Heart of Tears and Joy

So I awoke this morning, dazed and confused, trying to orient myself to my surroundings.  Looking out the window, I was perplexed and slightly nervous; it was chilly out, yet it seemed all the snow had thawed. While wandering the house in a stupor, I came upon the calendar hanging in the living room and I let out a shock of gasp. September?! It can't be September... Questions filled my head: where did the last thirty-two weeks go? What have I been doing? Why haven't I posted on Livejournal?

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So, yes, I've been rather delinquet in posting and maintaining a presence on LJ--mostly due to the insane business of my life that has been going on. But rather than try to fill in the entirety of the last seven months in one post, which would consequently overwhelm me and force me to give up trying to post at all, I'm going to try to do it in a number of little posts over the next  week. And once that is finished, perhaps I can actually continue to post regularly. *snicker*

Guilt	What is yours?	Explain yourself
Culinary:	French Fries	How can the tuber of a plant, cut into tiny slices, fried in oil and then dipped in ranch taste so good? And be such a death stroke to my poor heart!
Literary:	Cheap Sci-Fi Novels	They're poorly written, have transparent plots and don't mean anything, but I waste my time with them. My favorite are Star Wars 'novels.'
Audiovisual:	Buffy the Vampire Slayer/Angel	No guilt because of the quality: I love these shows and Joss Whedon is a genius. Just guilt in the pure number of times I've seen most of the episodes.
Musical:	My Angry Music	Sometimes I get into the mood for music that is really angsty and rubs all the good feelings in me the wrong way, but it helps me get through stormy moods (for a while at least)
Celebrity:	Natalie Portman	I just like her. She's a good actress, she's beautiful and she has a very distinctive voice. But the only celebrity actress I've really attached to.

Now I tag:-

kwiksatik bex_rex geekus_duos ren_kittenlord and fair_orc_maiden


to complete this same Quiz, Its HERE.

You don't have to fill it out or anything, they just made me put in five people for some reason... Grr.

So, as we all get back into the swing of school, and I sit here waiting for my second class to begin, I thought I'd write something out that can be applied to everybody's life: Venipuncture Tips for the Everyday Patient:

So, as somebody who has had to perform venipuncture (drawing of blood for lab sampling usage) literally dozens of times a day in the past five weeks, I thought I'd share a few tips for anyone who must get their blood drawn, because although nobody enjoys the process, it doesn't have to be a trauma for you or your phlebotomist (although if you do any of these things, they'll probably just laugh about it when you're gone).

• Don't flinch.  Seriously.  When the phlebomist is sticking a needle into your arm, make yourself calm however you can; take deep breaths, look away, think about something else, they don't care--just don't throw your arm around, cause it'll hurt you more than it does the phlebotomist (actually, it won't hurt them at all).
• If you're an outpatient (not admitted to the hospital) don't complain to the phlebotomist about how many times you've been stuck in the past two weeks, cause odds are, that same phlebotomist has been doing inpatient draws lately and has had to stick the elderly man with COPD who wheezes when he breaths last night, or that post-op lady for the sixth day in a row at <b>six o'clock in the morning</b> while she barely has enough energy to stand up once a day.  A little needlepoke isn't going to kill ya.
• Don't tell the phlebotomist how to do their job.  I don't care if the last phlebotomist said you always need to have blood taken from your left hand with 23 guage butterfly while you're standing on your head and reciting the declaration of independence in Russian--cause odds are that last phlebotomist was an idiot.  So let me look at your arms when I ask without complaining, and when I use a vacutainer to get blood from your antecubital vein because it is the Nile River of blood in your body I'll point out that people's veins change tremendously from day to day because of stress, water intake, blood pressure and your health.  But if you tell me how to do my job, I'll just smile and shrug after I prove you're wrong.
• Sometimes things don't go right when the phlebotomist first puts the needle in.  It happens, and we don't want it to, it makes my heart drop every time it does.  But we're not trying to hurt you when we pull the needle out most of the way, feel around with our finger and try to redirect it--we're trying to save you the pain of getting stabbed all over again.  All I ask here is to let me concentrate and let me figure out what's going on and fix it--as soon as I'm done, I'll let you know what happened and apologize for any discomfort.
• Be glad that this procedure is quick, simple and provides such great results!  It's amazing the different things the doctor can learn from your blood and serum, and it has helped make diagnosing more sure and less painful than the past!

HIPAA (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act) was enacted partly to give patients privacy--no unauthorized access to their health records. It's a great idea, and I'm all for privacy, but there is definitely room for finding a way to share information amongst healthcare providers, as evidenced by Emergency Medicine Doc's Blog.

"So here a layperson, whose current job is working as a cashier in a supermarket, sees everyone with wireless phones, broadband internet access, satellite TV, has the ability to view and pay her bills online thinks it would be safe to assume that this should occur at every level in business and especially in healthcare where a life may hang in the balance."

And those CT scans aren't cheap.

( I have to rant about work somewhere, so don't click if you don't want to hear. )

BOOK MEME

1. Grab the nearest book.
2. Open the book to page 123.
3. Find the fifth sentence.
4. Post the text of the next 3 sentences, along with these instructions.
5. Don't you dare dig for that "cool" or "intellectual" book in your closet! I know you were thinking about it! Just pick up whatever is closest.

"Drovna, I.K.S Klingon warship, Vor'cha class. In 2372 the Drovna illegally mined the Bajoran system with cloaked explosives."

From the Star Trek Encyclopedia: A Reference Guide to the Future; Updated and Expanded Edition.

And there's no way to explain that away, so I won't try.

So, the wedding is no longer a surprise to anyone (I think), and I apologize if you feel left out because I didn't contact you through MSN or LJ, I just felt like it wasn't how I wanted to spread the news--it's not anything personal. Also, it still feels odd for me to get on here and expose me and my personal life to you all, I'm still a natural loner at heart--to a certain degree at least. So, if you have any questions, please feel free to ask. And I thought I'd post the Wedding Site as well. It's pretty crude, but not a bad 'Out of the Box' website--although I'll instantly admit it's much more Megan's project than mine.

Also, thanks for the advice to everyone who dropped by about the apartment, we found something very much to our liking: an actual house with a main floor and a basement, we have the entire main floor (the basement is two other apartments). It's very close to my grandmother's house, it's really quite spacious and it just feels like 'us.' So yay for that!

Hope you're all having good summers, and I'll be seeing ya around!

So afyer a very delayed departure from Bozeman I am now on my way to Cieur d' Alene for the next week. However, my trip has been severly delayed by extensive roadwork. Oh well though.

Lex Luthor Returns or Superman or whatever, was increible. Ooops, traffic is going, will finish later.

I hate to keep populating your friend's lists with posts about superheroes and the movies we craft about them, but... massive Drooling.

Also: Italy v. Australia? Incredible. (Please don't post any World Cup results here though as I'm mostly catching the games a few days late due to TiVo, thanks.

Tomorrow is the release of Superman Returns which has gotten rave reviews and I'm definitely planning on seeing. Anyone else up for a viewing?

So I've embarked on a new and interesting path in my journey of becoming a CPD Tech, that path being 'On Call.' Yes, indeedy, I have bound to my cellular phone all weekend as I have eagerly awaited the buzzing that would indicate it is my time to come in to sterilize whatever hapless surgical cases that may pile up, and it's been fairly interesting. Call is very slow, yet busy at the same time. Mostly it's having to do a bunch of stuff really quickly and then wait for everything to cook and cool.

The bad part of this whole endeavour however, is that my allergies have begun to get worse and worse and worse these past two weeks, until they have culminated into a sinus clogging, eye watering, havoc headache creating monster that leaves me miserable eighteen hours of a day. Needless to say, I hate it, and am greatly looking forward to returning to Coeur d' Alene for a week and a half this Thursday where my allergies generally leave me to enjoy life.

C'est la vie, I guess.

Have a great week all.

Plastic Surgery Meets Hollywood.

Very interesting article.

As yoinked from beloved_tree, who originally found it at lit_meme: Pick 5-10 of your favorite books. Post the first lines in your journal. If the book has a prologue or introduction, use your own judgement. Have your friends guess the titles/authors. If you then choose to extol the virtues of your favorite books/authors in your journal or comments, it is unlikely that anyone will stop you.

I had some troubles since most of my older books (Idaho and before era) are still packed away and in storage, so it isn't the greatest variety in the world. But anyways, here you go, my ( Lit Meme: )

I was tagged by warrior_bride

Since you've been tagged, you have to write a blog with 6 weird facts/things/habits about yourself, saying who tagged you. In the end you need to choose the 6 people to be tagged and list their names. No tag backs.

( My Odd Stuff )

With the wave of this wand, I tag thee: fair_orc_maiden! kampsvr! bex_rex! taranabug! eloquent_labrat! yllisbelladonna!

As yoinked from beloved_tree The quote meme!

Take 25 quotes from 25 of your favorite movies, and have your friendslist try and guess them. NO Googling, NO IMDBing, NO Wiki-ing.

( Only ten 'cause I'm lazy. )

As somewhat yoinked from beloved_tree. Tried to make them just characters but needed to include one actor.

( My top ten character/actor crushes. )

"Daily I am amazed at your inexhaustable ability to just live."

"It's either that or die."

- Alan Shore and Denny Crane, Boston Legal

Which Horrible Affliction are you?
A Rum and Monkey disease.

The description is ( disturbing )</lj-cut

Well...

It looks like the whole summer school thing isn't going to happen. This has both good and bad consequences. The good is that I have the whole summer off to enjoy myself, work, sleep in and generally not worry about school. The bad is that it's probably going to take me another semester or two to finish my undergraduate degree. I'm looking forward to it, hopefully God will help show me what I'm supposed to be doing with my life this summer, let me rest and recuperate and really go after school next semester, and most of all, just let me enjoy life for a while.

Here's hoping, at least!

Which Historical Lunatic Are You?
From the fecund loins of Rum and Monkey.

( You are Gaius Caesar Germanicus - better known as Caligula! )