So my kids had their first week of summer camp and things went off relatively smoothly. No beads stuck up the nose, Oona's incident last year (which I somehow neglected to blog about, (she shoved a blue bead 'for honesty' up her nose and we had to take her to the ER, where she gave various not so honest stories about how it made it's way up her nose, to get it out) resulted in a policy change where they have a 'bead ceremony' but they give out stickers instead of beads. Sort of confusing I know. Owen and Oona are having some minor difficulties at camp because Oona idolizes her brother and wants to follow him everywhere and Owen is annoyed that Oona is trying to join drama club, which is Owen's thing. Being an only child I always feel lost with the sibling rivalry stuff, I just try to tell them both that they're going to be around each other for the rest of their lives so they might as well get along. But overall the week was a good one. They went swimming twice (I worry about them drowning even more now that I've been at Children's and since they don't really know how to swim, but it sounds like they have to stay in water under their armpits), went to the library and went to Soldiers and Sailors museum. I got Owen's report card in the mail and he did great, he got straight A's except for handwriting, where he got a B. Last term he got a C in handwriting. Truth be told he probably should get a D in handwriting because his writing is barely legible and this is only after we go over his homework repeatedly. The hardest part of his homework is being able to print well enough that someone can read it, we wound up having to erase and rewrite a lot. He gets so frustrated by this and it makes me feel awful, he'd be better off typing his homework. I just don't get how his handwriting can be so god awful, Oona's three years younger and her penmanship and drawings blow Owen's away. Oh well, what are you going to do, if that's his only trouble in life he's pretty well off. I still haven't gotten Oona's report card, don't know how to interpret this. Perhaps her behavior was so bad Mrs. M is at a loss for how many N's for needs improvement to give her? I'll leave you with Oona's article for the camp newsletter. I'm kicking myself for ever promising the kids a dog once I graduate from school.

About Dogs
Dogs are furry. You can play with them. I can play catch with them. They are fun. They live in your house. Dogs eat dog food and they can eat out of the garbage. They can sleep with you. They make me happy. Some are fast, some have no fur. They can be big or small. They can be nice or mean. And they are so lovable!

in no particular order

I can miss my father so acutely on random days throughout the year but yesterday wasn't random. He always used to enjoy watching as much golf as humanly possible on Father's Day and gmail had this creepy reminder in the contacts to call Dad, and I say creepy because what the hell am I supposed to do when my father is dead? I don't like stuff like that, it just makes me hyperaware of how people can sort of take a lot of things for granted. I know I did. I wouldn't have thought twice about something like that until now. And yes, I feel more than a little guilt at the fact that my Dad ashes are hanging out in a box on the third floor, it's so hot up there with the windows closed and no a/c, I feel like I should put his cremains in a more comfortable place. I also feel guilty that I'm mad at him that he decided he wants his ashes spread out in San Francisco, rather than Moosehead lake, where his mother's ashes were spread and where he said he wanted his ashes spread years ago. But the man lived beyond his means in life so I guess wanting his ashes spread off the coast of Marin makes sense in a way. My father was far from perfect, but I know he loved me and faulted as he was I miss him. I miss playing Scrabble with him and how he could make me laugh and making him laugh, because he when he laughed he put everything into it so it was oddly flattering to get that sort of reaction from him based on something I said.

In other news, my kids had their last day of school last wednesday, which was followed with a pizza party at the park I'll take them to when I'm able to get out of school early. They had a lot of fun, faces were painted, popsicles were eaten in bulk. My mom watched them on thursday and friday, since I was at the hospital, and they went to the zoo thursday. My mom told them that she would buy each of them stuffed animals but they had to find something under ten dollars. So Oona found a cute little macaroni penguin within the price range but apparently Owen's stuffed animal needs are so high maintenance that he just couldn't find anything he liked under ten dollars so she wound up buying him a really cool, over budget stuffed squid. Then we went to Burgatory for dinner on friday, it was Owen's choice, and I'll never go there again because it's so loud I can't hear myself think. And yes saying that I'm now officially ready for my AARP subscription. I played hangman with Oona and being the smart ass mother that I am said to my mom, 'What are the chances that Oona correctly spelled her clue?' Actually she did spell 'Hannah Montana' correctly but she didn't fully understand the rules of the game. Like when I said 'a' she only put one 'a' in and she did the same thing with 'n'. I tried to explain that it's like 'Wheel of Fortune' and you have to show all instances of the letter. To be fair though she draws a very nice interpretation of hangman where the person is jumping off a chair. Owen complained that that isn't how you do hangman but I think she gets bonus points for creative interpretation of the hanging.

Finally, I've been at Children's hospital for my clinical rotations the past two weeks and I absolutely love it there. I'm so confused. How can I love pediatrics this much when I'm not a fun parent, frequently feel inadequate and exhausted when it comes to being a mother? I don't get it. But I'm not going to analyze this too much, it's such a wonderful environment, it's 'my mother' in terms of a specialty in healthcare that fits.
Last day of school
Oona looks much better when her bangs aren't hanging in her eyes
Owen keeping the park safe

out of the mouths of babes

I stand corrected. Owen sort of elaborated on his abilities, or perhaps had a different interpretation of what his math teacher said. It turns out it was within his grade level, he's still doing extremely well, but yesterday I was thinking he was some math prodigy and I wondered how he beat out fourth and firth graders if he hasn't even been exposed to the math they do. Well no need to wonder about that anymore. I mean for the most part my children are very accurate in the stories they tell me but yesterday Owen also said his one friend was really scraped up badly because he fell off his bike and then a cub scout rode over his friend on his cub scout bike, yeah Owen insisted it was a cub scout riding over him on the 'cub scout bike'. I'm thinking the whole cub scout part might need some reexamination. And then there was the time Oona told me her dad's fiance was pregnant, and yes, I'm probably a gullible idiot, but I did believe her until I asked Toby. I can only imagine what they say about me.

So Owen just told me that his math teacher took him aside today to let him know that he tied for third highest score on his PSSA tests that he took a while back (I wrote about him taking a warmup run before the test, the principal encourages all the students to do this, where he wiped out and wound up scraping his nose up). So graceful he's not but smart yes. I mean, apparently he outscored most of the fourth and fifth graders, the teacher is saying he tied for third in the school, although I'm not sure if it was for the test overall or just in math. His math teacher is super nice and has mentioned to me before that Owen does really well in math. I was so happy for him, I had him call my mom and his dad to share the news. But then I started thinking, what can I do so he's challenged in school because I sort of get the feeling, based on what he says, that he's not. I'm wondering if I'd be able to get him into a private school on an academic scholarship (because God knows he will not be going to one on whatever I'll make once I get a job).

In other news, even though it might not look like it from the photo with the painfully prominent clavicle I promise you that Owen eats plenty of food. He just doesn't seem to put on weight, or he's growing too quickly. I imagine he'd look amazing in skinny jeans.

hotness

Maybe it's the weather, being on match or going to celebitchy every friday to check out their hot dong friday but I keep thinking of what men I find physically attractive (ooh and especially at the gym when my favorite is getting his sweat on). Sure, there are men that I find physically attractive that I'm sure I would have felt the same way about twenty five years ago and then there are those that I find attractive that I probably wouldn't have looked at twice ten years ago. But this weekend I'm thinking of hot Scots (James Mcavoy who is lovingly covered in the hot dong friday link) and the very very young (20!) Aaron Johnson, who's engaged to someone older than me (Sam Taylor-Wood). At first, this seems a bit creepy, but then I'm like fuck it more power to her. I mean, God knows I'd be happy as a clam to have that face and body lying in my bed. And there are so many men that date people where the age difference is even more than twenty-three years between them. I mean my personal rule tends to be I want someone who can at least recall bicentennial because I remember leapfrogging over the fire hydrants in my town that were painted to resemble midget pilgrims. But I see that for the very arbitrary line drawn in the sand that it is. And, really, if James McAvoy (32) or Aaron Johnson (20) decided they simply must be with me I'm sure I'd be jumping right over that line in the sand in a heartbeat.


So James Mcavoy (above) is better known than Aaron Johnson. He was in Last King of Scotland, Wanted (which I rented just to watch his loveliness) and Atonement (which I own because I loved the book and the movie isn't as great as the book but the book didn't have James Mcavoy in it so it's sort of a tie). And, yes, I'll admit to renting Penelope under the guise of it being a family film I could watch with my kids when really it was all for me to lust after James in all his hotness.

Aaron Johnson was in Kick-Ass, which was actually a pretty good movie, and he's such an adorable goofball in it. I also watched Nowhere Boy over my break in April, which is where he met Sam Taylor-Wood since she directed the film. It's about John Lennon's years as a teen and the very very early start of his music career. She got amazing actors for her film, Kristin Scott-Thomas, who is always so incredible and James Mcacvoy's wife, plus that cute little Boy that played Liam Neeson's stepson in Love, Actually plays Paul McCartney in this (and he's actually older than Aaron Johnson in real life, wow this boy is crazy young). Aaron Johnson does a really good job in this film, it's a small film but I thought it was very well done (some of the shots in the film are stunning). And, so I guess the perpetual nineteen year old in me finds Aaron Johnson incredibly hot and just wants to have a makeout session with those full lips of his and run my fingers through his goregous curls (just look at how flipping lovely they are in that last shot of him with his fiance, how does she not have her hands in his hair?!). Okay, I'll stop panting now.

dilemma

I don't know how to even go about explaining what happened today. I picked my kids up early and took them to the place we usually go to so they can play for an hour or so before dinner. One of the parents I know, it's not like we're tight (I'm not really tight with anyone) but we talk when we're up there, wound up backing into my car. I saw the whole thing from a distance of about 50 yards. The parent got out of there car, looked at my car and then got back in their car and drove off. Now it's not like my car sustained major damage, hardly, the paint got scraped where my bumper was tapped. It wouldn't be a big deal if this parent had bothered to walk over and say something to me. But they didn't. I don't know why I didn't get up, maybe I assumed they would come over to me? I honestly can't say. But it makes me feel so crappy. And I don't even know what to say to this person next time I see them. Thanks for the hit and run on my car? I avoid conflict like the plague, so I'm obviously not going to say that, but what would be a way to politely get the point across that it totally wasn't cool to back into my car and then drive off hoping that I didn't see what I did?

study break

Damn, where has May gone and how did it get to be the twenty-second all of a sudden? So I'm doing my usual panic/procrastination dance. Have a test tomorrow morning and I really need to study but then I decide I need to recycle my glass and plastic even more, and it's off to construction junction. Or I simply must stop at Anthropologie NOW and buy a scented candle (oakmoss, it's yummy) to get rid of the spunky smell in my house (a fetid attar of stinkbug, cat, and rotting bananas). And can someone please explain to me just who is buying the handsoap at Anthropologie that's selling for twenty-fucking-two dollars?! So I ponder that insanity for a while and the unfairness that all I can afford is a scented candle, even their sale stuff is pricey. But right now I have a home and health insurance, I'm more fortunate than many in this country, in that I can afford an overpriced candle. Then when I get home and sit down with all my powerpoints, well, of course, that's when I notice how filthy the house is and start cleaning like a madwoman trying to atone for the vacuum neglect this house endures during the week. And just to go off on a side note I really need a new vacuum, like the perfect vacuum (I'm on a quest for the perfect vacuum, pillow, pair of jeans to make my thighs look slender, oh and man). Speaking of which, man have I had quite a few responses from match. It gives me faith that there are other intelligent, kind, educated people in Pittsburgh and they get bonus points for good spelling (you can't imagine how many people on match have trouble even constructing a sentence). Who knows how it will pan out, fingers crossed I can get a couple free meals at Umi if nothing else. I know what I want but if it doesn't happen on match, well at least I met some nice people. And I have to give my Mom (who is also on match) a special thank you because I can't just outright reject people I'm not interested in by ignoring their emails and I figured she would have a kind diplomatic way of saying 'I'm not interested' and she did. Plus we had a giggle about some of the stuff we've seen on match, she has a 36 year old who keeps writing to her that she's had to block. I was like 'imagine if we wind up having the same guy hitting on both of us?' I go out to dinner with my mom and the kids every week and we have some good laughs, in between my having to take Oona to the bathroom. The girl has a thing for public restrooms, it really pushes the limits of the latent germphobe in me.

Okay, now to find something to eat, I absolutely have to fold the laundry and then back to studying. Really and truly this time. Wish me luck.

biting the bullet

Much like someone who holds their nose when taking a vile medicine I'm deciding to dip my foot back into online dating with match. My mom was the real motivator. She keeps emailing me profiles of men with graduate degrees and nice smiles that she notices on match. These men get bonus points, meaning my mom comments even more about them, if they are superb spellers (they've got spellcheck on match now so it shouldn't be that difficult). My mom means well and she knows I'd like to share my life with someone so she keeps trying to nudge me back into online dating, even offering to pay for my subscription, if money is what's holding me back. It's not the money that's kept me out of the dating pool. The whole internet dating scene is pretty much anathema to me but I'm looking at it as a necessary evil towards meeting someone, since I'm not getting any younger and I'm pretty much sick to death of spending all my free time alone. In some ways it's easier than meeting someone in person because I have no clue when someone is interested in me, I need the romantic equivalent of an anvil dropped on my head to get the hint. So in virtual dating I can get winks or emails and that's a hint even I'm not obtuse enough to be puzzled over. It's also much easier for me to flirt through writing than in person. But not on the phone, and unfortunately, some guys like to preemptively screen potential face to face dates with a phone call and if that happens I'll quickly fall out of the potentially date worthy pool. Phone calls when I don't really know someone make me feel as awkward and uninspired by just what to say as I was when I was middle school and the silences on the phone with boys I was 'going out' with would make me blush and stammer to find something (anything!) to fill that gap of nothingness between our ears. But another really tough thing with online dating is the need to sell myself in writing and, you know, if your skill is to pick yourself apart that isn't the easiest thing to do. So what do I write? How do I make myself date worthy? Well I can always hold off on that until I get a decent profile picture to put up, and with the way my hair is looking lately it might be months until I can put a decent profile up.

think up

My forties have not been a decade that's welcomed me with open arms. I've gone through a separation, lost my father and grandmother, am reinventing myself as a nurse, which is no easy task in your twenties, let alone at twice that age. The past couple of years have been a bit of a suckfest for the most part. Financial struggles? check. Uncertain future? check. Middle aged and without health in 2012 if I don't find a job in the two months after I graduate? check. It is enough to keep me up at night and has sucked the fat right out of my face (but not my thighs, it's so not right). But there are a couple of things that continue to go right for me. In spite of me really. Owen and Oona. As bad as things get in every fucking arena of my life, my children are the bright spots in my life. The other day Owen heard me talking to his Dad on the phone about Oona's behavior at school. She is very bright and, I suspect, very bored, and winds up talking constantly in class. The teacher can't control her and I think it's gotten to a point where the teacher has sort of tossed up her hands and Oona controls the class. We get daily behavior chart updates and there are days where the teacher makes sad faces in the row 'I will listen quietly when the teacher is talking' that drawn so violently I'm surprised it doesn't go through the paper. What can I do? I've met with the teacher. I've suggested using Oona as a helper, which I think Oona would love, she plays teacher all the time, and with 25 other students in the class it might be in Mrs. M's best interests. I've said to send her to the principal's office when she acts out (if she isn't going to positively reinforce her than send her to a place she's terrified to be sent to) but the teacher does none of this. Just puts her on sad face and I get the daily update clearly showing how taxed the teacher is by Oona's loquacious nature. So after I got off the phone Owen looks at me and it's like I can see the lightbulb over his head. He says, 'I've got an idea for how to help Oona. Why don't we send her to the talk doc.' The talk doc being a absolutely wonderful children's therapist who helped out Owen when he was having a tough time this fall with all the changes that have occurred in his life over the past year or so. It just made me want to cry it seemed so sweet of him. Just like the fact that ever since I've been able to ask Owen what his favorite color is it's always been the same answer, 'all of them' because he doesn't want any of the colors to feel left out. I kvell over that sweet little heart of his. Or Oona coming over to hug me and pat my head, she can be the most maternal five year old, when I'm lying on the couch and can barely talk my head is hurting so badly. I love that my children are such kind loving souls. I just would like to find an adult version that I could wake up next to. It's not something I need but for fuck's sake it certainly makes life much more enjoyable.

hello, my name is

Loser? Actually it's Kim, not Amelia, and I get that that might be a bit confusing with the blog name but that isn't really the issue. The issue is that I've had this lovely two and a half week break and just the word break, it usually implies all the fun things you'll try to fit into that precious amount of time, activities, seeing people, you know, something to make the transience of it jam packed with fun. And my break has just sort of stung for the most part. I had a couple days that I got to spend with two friends and they were really lovely days. But one friend I had to import from Philly and I wind up sucking the marrow out of my time with them like a starving person because I have so few friends and therein lies the problem. Now I'm not a person that needs to have five hundred close friends, or even fifty, I'd be elated with five people that I could consider true friends, but I'd be lucky if I had half that. My phone hardly ever rings and when it does it's either my Mom or my ex, who's usually calling to speak to the kids. So there's truly only one person who calls me on a regular basis and I love my Mom but I'd sort of like to have someone else calling to see how I'm doing, or want to do something with me. And even my Mom is counting down the days until I graduate so she can leave Pittsburgh because she doesn't like it here and then I won't even have her to go to the diner with on Sundays, which is the extent of my social life. And yes, I'm well aware of how cringe worthy that is. I know that I can be quiet and shy so I'm not one that people naturally gravitate to. In fact I seem to be the type of person that gets reintroduced to people because they just can't remember meeting me. But I have actively tried with some people, to get together for coffee, or a drink (I've extended invitations to my house since I'm a bit of a lightweight with alcohol) or dinner. And 99% of time I get blown off. Which really makes me feel crappy, like I must be incredibly boring or just not worth the time. At the start of this break I asked one Mom for her phone number because Oona loves playing with her daughter, she'll scream her name the way Marlon Brando screamed 'Stella' in Streetcar Named Desire when this girl isn't at the farmhouse to play. The mother wouldn't give me her number, which struck me as odd, but she put my name and number in her cell phone and said she'd get in touch over break. And I never heard from her. I just don't get it. Not only am I not friend-worthy but I'm not even playdate worthy for your child who, ostensibly, could have just been dropped off and it would have given the mom a free afternoon? I mean I don't think I look like a pedophile or otherwise sketchy and I just thought it would be fun for Oona. So I spent my break going to the gym a lot, which isn't out of the ordinary, since that's one way to pass the time. I watched season five of Lost and am almost done with my book, which is sort of petering out of its initial promise but I can't not finish a book. I start school again on Monday and my high from having done well the previous term is long gone, having a break without anyone to really talk to I quickly start feeling that I'm not really nurse material but just what material I am I don't know.

those pesky details

Last week I decided to treat myself to having the interior of my car professionally cleaned and detailed, because the seats, which I've talked about in previous posts, are tan cloth and, impractically enough, get stained with water. The carpet is also tan and was pretty wretched looking and the car had an odor of dirty, sweaty child that always made me want to apologize when I drove other students to the various hospitals that we'd go to on clinical days. So the fellow that did the work on my car was super friendly. He even brought the car to my house when he was done with it, since it was pouring and I didn't want to walk with the kids in the bad weather to pick it up. I tipped him and thanked him and, at first look, everything looked really good, although I immediately saw that the major stains on the passenger seat weren't going to come out. The stains on Owen and Oona's seats, that I yell at them about for getting mud all over, those stains came out fine. But the passenger seat, the stains that I made by using that seat as a makeshift dining tray, were unfortunately permanent, and, also unfortunate, the stain really looks like someone urinates on that seat on regular basis. So I was doing this internal fight of, well it does look better versus maybe there was a better way to have spent $110? Although, to be fair to the detailer, the carpeting really looks amazing, it's just the passenger seat that still looked bad. And the driver's seat, where the right side is stained from my wiping my (coffee or cookie covered hand on the seat, in lieu of napkins, because I feel compelled to expose how filthy I am to you and how someone, my children perhaps? should yell at me). Honestly the amount I eat in the car is saddening and, frankly, disgusting. I've had to ask another student (female, I assure you) in the wee morning hours, heading to the hospital before light has touched the sky, if I have chocolate stains on the ass of my blindingly white scrubs (and how practical is white as a scrub color?) because I eat so many cookies in the car. Fortunately the answer has been no but I seem to have a problem walking in my shoes that causes me to kick back dirt on rainy/snowy days severely enough that I wind up with spots up to my ass, it's like I need mud flaps (chaps?) on my uniform when I'm outside.

But back to my clean, but not clean enough, car. It looked much better, although the seats were still damp from the cleaning. The detailer told me to just leave the car on and blast the heat but I felt really bad doing that on Earth day so I just turned the car off and cracked the windows a bit. I had brought in the car mats to dry in the hallway but after a half hour I realized I couldn't deal with the smell of them in the house. And that's when it dawned on me. The inside of my car reeked from whatever industrial crap he had used to clean the carpet and upholstery, an awful, cloying perfume smell that was ten times worse than the child spunk of before. So for the past week I've been driving around in my Mom's Civic while leaving my car with the windows at various stages of open depending on the weather (and the weather has not been making this easy, what with all the frequent showers) and time of day. I also put a box of baking soda and an odor absorber in the car. And the car still reeks, in a super strong, permeate your clothes, headache & nausea inducing way. Granted, I am really smell sensitive to begin with. Nothing like a bout of hyperemesis gravidarum in pregnancy to give you the nose of a bloodhound. I can't deal with my laundry detergent being scented and the only dish soap I can use is Ivory (Ecover's lemon verbena dishsoap is heavenly smelling, my favorite, but too pricy to justify using and Method's lemon verbena cleanser is horrible smelling, like it's hard to believe they're both aiming for the same scent). When Oona was a month old Toby decided to paint Drylock in part of the basement and the smell was so strong I stayed in a hotel for the night with the kids and then insisted we go to his parents for a long weekend because I was convinced the VOC's were going to permanently damage my children and their vulnerable, developing brains (this became an ongoing joke with Toby's friends that he played video games with online, where they saw the opportunity in it, a cunning way to carve out time for themselves, away from family, by offering to Drylock a basement). Yeah, so I sound more and more like Julianne Moore in Safe and I'm sure you can sort of sympathize with my ex at this point.

teeth

I just went to the dentist and it made me sad. Don't get me wrong, needing a crown, a filing replaced and a new filing made definitely caused me to feel like my mouth might be comparable to Martin Amis's. And, yes, that was a bit disheartening. But the really sad thing is that my dentist retired (due to ongoing back problems) and has been replaced with a new uper-competent woman. There's nothing not to like about the new dentist. She was friendly, liked the title of the book I was reading (White Teeth, I know it seems like a joke that I would bring that to the dentist but I'm smack dab in the middle of it) and was lightning quick to work with me on any payment plan I might need to cover the expenses hemorrhaging from my mouth. No, the problem was that she's redecorated the place. Now my former dentist was in no way a bang up interior designer. His proclivity was to maximize the space of the place by packing as much crap as was possible to fit in it. The waiting area had at least 3 years worth of magazines, and you never have to even wait all that long there. The hallway wall was festooned with various diplomas and awards he had received in his career. The far room, where you got in depth work on your teeth, had professional portraits of him with his dogs. There was an honorary portrait of a cancer stricken dog, now deceased. And, my personal favorite, one of him on a motorcycle with one of his dogs in the sidecar and for some bizarre branding reason, 'Pupperoni Pizza' in a corner, what pizza snacks for canines has to do with motorcycles and sidecars I'm sure I don't know, maybe because I have two cats this photo passion with pets escapes me. But I loved the way his dental practice looked. The fact that it was such a cluttered mess and sort of reminded me of the benign chaos in some establishments I've worked at, people I know, Indian restaurants I love to eat at. There's something wonderful about the so not caring what the interior decoration rules are. And he had a massive wheel that you could spin if you recommended a new patient to the practice and you could win cool stuff, like a gift certificate to Barnes and Noble for $10. The new dentist has made things completely tasteful. The new waiting area has a cork floor with blue leather chairs and actually interesting small paintings of Pittsburgh. The hallway is clear of any clutter and was painted a pale neutral-ish yellow. The dental rooms no longer have tons of crap posted to the walls. I totally get why she did this. If I were her it was the first thing I would have done. But it makes me sad. All the front staff and hygienists wear the same ensemble of black pants and dark grey lab coats, nipped in at the waist. Even the dentist wears the same uniform. I just miss the clashing scrub tops, items I will never ever wear as a nurse but I secretly celebrate that lovely tackiness. Most of the staff stayed but one hygienist left, I think it was the one that dubbed herself 'the small fry' and had her room pretty much wallpapered in newspaper and magazine cutouts referring to small fry related stuff, like 'small is the next big'. I'll keep going to this new dentist, unlike my ex who was really rubbed the wrong way by her, but I so miss my old dentist, the eccentric Dr. Melnick. I can always keep my fingers crossed that he has some great recovery with his back issues and misses practicing dentistry so much he comes out of retirement. Here's hoping.

easter break

This week the kids have had off and the week has pretty much sucked weather wise. One beautiful sunny day yesterday, although a bit chilly, drizzly every other day. So we have gone bike riding twice, gone to see Hop (a big hit with the kids, I liked hearing Hugh Laurie as the paternal bunny, imagining lurid fantasies of Hugh talking dirty to me as both a demeaning House and a bunny that will give me all the candy I want, I'm concerned that I find Hugh the sexiest when he plays an asshole doctor), Oona's made a mess load of Easter cards and drawings, and Owen has begged to go on the computer and watch TV daily, I've had to try and keep both to a minimum, which is no easy task with the crappy weather. During the times Owen isn't pestering me about the TV/computer he has been rereading these Translucent books which he loves (he's read each half a dozen times) and I find it sort of adorable because the books are manga romance. He's also been teasing his sister and refusing to play with her, typical sibling stuff but it drives me crazy because I was an only child and it just seems mean so instead of ignoring it I point out how nasty he's being to Oona. I don't know what to ignore and when to intervene, I don't have history with the sibling rivalry stuff. Elise came out to visit on the mega bus (which I keep calling in my head the magic bus but correct myself before saying it). Oona loooved Elise and was trying to craft a way to enjoy the girls weekend with us. Elise and I both had a religious experience going to Umi, which is the best sushi restaurant I've ever eaten at. It's the only place I want to go for sushi, the toppings they use, looking at their website is like food porn for me just fantasizing about the red snapper, salmon, sawara and tuna. They have really good riesling too. I'd just like to have a lost summer of sushi and riesling, mmmmm.

Elise with a recently converted acolyte, my daughter, just wait until she's old enough to read Elise's book, there'll be no bounds to her admiration.
Owen with his invention, the submafish
One of the bike days, Oona fell and scraped both knees shortly after this picture was taken putting an end to the biking for that day. At least she didn't knock out any teeth. I always see my kids falling off their bikes and knocking their teeth out. It's causes a physical reaction in me, like nails on a chalkboard, when I think of this, my mind is a horrible instrument of self torture.

vacation

I'm done with my critical care term! I not only passed, I got high honors and I got the highest grade on the final! This is one of the advantages of having no social life to speak of, all I did was study, go to the gym, and rent movies. By the way can someone tell me what the end of Inception means? I have a feeling it's sort of like the end of Momento where I'm left wondering about the reliability of the film's narrator. I actually got a really nice final clinical evaluation too, where my instructor was proud of me considering how far I'd come this term what with dealing with my anxiety (she did tell me the first time she was my clinical instructor, way back in week five, that I should take a valium before coming to clinicals). I finally got to a place where I not only didn't cry but actually started feeling comfortable in the ICU setting. I loved the ICU in the not so great neighborhood, commute aside I'd love to work there. The environment with the nurses was really wonderful. I had two nurses thank me profusely for my help, the one I worked with the last week said it would be great if I wanted to work there. Oh and I got to change my patient's surgical dressing last week, she had gone to surgery on Tuesday for removal of a PEG tube due to infection (necrotizing fasciitis). I removed the original dressing, there's a pretty distinct odor that comes with an infected wound, but I felt like Jodi Foster in Silence of the Lambs when her fascination overcomes her initial squeamishness at seeing a dead body fresh from the water. The smell didn't bother me because I was fixated on treating the wound properly. I pulled out the original packing, which was purulent. I saw another piece in the patient and my instructor said, no that's her insides (because, yes, you could see her insides) but it turned out to be more packing, it resembled a shoelace, so I took a hemostat and pulled that out as well. And then I cleansed her wound and repacked it with gauze and an abd pad, using sterile technique. And I absolutely loved doing it, like I could totally see myself enjoying being a wound care nurse. When a wound care nurse came to speak to our class, way back in Basic II almost a year ago, I could never imagine doing that as a job because wound care nurses work quite a bit with ostomy patients which, when I first learned about ostomies, I didn't know how I could handle that, I had a hard enough time bathing patients and not feeling invasive. But after you have cared for a patient that has a urostomy or colostomy, well, it doesn't freak me out at all. And this tough as nails female surgeon once told me I should consider becoming a wound care nurse, that it pays well and you get to establish long term relationships with your patients. I have no idea why she told me this last summer, when I showed interest in an abdominal X-ray of my patient's that she was looking over.

One thing I'm puzzling over is that all my instructors write about how kind and caring I am in my clinical evaluations and I'm always wondering, do they really mean that or is that just the nice thing to say about someone who doesn't seem to have much else going for them in the clinical environment, aside from a propensity for tears? It makes me think of when I wanted to work for a magazine, back when I was twenty-five. I met with Marin Hopper at Elle (somehow my Dad knew her) and she was like 'You seem like a very nice girl, why do you want to work at a magazine? You are too nice for this business.' Sometimes I get that same feeling reading my clinical evaluations and then I'm like 'What the fuck am I suited for?' and, alternately, 'I'm not that nice. Just ask my kids or anyone who pisses me off while driving.' I still want to do psychiatric nursing first and foremost. But for PNR, my practical internship where I shadow a nurse for 120 hours before graduation, I'm not allowed to do psychiatric nursing (or, for that matter, OR or ER nursing ) so I'm thinking of the neuro ICU or possibly the NICU, I'll have to see what that's like this coming term. I'd almost like to work in the ICU just to prove to myself that I am capable of that type of nursing. And it's the best experience if I ever decided I wanted to become a nurse anesthetist (and if I became a nurse anesthetist I might finally be able to stop worrying about money). In terms of critical thinking, ICU nursing is the best specialty out there. Okay, but I'm officially done with thinking nursing school until May 1st. It should be a blissful couple of weeks. Hopefully I can sleep away the bags under my eyes that have been a fixture since October.