Stand Pat at Work

So the whole job thing is done and over with.  I'm staying at my current facility.  I'd love to say that I weighed all the options and decided that staying was better.

I'd love to say that I considered everything, decided to go for it and didn't get the job.

I'd love to say that in anyway this was my decision.  Sadly conditions aligned and made the choice for me.

I was so on the fence about changing to the local correctional facility that I honestly couldn't make up my mind.  It was six one way and half a dozen the other way.  Advantages and disadvantages were plentiful on both sides but kept canceling each other out.  Just when I thought I had gotten to the end of my decision making process and picked up a quarter to flip, I thought of one last thing.  Change for changes sake.

I've changed a lot over the past few years.  Photographer to Nurse.  Productive member of society from bum.  Correctional nurse from hopeful hospital nurse.  Change for the past few years has been my bread and butter.  The problem?  I don't like change.  Oh sure, I like improving things... I like taking something that doesn't work and changing it to working order or taking something that works OK and changing it to working great... but if something is already going well then I don't like change.

Who exactly are we fighting?

My grandfather's generation had December 7, 1941.  My parents generation had November 22, 1963.

We have September 11, 2001.

I recall that day and how it seemed that everything changed.  I was up and watching the Today show, waiting for my brother and my cousin to pick me up.  We were going to go fishing.

I couldn't change the channel.  When they broke in at first and reported a plane hitting the World Trade Center I thought that it was a 'New York' story.  Sure, a plane hit the tower but how bad could it be?  The news never stopped though.  When they showed video of it and it became apparent just how bad it was.

Just about the time that I got my head around how big of a plane it must have been.... how many people died and how many were now in danger... the other plane hit.  This time they had video and it became immediately obvious;  This was intentional.  This was an attack.

Bastards.  BASTARDS!!

Beggin' Cover and the Other Job

I love discovering new music.  I've mentioned that I get a lot of my music from television shows and about 8 years ago I got a song from CSI:NY.  I really don't remember the scene, but it was from a band called Madcon called Beggin'.

Like most music, I'm not sure what initially drew me into it.  I eventually found it on iTunes and added it to my collection.  It stands the test of time as I'll often find myself jamming to it while cruising down the highway to work.

The other day while driving I was listening to 'Fresh Air' on NPR.  Terry Gross was interviewing Bob Gaudio of the Four Seasons.  Naturally the music heading into and out of the breaks was from the Four Seasons.

One song used was "Beggin'".  I immediately recognized the beat and harmony and for just a moment I thought that I was hearing a Cover of the song that I've had in my playlist for years!

Obviously Madcon made a cover of The Four Seasons' song.  I love a good cover of a good song.  In most instances it's like having a truly alternative version, but here the cover has lead me to a really good original version.  If I hadn't gotten Madcon's version I doubt that the original Four Seasons' recording would have caught my interest.  Thankfully I now have both versions:

Doorways

I may have a door opening for me far sooner than I was initially prepared to walk through.

I got a call from a colleague at work last night.  Actually he emailed me on my work account to call him at work about a personal matter.  What exactly does it say that a colleague knows that I check my work email even on my days off?

Anywho... we talked on the phone.  A relative of his talked with a nursing supervisor.  This nursing supervisor works in a prison located in the town that I live.  I think I've mentioned before that I drive quite a ways to and from work, but there are actually several state prisons in my home town.

So this nursing supervisor is looking to fill a vacancy.  This colleague at work isn't interested as its for an 8 hour shift where he is only interested in 12 hour shifts.  He figures the gains he would get by a little less traveling (he lives further away from our current prison than I do!) wouldn't make up for the extra days traveling nor for the fewer days off.  But he knows that I'm certainly interested in 8 hour shifts.  So he passed the supervisor's name on to me.

Now if this were simply a matter of transferring to a nearby prison, I wouldn't be interested.  But this job offers a very interesting opportunity.  Instead of working every other weekend (and more or less having one weekday off a week), this job is Monday through Friday and every 6th weekend.

Weekends off!?

Mentoring

So something wonderful has happened at work.  We hired a couple new nurses.  For the purposes of this writing lets call them H and B.  They're both guys, they're both in their second career, and while I haven't asked their age I believe both are in their 40s.

Sound familiar?

First and foremost, it's wonderful having an almost fully staffed nursing service.  For too long now we've been short handed with people either out on long term sick leave, or recent transfers and retirees.  We're still missing one 'first' shift nurse as well as a third shift nurse... but neither of those positions really affect me (well, the third shift one does, but I'll talk about that and the end of this post).

Between me hiring in and these two new RNs, the prison has hired four other RNs.  All four of them came in with more experience than me.  One has worked in corrections for ten years or so (five at this very facility), one has worked in corrections for four years and been an RN for almost twenty.  One was still fairly new, but she had a years experience at this facility before leaving to have a baby.  The other one had no corrections experience, and in fact had no experience with nursing in America, but had worked as an RN for twenty or so years in eastern Europe.  But these two RNs... well their story matches up with mine a year ago.

It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year!

FOOTBALL!!!!

Yes yes, its that time of year again.  Take your Birthday, Christmas, Memorial Day, Labor Day, and Vacation.  Wrap them all up together and you'll get an idea of just how excited I am today.  It's only been building up since January!

Technically the college football season started this past Thursday when Texas A&M upset South Carolina, but Saturday's during the season are more sacred.  More special.

I awoke this morning at 6am.  Not too early for me, but it was a day off and I had only gotten about 5 hours of sleep.  My first thought was something along the lines of "fuck this, i'm going back to sleep", followed almost immediately by "IT'S FOOTBALL DAY!!!"

So I jumped out of bed and began the day.  By getting up this early I could ensure that I could peruse the web, get some coffee in me, go over my picks for this week's games, clean up a bit, shit/shower/shave, and be ready at 9 am for College Game Day.  The rest of the day will be spent in front of the boob toob watching college student atheletes playing the glorioust of glorious games;

FOOTBALL!!!!

I'm either a nurse or I'm not

So Friday after work I had another scare.  While getting under way I got a text from my brother... Mom is in the hospital ER.

The news really took me by surprise as I had just seen her 9 hours previous and so far as I'd known there wasn't anything going on.

Well... nothing NEW going on.  Her hernia is getting worse and will probably need to be addressed sooner rather than later, but that wouldn't send her to the ER in a matter of hours.  There is always her pace maker to consider... it DID fire off earlier this year.  But her new anti-arrhythmia medicine should help avoid that.  There shouldn't be much that could quickly happen in 9 hours that involves her ongoing issues.  So my first thought was that she fell and broke something.   Not a good situation at her age or general health, but not as bad as a lot of things could be.

So I called and found out that Mom believe she has a bowel obstruction.  She'd actually suspected it before I left for work but didn't want to 'worry' me and hoped that it would just go away.  I should add that she's had previous experience with bowel obstructions, so when she suspects it I need to sit up and take her seriously.

One step can be one step to far

I knew this day would come.  Her echo is back.

Caitlyn

It had to come eventually.  When I first posted my 'goodbye' post on Caitlyn's Masks, I vowed that I'd "Stay Away" from anything Caitlyn for at least one month.  No posting, no attempts at capping, no commenting.... nothing.

At least nothing on an 'active' scale.  I would still visit blogs, read caps, and most importantly read posts from other cap artists.  But I wouldn't lest myself interact.  It would have been just too easy to slip back into that mask and try and speak with her voice.

So I went quiet.  Like the submarine from Red October.  I'd become what I was before Caitlyn... a lurker. But eventually that would have to end, and for two very good reasons.  1) I want to ensure that the Masks blog stays up.  2) I want to interact with my friends... just not as Caitlyn or any imitation of her.  So eventually I'd want to comment on someone's blog.  Eventually I'd want to update the blog.  At that point I'd face the spectre... the echo.. of Caitlyn again.

That time is now.

The whining continues...

So in the previous post I complained about Spirit air and promised to complain about Netflix.  Here's that issue:

My family seemingly has always been proud TV viewers.  I recall being a child that my nickname seemed to be 'Remote Control', as I was the one tasked with changing the channel.  Thank God there was only about five channels and channel surfing wasn't yet in vogue.

Even without a remote control, our TV was fairly glorious back then.  I don't recall the size, but it was big, it had a beautiful wooden case, and even had the full VHW channel dial.

But back then, that was about all there was to having a good television.  Have it big, have it in a good looking case, and ensuring that you could get all the different channels.  Ever so slowly as the television landscape evolved, we've added more and more accessories.  The first was the VCR.  I remember those heady days when VHS had beaten back the superior Betamax foe.  It was a Christmas gift from Grandpa and we suddenly added 'going to the Video Rental store' to our lexicon.

Excuse me while I whine about having enough money to travel via jet aircraft and lazily stream movies from the interwebs right into my big screen television and home theater system

If you don't get what the image is, just search google for 'first world problems'.  Yeah... I have problems that I really shouldn't ever EVER complain about.

But I'm going to complain about them none the less!

Before I get into the meat of this rant/post, I do want to point out that my life is wonderful.  Every complaint I have I would still take over real world problems like hunger, hatred, war, disease, and other assorted issues.  I work, I have enough money to live my life, I am loved, and I love.  In the grand scheme of things I am doing well and should always sing the praises of my life.

But then again, I'm a natural complainer, and complainers will always complain.  So this post is dedicated to my increasingly expensive addiction to netflix streaming service and the horror show that is Spirit Airlines.  Let's go ahead and start with Spirit as I was only recently falling over myself to compliment them.  Bastards.