busy busy busy

It was another very busy week at work. Our patient census is very high, and some of the patients are extremely sick and need a lot of extra care. In addition, we are in the process of changing over narcotic dispensing machines from those made by Pyxis to those made by Omni-Cell. So we are having to help get the new machines ready to go to the clinics and nursing units and learn the new technology. It was a rough week, but most of us are doing OK. One of my coworkers seems stressed out to the point of possibly having problems, but I think she will be fine, too, once things calm down a bit with the new machines.

It was a busy day today, as well. I took Steven to Mott Children's Hospital for his last check up for his head injury he got wrestling right before Christmas. He is doing just fine.

After I took him back to school, I ran into town. I had to go to the post office, as the price of stamps went up and we did not have any of the new ones. I saw Dan's truck parked across the street from the post office, so went over and found him working on a roof. I checked on him (he has not been feeling well the last few days, went to the doctor yesterday, and will have to go get another butt scoping to see if the polyps in his colon are what is causing all of his abdominal pain). He was doing OK this afternoon, and all of this will give me a good excuse to feed him more vegetables and whole grains.

I then stopped off at the bakery to see if they had any of their delicious cheese bread. They did not have cheese bread, but they did have salt rising bread and whole wheat bread, so I got a loaf of both.

After that the grocery store. I got a lot of breakfast foods so we can eat a huge breakfast on Sunday, as we so like to do. I got maple sausage links, brown eggs, lots of cheese and other stuff like mushrooms for omelets, canned biscuits, bagels and low fat cream cheese, precut hash browns, grits, and cottage cheese. We shall feast!

I also have a huge craving right now for vegetable soup, so I got the stuff to make a big crock pot full. I got a few cans of chicken broth for the base of the soup, and a can of sweet corn kernels and of white Italian kidney beans. I also threw in a couple of handfuls of dried whole wheat rotini noodles. Everything else will be fresh (I have them steaming now, and will add them to the chicken broth when they are cooked) - Yukon gold potatoes, baby carrots, celery, broccoli, green onion, fresh cloves of garlic, cauliflower, and asparagus. Yummy! So far the only seasoning I have added is black pepper. I am waiting to see how much flavor the onions and fresh garlic will add before I get too crazy with spices.

I also got stuff to make a huge bowl of green salad for tonight's dinner, and some stuff to take to the wrestling tournaments tomorrow (clementines and sports drinks).

Tomorrow Bill will be at a varsity tournament in Chelsea and Steven at a middle school tournament in Dexter. Provided we do no get too much snow tonight, of course. We could get as much as 6-8 inches, in which case one or both tournaments might be cancelled if the roads get bad. The recent death of that fire fighter who was responding to the traffic accident on I-94 in the ice storm two Saturdays ago is haunting everyone in this area. She was so young, and very recently married. Such a tragedy...

I will have another vacation day on Sunday, as we have tickets to go see the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra perform Johnny Coltrane's jazz symphony A Love Supreme that afternoon. We will probably go out to eat a nice dinner as well. Something interesting and spicy would be welcome. Perhaps Thai, Indian, or Ethiopian would be very good.

 

what a difference a day makes

Yesterday was as beautiful a winter day as I have ever seen. It was warm enough to wear a jacket rather than a coat. The sun was shining on Lake Michigan and on the tall buildings of the Chicago skyline. Today was cloudy, rainy, and chilly, and it was nearly a white-out from the heavy snowfall as I was driving home from work.

What a difference a day makes!

Got a lot done today, though. Lots of laundry, and I went through a dresser and took out all of the clothes no one wears very often to donate to charity. They are out in the Jeep awaiting an opportunity in the next day or so to drop them off.

Dan brought the dog home from the kennel, and he is exhausted. We always pay extra money so Max can have plenty of supervised play time with other dogs. He loves it, but it tires the poor dear old doggy out.

a visit to Evanston

Well, we got home from Illinois a few minutes ago. It was a pretty good couple of days.

We got on the road in the middle of the afternoon on Sunday. Dan was not feeling well, and we got off to a pretty slow start, made slower for having to go get Dan's blood pressure pills refilled since he was out and had forgotten to. We also went out to a very late breakfast.

But the drive went smoothly. It is the first time in my life I have driven through Chicago, or even by Chicago on my way further west and did not run into a parking lot on the freeways of northern Indiana. The roads were clear and fine, and the weather was perfect, and we made record time up to Evanston.

In fact, a couple of cool things happened on the way. The first was seeing a very strange sight in the sky in western Michigan, right near the Lake. A cloud of an interesting shape had turned into a prism in the sky. It must have had a lot of ice crystals and the sun was shining on it just right, or perhaps there was a reflection of some sort from Lake Michigan. The cloud was glowing with all of the colors of the rainbow. It was so beautiful.

The other interesting thing was driving right by the football stadium in Chicago right in the middle of da Bears playing in their playoff game. We were listening to the game on the radio, and just as we were passing by the stadium, da Bears did something right, and you could see all of the fans standing up and getting wild.

We checked into the hotel in Evanston, then walked a couple of blocks for pizza. It was very good pizza, and one of the ingredients we got on it was fresh garlic, which is probably my favorite pizza topping of all time. Yum!

This morning we slept in late then went out for bagels and juice for breakfast. We then walked around Northwestern University for awhile. When Bill's tours and interviews got close in time, Stevie and I split off. Dan and Bill stayed at Northwestern, and Steven and I went down to Chicago for the afternoon on the train.

We rode a CTA train down to the Loop, where we got off in the Theater District, and got lunch at a hog dog place that had been recommended to us.  I am not a hot dog eater, but I munched on fries while Steven greatly enjoyed his hot dogs.

It was such a glorious and sunny winter day we then made the mistake of walking all of the way to the Field Museum. About the time we got to Grant Park, Steven's knee was really bothering him, but by then we were so close it seemed silly to take a taxi the rest of the way...

We rested a lot on benches during the walk, but that was no hardship on such a sunny day! And Chicago Harbor and Lake Michigan are always lovely!

At the Field Museum we looked at a lot of the stuffed and mounted animals, including the man-eating lions. But the main reason we went there was to see a special exhibit with all sorts of artifacts from Pompeii.

It was a very interesting exhibit, though it also made me sad. Some of the bodies they found had run to the beaches and boat docks hoping to be rescued. They took their jewelry and coins and even their silverware with them. And, of course, the rescue did not come. It made me think of hurricane Katrina...

The artifacts included casts of the dead, and even a dog that had been killed. There were furnishings (even a safe, and a bathtub), A doctor had been killed, and they had his instruments and the cases for the instruments. There were pieces of art, and copies of wall murals. There was a lot of jewelry. I was surprised at the frequency of snakes in the rings and bracelets. I associate snakes with various goddess cults in Greece, but not so much in Rome.

After the museum closed, Dan and Bill came to get us in the Jeep, and we drove on home. It sounds as if they had a great day touring Northwestern. Bill even got a chance to talk with the dean of the college of engineering, and she asked him to email her this week so she could talk to the admissions office about him. I take that as a good sign? He was pretty upbeat about Northwestern, but wants to wait to see what happens with all of his scholarship offers, and to see if he is admitted to Ball State's Architecture School before he makes up his mind about anything.

If he does end up going to Northwestern, I foresee myself taking a lot of train rides in the future...its definitely the easiest way to get up there by myself. And I would probably be by myself for most of the trips with Steven being in high school next year and doing two sports like his brother did...

The drive home was the second drive through northern Indiana in my life where the freeways did not resemble a parking lot. The drive was quick and went well, and we followed a huge full moon all of the way home.

a sunny Saturday in a stinky gym

Today was a glorious day, the second one this week. It was unseasonably warm, and very sunny. You could go outside in a jacket rather than a heavy coat! So, of course, we were at a wrestling tournament all day.

Bill did not wrestle, he was given a day off, and a senior at the same weight who has missed most of the year with an injury was allowed to wrestle in his place, which is both fair and right. All seniors who have put four years into the program should get mat time and this was a day for the other kid to get a chance to shine. The coach did have Bill dress in uniform, and made him one of the captains for the day, which I thought sent a strong message to Bill and to the other kids about how Bill is a team player who puts the team before himself.

After the tournament we went with two of the other wrestlers and their parents to a very good Chinese restaurant in Canton which has wonderful and spicy food. We all had dinner, and had a very pleasant time indeed.

We are pretty much packed and ready to go to Evanston in the morning. I think it will be a good couple of days.

Trying to keep my resolutions

Well, I only had a few simple New Year's Resolutions this year. I figure if I can keep them simple and few, it might be easier keeping them.

One of them was to take better care of myself. So today I forced myself to go into the doctor for my female exam. I hate it, so kept putting it off again and again. I had not realized that it has been for nine years, but...at least everything looked healthy, according to the doctor. They sure pulled a lot of blood, though, as they wanted to run all sorts of blood tests since its been so long since I had a physical. They even wanted a red cell blood count because of my bad periods, to make sure that I am not anemic from all of the blood loss. I was at the doctor's office for 2.5 hours. What a pain. But it is over now. I even got referrals for the base line mammogram and to visit a dietician for weight loss. Since I got home so late, I will make those phone calls next week. I have also put off getting an eye exam for many years since my insurance does not cover any of it and glasses are so bloody expensive. But now that we are out of debt, I guess I had better take care of that, too. Another phone call to make next week.

I have definitely been doing all I can to get my son off to college. I am looking forward to Sunday and traveling to Evanston. And traveling to Kalamazoo with him for the last weekend of the month.

In my first step to be better about communicating with my sisters, I sat down and ordered all of them beautiful flowers for Valentine's Day. I will send them a card and pictures for that, too, as the time gets closer.

And I have been giving Danlo's Internet discussion board, Ahira's Hangar, as much time and attention as I can.

Best of all, focusing on this stuff is keeping my mind off of my troubles.

And now it is time to take a nap before cooking some dinner.

mythological profile test

Unicorn

 

The unicorn is a legendary animal. It is usually portrayed as a slender, white horse with a spiraling horn on its forehead, although its appearance and behavior differs, depending on the location. In the west it was usually considered wild and untamable, while in the Orient it was peaceful, meek and thought to be the bringer of good luck. There it is usually depicted as a goat-like creature, with cloven hooves and a beard. In Japan it is called Kirin, and in China Ki-lin. The word "unicorn" is based on the Hebrew word re'em ("horned animal"), in early versions of the Old Testament translated as "monokeros", meaning "one horn", which became "unicorn" in English. The creature is possibly based on the rhinoceros or the narwhal, a marine creature with one horn.

The Mythological Profile Test
http://www.okcupid.com/tests/take?testid=2433319677885706722

a long weekend begins

Made it through an extremely busy and unpleasant week at work. I am glad this work week is now one for the history books. What a stinker it was! We had pretty much every impatient bed filled all week, and we have some horribly sick patients. 

One of the two Internet discussion boards I sometimes go was horribly hacked today. I would probably be a lot more panicked, but the same thing happened at the other board where  I am a moderator last summer. That board was badly hurt, but is surviving. I am sure that this one, as it is a lot busier and has a lot more members, will end up being just fine. It's still a pain, though. I've never understood how and why some people can get their jollies by messing up other peoples' work and fun.

Steven hurt his knee at wrestling practice. It wasn't even at a high school practice (he works out with the high school these days as much as, if not more than, the middle school) - it was at a middle school practice. He went to the doctor today and they think he'll be fine in a couple of weeks as long as he does the rehab exercises they prescribed for him. So starting on Tuesday he will do those exercises under the eye of the high school athletic trainer every day.

Bill is in the middle of his final exams, and will be done with them tomorrow.

The kids have a half day of school tomorrow, and I know that will make them both very happy.

Steven will obviously not wrestle now on Saturday, but Bill will have a varsity team tournament. I will drag myself there as early in the morning as I can stand to, to watch as much of it as I can. Dan will be at the middle school scrimmage. I will probably let Steven stay at home that morning, since the high school tournament is in a neighboring town and I can get home quickly if I am needed.

Tomorrow I will have a doctor's appointment. It is time for the dreaded pap & pelvic, which I have been putting off, as I hate it so much. I know they will also schedule me for the dreaded base line mammogram, too. Also no fun.

Sunday should be good, though. I am looking forward to visiting Evanston. I had signed Bill up to tour Northwestern with three other people on Monday, but with Steven's bad knee, now I might catch the train down to Chicago with Steven. We can take cabs around once we get down there, and he won't have to do so much walking or try to stay up with a group. Steven and I can very happily spend most of a day in this one block of Michigan Avenue that has a great big book store and a gourmet chocolate shop.