Holy cow.

Ten days have passed since my last post – they’ve flown by in a whirlwind of new information and general craziness. As predicted, this semester is keeping me very, very occupied. The bright side is that I'm learning stuff I really want to know, so that makes the thousands of pages of assigned weekly reading much more bearable.

Today was a tough day at the office. It takes a lot of work to work with people who have fundamentally different views from your own. I’m still working on it. Sometimes you just have to mentally agree to disagree...

Last night was our winter office party… it was fun, and for the first time in four years we won one of the door prizes! Well, by ‘we’ I mean Luis – he won a silver 4GB second generation ipod Nano. I’m pretty jealous. He’d been talking about upgrading to one of the newer ones, and now he has one.

Our pharmacotheraputics lab on Friday was spent practicing different routes of dispensing medications – the most interesting of which were the types of injections. I got to give a subcutaneous and an intramuscular injection. We used normal saline solution, and we practiced on each other. I was a little apprehensive the night before class, but I didn’t have any problems poking Jessica (a very nice girl in my class). Turns out that it doesn’t hurt at all to give an injection… Ha, little joke there. I don’t like the idea of causing anyone pain, but I know that it’s a moment of discomfort in order to preserve their health, or to alleviate their pain, or to help them get well. The benefit certainly outweighs the small amount of hurt.

Ugh. I suppose I should get to studying. 6:30 comes pretty early...

First day of school

Today was the first day of the new semester. Here's what I've learned so far:

I'm going to be in class/clinicals about 30 hours a week. I also work just under 20 hours a week. The sheer volume of coursework we're going to cover, as well as the increased difficulty of the curriculum means that I'm really going to have to utilize my time efficiently. Time management has always been a weak area for me, so I'm looking at this as an opportunity to improve.

I'm not the only one nervous about our upcoming clinical experience. Everyone in my class feels the same way.

For grins, I decided to weigh my textbooks - 48.8 pounds, not including my binders and course packets. I also have three more books yet to buy (smaller and lighter, thankfully!) I prefer to think of my books in terms of weight rather than cost – in pounds it’s kind of funny, in dollars it’s just plain painful...

We received our clinical groups and unit assignments today. My first clinical rotation is in surgery. Nothing like jumping in headfirst, eh?

Now it's time for bed. I'll end with a lovely quote from Virginia Henderson, one of the bright, influential nurses of the 20th century:

The nurse is temporarily the consciousness of the unconscious, the love of life for the suicidal, the leg of the amputee, the eyes of the newly blind, a means of locomotion for the infant, knowledge and confidence for the young mother, a 'mouthpiece' for those too weak or withdrawn to speak.

Cold, running, and Lost.

I returned to Montana just in time to enjoy an effing freezing cold snap. This morning when I woke the actual temperature was 0°, and in the past hour it's risen to a balmy 2°. God knows what the wind chill is out there - I have no intention of leaving my toasty apartment until I have to be at work this evening... The predicted low for tonight is -8°, but this should be the worst of it. We're supposed to slowly climb back into the 30's by next week.

The most frustrating part about the cold weather is the fact that I can't go running. Running is my main form of exercise (as well as stress release), and as I don't currently have a gym membership, other options are pretty limited. I have a strong desire to burn off any Christmas poundage I may have acquired during my three weeks of vacation-style eating, and even more importantly, I really want to play more with my new toy. For Christmas Emilio gave me a Nike + ipod sport kit, and a couple of lacelids to adapt it to my current running shoes. It's cool. Really cool. I used it once outdoors before it got too cold, and I can't wait to get back out...

Most of my free time this week has been spent on my new addiction – my Mother got me hooked on LOST. I'd watched a few episodes of season one and liked it well enough, but I worked on Wednesday evenings and couldn't follow it. Then last week Mom and I started watching her season two DVDs. I got hooked hardcore. I returned home and started the series from the beginning - Luis and I are getting through a disc a day. Why the furious pace? I picked a poor time to become obsessed with a television show – this semester is going to be a toughie, and I'm still working too. I figure if I can get through most of the old episodes before classes get into full swing, I can spare an hour a week to keep up with it.

Ha. My Weather Channel desktop icon has informed me that it's dropped back down to 0°. Dang, that's cold.

Resolve.

I will become a better listener.

I will strive to be more understanding.

I will eat more veggies.

I will not allow myself to entertain unkind thoughts about others.

I will switch from SPF 15 to SPF 30.

I will spend more time considering life from others' points of view.

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Best wishes to you all for a peaceful and contented 2007.