics were varied. One that stuck with me was given by the Temple President. He of course talked about the blessings of temple attendence. He told that there are two blessings attached to temple attendence and that if we were just coming to the temple and not researching and bringing our own family names to the temple that we were missing half of the blessings which we could be recieving. During his talk I really did feel the desire to be more diligent in going to the temple, and I thought about how I had planned in the past to attend once a week and how that had all gone by the wayside, (especially in this last year) He said that only 14 people from out stake were temple workers and that he thought there should be at least 50. I hope that I can overcome whatever it has been that has kept me so immobile and that I can start attending regularly again.


Susie and Micah got back late last night from Tucson, Susie says that the photo session was amazing!! She is so excited. I haven't got to see any of the pics yet as they only brought back a couple on a disc because his cousin shoots in RAW and still needs to Photoshop the rest. And for whatever reason, we couldn't get them to come up on my computer so Susie went to print them. (Micah did view them on his computer so I know the disc works) In the meantime, if anyone is interested, I did get Micah's cousin--the photographer's website address so if you want to look at some of their work, you can check it out at www.Pangburnphotography.com

Susie and Micah

Here are some of the pictures I took this morning of Susie and Micah. They are going to Tucson today to visit with his cousin and his professional Photographer wife. I give you a link to her website when Susie gets back. I have been on it before but can't remember what it was. She is really very talented. Anyhow, I got them to slow down for 5 mins so I could snap a few shots myself. I really need to learn about the lighting thing as it was very bright outside and so there was a lot of squinting going on.

More pictures

HI, This is an adendum to the previous post. Susie got home so I took a few pictures of her and of the flowergirl dress. I couldn't remember how to turn off the flash so the lighting certainly isn't right but you can get the idea. The tiara is for my little flowergirl granddaughter to wear. That's it for me tonight

April 11,2008

Well, I managed to add some pictures to my blog but now I need to learn how to put them where I want them with text, rather than all at the front. This is a series of pictures of my youngest dtr who I told you had been diagnosed with ovarian CA last year. The first Pic was taken about 6 months before the cancer was found. The next is a picture of her after the surgery and just before she started chemo. She went and got her hair cut shorter, the plan was to keep going shorter over the first weeks of chemo so that by the time her hair fell out it would be less of a shock. The next picture was taken the day before her hair fell out. She had gotten her hair cut the day before and came home and was so depressed but the next day she got up and fixed her hair and when she went to the store she had a guy really check her out, and another stranger complemented her on her cute hair style so she felt much better but then the next slide shows where she went over the next week!!! The final slide is one of her three wigs, this is the brown one. the 6th pic is Micah with the brown wig. following is her long blonde wig and her short blonde wig. It took a while but she finally thought it was fun and easy since she didn't have to spend all that time fixing her hair anymore. I don't have a current picture of my BEAUTIFUL radiant golden dtr of today with her sassy curly hair but will post one soon. Maybe when she comes in tonight I can catch a shot for you.

(This was how I started this blog but after i added the pictures I added a paragraph to explain the pictures) I really did finish the flowergirl dress last night. It has been so long since I sewed and because I'm so unorganized, I couldn't find the zipper foot for my sewing machine--it was late and I was committed to finishing so I hand sewed the zipper into the dress. I am going to try and figure out how to post a picture of the dress. We are still going to do a few more things to it. The bridesmaid's dresses have a gather on the hem which then shows the netting underneath so I guess we will also gather up several areas around the hem so the flouncy undernetting will show. I love all of the blogs with so many posted pictures and I bought a new camera last year and have not taken many pictures yet or even learned how to use it. I also bought a Adobe photoshop elements 6 program (I didn't feel that I could afford Photoshop CS or that I am ready for that yet.) I have not even experimented with it yet. I have some problems with my computer, and when I load new programs or try to download, I keep getting an error message and I can't get to the program from the Icon I have to go in another way. Then when I am working or looking around in it often I will get an error message and the program just closes. It is frustrating. i upgraded my internal memory and bought an external harddrive so I thought that I would be OK but I am pretty illiterate when it comes to computers. I did just order a Scott Kelby how to manual for the Elements program which should arrive next week. I am getting excited about learning new things and taking some great pictures. My biggest problem is that all of my children are grown, and most of my grandchildren moved out of state, so I don't have the subjects available that I want to take pictures of. I really do not care enough about Susie's dog to focus on him and Susie is always busy, working, going to school and seeing Micah to do any serious picture taking. I don't have a macro lens to take pictures of flowers/bugs/water drops etc. So the camera just sits. Well I am going to try and post a picture and if I am successful, I will take a picture of the dress and post it.

Time Flies

Even though I READ blogs everyday (my cousin's: Constant, Growing, Amazement and Confessions of a Pioneer Woman--who both are wonderful daily bloggers), I just seem to have lost my muse when it comes to blogging myself. This spring though I feel like the light is starting to come back into my life and I am coming up out a full year of shadow.
A year and a half ago, the company I was working for sold our division to a new company. The feelings of disenfranchisement and loss that accompanied the handling of the sale was huge. We were not told even of any negotiations until after it was a done deal. They called us to a mandatory meeting and said "as of yesterday you no longer work for this company, your benefits will end at the end of the month and you are ineligible to reapply to this company for a period of 6 months". Now most of us worked for this company because of the great benefits and opportunities for work. If you were tired of one position, look for another in a different area! It had a pension plan, most of us had worked for this company for years, and some were approaching retirement, we were very loyal employees and had planned to retire from this company. But now we were out! The new company would hire most of us (except some office and auxiliary staff) so we did have a job. But we felt betrayed and the poor local company that was set to encorporate, train and support us had also been in the dark of their out-of-state parent company's plans of expansion, therefore it was a suprise to them as well and to say the least, they were not prepared to accomplish all of what that meant on a moments notice. There was no transition plan no benefit people to talk to, no orientation,So we lived in complete ignorance of what and how we were supposed to carry on. So we just did our best to take care of the needs of our patients and continued to use our own paperwork. This limbo carried on for two months at which time they came into our facility and took away every form/paper with the SH logo, replaced it with their forms and left. We had no idea how to fill out all of this new paperwork, and all we could do was do our best but there was a lot of complaints from the home teams and when the in house auditors came 00-la-la were we a mess, finally our old manager called some lateral staff from another unit to come and show us what to do since management had not deemed it neccessary to orient us. It was a stressful time. Then our old manager decided she could not do what they asked her to do (since again she had no job training/no explanation of expectations/no orientation in fact what we heard from several people was "just do your best and when you screw up they'll let you know!) and asked me to apply for and take over her position as manager. I had not considered a management position as I really do want to do my job and then go home and live my life. But when I prayed about it, a very clear answer was that I was supposed to accept. I was shocked!! My husband kept asking me why did I want to do something for which I would work more and make less. I had no answer except that it would be like being in school and when I had a couple of years of management under my belt then I could take that experience to a company where I would make more. The job was requiring 50-60 hours a week and I still couldn't get it all done. I was "on call" 24/7 except for a few weekends when another manager would take the call. I worked 36 hours straight several times when a night nurse called off. And the really crappy part was that since I was salaried I didn't get paid for doing it!! Of course the retoric is that I was supposed to take the next day off which is bullcrap because if I couldn't get the job done even if I worked overtime, how could I do it by taking a day off! and an 8 hour day does not make up for a 12 hr nightshift.
There certainly were many aspects of the job that I enjoyed, I loved being behind the scenes providing the support that allowed my staff to do their jobs, I liked meetings and teaching, I liked having an office, and I even liked paperwork to some extent. But I did not like that I didn't know what was expected of me, I didn't like having a sword hanging over my head knowing that one day, someone would say "I need to see your ________" and I would say "my what?" and they would say "you know, your mandatory monthly/quarterly/annually/ blah blah blah!!" My only defense would be (A) don't know what a __________is and (B)nobody told me I needed to be doing _______!" It had begun to seem that every week, I would learn of some other thing that I was supposed to be doing/recording/monitoring/auditing that I didn't know about. After accepting the position but before I was officially in the position. I told several people in management that my biggest fear was that "The day to come when everyone just assumes and accepts me as the manager and I still hadn't been trained." AND IT CAME TRUE!! Now to my own culpability in this, I did have a couple of large binders in my office that held the COP's, Medicare regulations, policies and procedures, and unit manager guidelines and I carried them home many a night, I just could not find the time to study them.
At the same time as all of this, my beautiful 21 year old daughter was diagnosed with ovarian cancer. She underwent major surgery to remove a 5 pound tumor and her left ovary and fallopian tube, followed by chemotherapy. She was absolutely amazing through the entire process and only rarely complained. She was incredibly brave and upbeat and really showed us a side of her that (as the baby of the family and someone who quite honestly was most concerned with her looks) had been hidden. She supported all of us and made the whole episode less heartbreaking by her upbeat and cheerful attitude. But regardless it did contribute to the shadow that I have living under the past year.
After 8 months as the manager, I called it quits and asked to be transferred back to the floor as a staff nurse. I took a night position, because it was the opening that was available and it paid a night differential so I could make more money. The transition for me was smooth enough but the next manager came in and shook things up and then left after 6 weeks to move to CA. (though I do think she would have been a good manager and those she fired did have problems) Then the next manager was a nightmare. She lasted for 3-4 months and then the company did a big reorganization a lot of people were let go and they closed 2 units, and she was one who was gone. Our new manager is nice enough but through all of this there has been an undercurrent of anxiety, tension, unrest. Since I worked nights I was spared from a lot of it but it was still there. That coupled with having to work with some difficult staff (a very negative person and a drama queen who for what ever reason seemed to escalate issues rather than defuse) them made for an uncomfortable working environment. I began--after two back to back weekends of issues caused by these coworkers--to feel unsafe both professionally and physically. I was just keeping my mouth shut but inwardly I was upset and then like a dove landing on my shoulder I recieved a spiritual confirmation and release, I was told that it was OK to leave this toxic environment. While I was relieved, I now had to face again the question "what do you want do when you grow up?" do you want to go back to hospital nursing? perhaps labor and delivery and work on the other end of life's spectrum? or change to another hospice? I started checking out available posted positions on the internet and did not immediately find any that fit what I was looking for. I worked another week which was pretty uneventful and then came down sick for a week, the next week, I recieved a call from my old manager who now works for the hospice I was planning on applying to, and she stated that they were going to open a new facility and were looking for nurses (they had not had any open inpatient positions available when I checked online). She set a time for me to meet with her the next week and the following week I met with the HR person and accepted a position with them. It is pretty much a lateral move, they will take me at my present pay but I will lose senority and a week of PLT time annually. I will be starting orientation next week YEA ORIENTATION!! I have asked to be placed in an older unit close to my home, rather than 10-11 miles away where the new unit is going to be, so I will be joining a team that is already established. I just hope they are not too cliqueish and will accept me as a friend and fellow coworker. If I want though, I can transfer to the new unit when it opens if this doesn't seem like the right fit for me.
Of course there were other things going on in my life which may have contributed to this dark immobilizing cloud this past year but I am so glad to be coming out of it.
I need to close now, my now recovered youngest dtr. is getting married next month so there is a lot that needs done for that as well. I need to get off of the computer and finish the flowergirl's dress. I can't believe myself--first that I have put off making it for two months despite having all the materials and pattern and now that I have drug it out to be a three day thing rather than a one day event. (I really don't have that much left to do but you know those zippers are always intimidating!)