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joanus
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Name: Joan
Birthday: 12/7/1983
Gender: Female
Interests: backpacking, kayaking, hiking, all that outdoorsy stuff. Reading, text twist, philosophy (thanks to my husband)
Expertise: Someday, I'm going to be an expert at something. That someday is not now.
Occupation: Registered Nurse
Industry: Healthcare
Message: message meEmail: email me
Member Since:
5/5/2004
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| I've been sick for about 1.5 weeks now, it went like this: Thursday, Dec. 1: Go back to work after being off on vaca for a few weeks, where everyone was sick. Start feeling a very slight sore throat. Ignore it, hoping it will go away. Friday, Dec 2: Am genuinely sick, spend about 16 hours sleeping, am otherwise exhausted. Saturday-Monday, Dec 3-5: work everyday, am not feeling too sick but coughing. Not too bad, though. Tuesday, Dec 6: Start coughing a lot. Am also back to very tired. Don't leave the house all day. At all. Wednesday, Dec 7 (my birthday!): Call in sick, am still tired but am coughing A LOT, almost die coughing a couple times. Don't leave the house until 8pm, when I go on a short walk just to not spend 48 hours without leaving my 1 bedroom apt. Thursday, Dec 8: Call in sick, feel better, but am dying coughing. No joke. Have not slept more than 2 hours at a time since Tuesday, on account of the coughing. Friday, Dec 9: Drive to Bellingham, hack up a lung TWICE in Sarah's apt, spend the night NOT sleeping in a hotel because I'm coughing so much. Griff decides I am going to a doctor ASAP, as he hasn't slept, either. Saturday, Dec 10: Go to Sarah's graduation, but MISS Sarah's name being called because I coughed hard enough to start gagging and had to run out of the gym. Go to urgent care in Port Orchard on the way to Portland from Bellingham, PA there prescribes me albuterol and cough syrup with codeine in it. And tells me I have bronchitis. I take 2 puffs of said inhaler, and then codeine right before I go to bed (once back in Portland), and Griff and I sleep ALL night, except for waking up at 5:30 long enough to take both those medications again. Sunday, Dec 11 (today): for the first time, do not have a single coughing fit all day. Cough significantly less. Which is good, considering I now have sores on my tongue from coughing all the time (my tongue hits my retainer kinda hard when I cough). They hurt. I'm going to take some more codeine tonight and sleep all night again. I LOVE modern medicine. That PA in Port Orchard is currently one of my favorite people. Amazing. nothing like not sleeping for 4 days to really make you appreciate sleeping. | | |
| I almost applied for this, but then attempted to open a document from my downloads, and my computer thought it'd be super helpful to open EVERYTHING I've EVER downloaded. My computer couldn't handle its own helpfulness, though, and subsequently crashed. *kaboom!* So that's probably some kind of sign. I haven't updated in literally years, but xanga has been sitting around, patiently waiting for me to come back the whole time, and here I am. Honestly, I had forgotten about it, until a co-worker mentioned he had found it. Which is, you know, weird. But then I had to wait a sufficient length of time to actually update, because I felt it would be weird to run home and update immediately. Thinking pretty hard about linking to facebook, which is all the rage these days, but I still feel like its really awkward to advertise for yourself. Griff has come up with another way to ruin my summer (remember this?). I don't remember what happened last year, but this was going to be my golden summer. I took two whole weeks off in July with NO plans other than to enjoy summer, and he's come up with a HUGE project for church. I don't think I fully realized how huge it was going to be until very recently, but it's definitely going to ruin my "do whatever we want to every day of my vacation" plans. It never ceases to amaze me how someone with no job can ruin my plans so often. To be fair, I'm usually too tired and/or busy to be any sort of fun these days, so its really a two way street. Only two more days of work until that vacation, by the way, and even if we're busy doing interviews the whole time, we're not doing any interviews at 7am, so that counts for something. other news: I am taking my CNRN exam next Wednesday. I am probably going to fail. I keep telling myself its ok, I'm out $285 either way, but all the same, I'd like to pass it. I've heard nothing but horror stories about how hard it is, though, and unlike all the other tests I've taken and aced, this one actually has a bunch of stuff on it I've never heard of before, so that should be fantastic. I can always call this a practice run, pay another $285 and retake in October. If only I wasn't such a slacker, imagine all the studying I could have done these last few months...I have learned a considerable lot about neurosciences, though, so its not all a waste of time. I'm going to feel really bad if I'm still awake and have nothing to show for it when Griff gets home, so I'll go ahead and go to bed now, i think. Also, pandora's taste in music is getting worse by the song, for some reason. | | |
| I've noticed this trend in dentistry lately where anything wrong with your teeth is not your fault anymore. When I used to go to the dentist, they'd lecture me on the importance of flossing and tell me about how my gums would rot and fall off if I didn't brush twice a day and floss and avoid all sugars (probably not quite that drastic) but I felt like what I did for my teeth was directly proportional to how my teeth fared. Now I hear "Its really hard to remember to floss every day, but try...at least once...you know, if its not too much trouble." I went to the dentist today and found out I have a cavity but was assured that its in a recess in my tooth, purely developmental, my toothbrush bristles wouldn't reach there anyway. My dentist also informed me that they don't tell people not to eat sugar anymore because its hypocritcal.
My hygienist did tell me, on the other hand, that I'm flossing too hard and wearing a groove in my gumline, and that I need to be really careful to brush very gently because I can damage the gums by brushing too hard.
I just can't win with these people.
Griff's working tonight, from 3-almost 10, so I'm all on my own for dinner. Was trying to think up some mischief to cause but it turns out I'm way too tired for such shinanigins and so am spending the night reading and eating chips instead. Such an exciting life I lead.
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| Sometimes I want an SUV. My sister has one, and its comfortable. It’s safe and big enough to fit anything you want to bring. It has heated seats for wintertime and air conditioning in the summer. It has tinted windows for privacy and satellite radio so you only ever have to listen to things you like. It even came with a GPS system so you always know where you’re going.
Sometimes I want a faith like that, too. One that’s comfortable and safe, with a GPS system so I’d never get confused. A faith that looks nice, so I could park it out where the neighbors could see and they would be impressed with my big, shiny faith, with its tinted windows so if it was messy inside no one would know.
I had a conversation with my old pastor once, a long time ago, about missions. About giving up Bon Marche to spread the gospel. I thought he was making fun of me, because who shops at Bon Marche in high school? And, when you put it that way, it does sound like a pretty stupid dilemma. But the point is not the Bon Marche. I do live in this very comfortable apartment, making comfortable money at a comfortable job. I surround myself with people I’m comfortable with, and from here I can write checks out to various humanitarian organizations, throwing money at the problems of homelessness, child hunger, and human trafficking, never seeing anyone’s face or knowing anyone’s name, never connecting in any way that might disrupt my comfortable existence. Which seems like it should be good enough, except I claim to follow this guy who seemed to think it was pretty important to actually get to know people, who spent a lot of time going to people’s houses, and hanging out at parties, who touched most of those he healed, and told his disciples to wash each other’s feet. And he seemed to have this thing with sacrifice, like praising a widow who gave everything she had, while denouncing the rich guys who only gave money to show off. Remember the rich young ruler? Sometimes I wish I had a faith that would leave me alone, that would take what I can do from my comfort zone and agree that its enough.
Last week, I read the book, Jesus Wants to Save Christians, by Rob Bell. In short, it’s a book about the contradiction of a church that spends $2 million on a new sanctuary in a city where 1 in 5 are facing homelessness. The same day I picked it up from the library, my World Vision magazine came, with a story about The Hole in Our Gospel, a new book by Rich Stearns, about what happens when Christians forget we’re the light of the world and the salt of the earth. I took both of these to LA, and when I got back, the latest Discipleship Journal was waiting for me, with a special section on the poor and vulnerable. Really? Did You really think I wasn’t paying attention? Did I mention February was Faith and Justice in action month at my church here in Olympia? Sometimes I want a faith that isn’t bent on breaking my heart.
I want to be one of those Christians who can go to big churches, sit in comfortable pews, and listen to sermons once a week, write my tithe check, maybe go to Bible study, and then go home, go to work, be a nice person and at the end of the day feel like I’ve done my part. Maybe even on occasion volunteer at a soup kitchen. But I’m not, and somewhere inside I know I don’t really want to be. The truth is, I get bored easily, and frankly, I’d be disappointed if the great life that God promised us is really just like the life I was already going to have but with a smile on my face. | | |
| The floor I work for at work has a unit council, I don't know what they do yet, but everyone (and by everyone I mean the four nurses who show regularly) is pretty convinced this council is absolutely necessary for the functioning of the unit. As such, I have been guilted into going to them. I've been meaning to for a full year now, just in case something gets decided there. Also, I feel like, thanks to instructors in nursing school, I guess, that its important to be involved in these things and take an active part in my profession. So I've started showing up.
Turns out this is a waste of my time. These meetings have a nasty tendency to turn into a hour and a half bitch session, where we talk about the nurses we don't like, the nurses who aren't doing their jobs correctly (without actually naming them, they seem to have this incredible facial expression system down to identify particular nurses), and any policies we're currently unhappy with.
Last meeting I had gotten off work at 7:45am, and come in for a meeting at 3pm, and I had to work at 7pm that evening, and was a little on the grumpy side to begin with. When we strayed from our agenda for the 10th time in half an hour, I grabbed the agenda from the secretary, and announced our next topic. I did this for the entire meeting, trying to be really nice about it, but also wanting to go back home before I had to come in.
Apparently, this means I am now the unit secretary. Which could be worse. I'm pretty sure this means that until our chair gets back (she's been out sick for months now), I am the highest ranking member and therefore have full authority to direct meetings however I want to. It also means I have to follow this incredibly complicated formula for printing up meeting minutes, that I just found out about today. So I'm spending my night off doing that.
I'm not convinced I'm as invested in this floor as I feel I should be.
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