*grumble*

It’s so pointless.

(and yes, I’m grouchy because I’m packing and I don’t DO packing)

When I saw his wife crying I thought “rather her than me.”

I have never felt so guilty in my life.

It’s tons easier to update things when you can only write a sentence or two.

I opened the door to my apartment expecting a rush of paws, ears and fur only to be met with two very exasperated looking dogs. It was as if they were saying “do you realize how long we’ve been waiting here, young lady? We heard you outside, you know” only, obviously it would be in French because Bo, at least, doesn’t speak English. Obviously.

I stepped over the wall of precisely two dogs and left them judging the door instead. I could, of course, have stepped around them but I was trying to make a point… To, uh, a pair of small dogs. Oh.

In London, thankfully, there were no small dogs to judge me when I came home later than expected. I didn’t have to explain why, when I brought a number of bags of shopping home, none of them contained doggie treats either.

I feel like I should explain this whole running away to London. A few months ago, I was in need of some inspiration, for lack of a better word. Perhaps it was more reassurance that moving over there was the right decision but either way, I was doubting myself. Now, having just started a new job, the chance of being given the time off work was smaller than a nano flower so I tried to push it to the back of my mind. I figured that eventually, something would happen to help me decide one way or another.

So, weeks later, everyone was arguing over who got to work over easter. Apparently work means far more to a lot of people than a chance to sit back and relax, you know, doing something like bungee jumping or skydiving. My boss who, by now, was looking slightly… puffier than usual asked if I would mind taking that weekend off. I told him I didn’t have a problem with it at all but then remembered that it was a big deal and should probably seem slightly disappointed so I looked at my feet and, well, acted disappointed. I think he was gone by the time I’d figured out what disappointed looked like but at least I tried.

And that’s how and why I got to go to London. Now, it would have been easy just to go and spend some time shopping or enjoying some English candy, but it wouldn’t really tell me whether or not I wanted to work there. What if their medicine was backwards, upside down and boring? Eventually, after harassing many, many people quite gently over MSN, I was offered a few days following an English doctor, you know, just in case they have three heads over there. Or something.

When I met him, I discovered that he did not, in fact have three heads. I’ll admit I was a little disappointed but also fairly relieved he was normal enough that I didn’t have to worry about leaving alive. He did, however, have a funny accent although I have a feeling that just how English people speak.

One of the first patients was an 18 month old baby with an ear infection. It wasn’t anything I’d hadn’t seen before, but the baby’s sister/nanny seemed to be overly attached to him, as if she was his mother. After they left, the doctor (who will now be known as English Doctor or ED for short) asked how old I thought the girl was. She seemed too young to be his mom but not that young so I offered a guess at 19. He laughed and told me that “mom is 17.” And then my innocence bubble burst.

It’s not that I didn’t know there were 17 year old girls in the world with babies, its just I’ve never met one before. In fact, in the two days I was with ED I saw one pregnant 16 year old, two 17 year olds with babies and one 18 year old with a three year old. I was really surprised to meet so many young people with children. At 19, I don’t think I could cope with having one.

Another patient that sticks in my mind was a man in his 60′s who’d spent four weeks with bloody diarrhea. He explained that his wife had been sick and was very stressed about it so he’d been taking care of her. Instead of worrying her about something “that is probably nothing, anyway” he’d put it off until she went into hospital so that he wouldn’t have to tell her about it.

Despite the fact his clothes were hanging loosely around him, he insisted his appetite was fine and that he hadn’t lost weight. He could have been telling the truth and just liked his clothes that way but I doubt it. When ED told him it was “most likely something bad,” the man seemed far more concerned about who would take care of his wife.

It really bothers me that he felt that he couldn’t tell his wife that he was sick. I mean, sure it hurt her for a while but surely upsetting her and surviving would be better than not upsetting her and dropping dead a few months later.

When I asked ED why he never told the man he probably had cancer, he replied; “A patient only remembers 10% of what you tell them. If you use words like cancer, no matter what the context, it’s likely that cancer will be the only thing they remember. I don’t like my patients to worry until I’m sure they have something to worry about.” I think that’s possibly one of the most useful things I’ve learned in a loooooong time.

ED told me on Friday that the man had missed his appointments at the hospital and that he’d never called back about his test results. If it were me, I think I’d want to know so that there was an answer one way or another. I’d hate to leave something like that to a point it couldn’t be treated only to find that I would have survived if I’d gone back to the doctor. If it were you, what would you do?

I don’t DO vomit.

After forgetting to mention that little fact, I spent a week at work where everyone seemed to want to puke on me. Most of the time, they aim for the pants, which is slightly but not hugely gross, however:

I have had someone barf on my uniform, which in itself isn’t all that bad, however, picking carrot chunks out of your pockets, off your pens and whatever else just happens to be in there is more than a little gag worthy. If you must show me what you had for lunch, please aim for the floor.

And when I say floor, I mean the floor. It is equally unacceptable for you to empty your stomach contents into my shoes. Sure, my feet are in there but they just so happen to have a nice open top letting your semi digested sandwich run into them so it sits comfortably around my innocent toes. Aim to the side of you, it’s a much nicer way to barf, anyway…

But when you’re aiming to the side of you, make sure that I’m not standing there. I don’t want your half chewed McDonalds breakfast burger washed down (and back up again) with a diet coke running down into my bra. Attempting to feed my breasts won’t make them any bigger, they’re just not hungry.

Normal posting will resume as soon as I stop coming home from work needing to scrub various patients gastric juices off myself and my shoes.

2. Unless the patient is unable to answer my questions for themselves, you should sit quietly and let them speak. When I ask your friend how they are feeling, I don’t want to know that you’re tired or thirsty. The coffee machine is down the hall, take a hike and leave us to it. Additionally, it is equally unhelpful for you to add “but he cut his thumb three months ago” when I ask about any other injuries/illnesses.

3. If your child/sibling/partner needs an IV or a shot and you know you’re not good with needles, leave the room or look away. Standing there going “I think I’m going to throw up” or “I feel kind of light headed” while doing absolutely nothing about it will not help you or your child/sibling/partner. Remember, you are here FOR the patient, not to BE the patient.

4. If you’re going to be concerned about something, at least google it before going wild with the baby wipes. Just so you know, the broken hand your child/sibling/partner has is not going to increase their risk of getting MRSA so the wet kleenex you insist on rubbing all over my patient is somewhat pointless. Besides, hospitals are the germiest places in the world… if you’re worried about getting sick, you’re in the wrong place.

5. Get out of the way when I tell you to. Grabbing at the patient and insisting you hold their hand/sit on the bed/massage their feet is not particularly helpful to me or them.

Patients:
1. If we need you to be naked, we will ask or cut your clothes off. Unless you have specifically been told you need to remove *everything,* I don’t want to walk into your room and find you laying on your bed completely naked – and smiling about it. It is not sexy and I dislike having to maintain eye contact the whole time just so you don’t think I’m looking at your… *ahem* stuff.

2. Unless you can show that you are sicker than we are, don’t bother coming to see us. I’ve had a cold for a month but I haven’t needed to go to hospital, what makes you so special?

3. If you can’t decide what is wrong with you, don’t even bother thinking about coming to see us. I’m sure your headache really did turn into a broken arm and then a heart attack but we can’t treat you for problems which spontaneously resolve themselves. I am sure your shrink would like to hear about this, however.

4. Presumably I’m seeing you because you chose to come here. The least you can do is put down your book/PSP/phone/laptop long enough to talk to me and let me do my job. Yes I know that discussing your sex life at the top of your voice is more important than the gaping wound in your arm but the sooner I can do what I have to, the sooner you can get back to Bruce and his HUGE…

…apartment.

The first retard award goes to the lady and her army of white trash who, as it suggests in the video “are the result of mating with vegetables.” After you watch the video, I think you’ll agree that there really is no need for further explanation. Direct your clickage here

The second award is also a joint award and goes to both my boyfriend and the guy who punched him in the face. There are some people who see my boyfriends job as a way to get themselves a ride in one of those nice, shiny, police cars. Asking for a ride or maybe buying him something pretty isn’t quite what these people had in mind. After all, their efforts may fail and then they’d really be screwed. What they want is a sure fire way to get the full experience. You know, the handcuffs, sirens, lights and maybe a gun or two pointed in their general direction. The simplest and most effective way to get this is to punch my boyfriend in the face and then again in the head – just in case…

Now, I’m not sure what kind of research has been done into stupidity but I’m reasonably certain it’s not contagious so I can’t blame the boy for what someone else did to him. What I can blame him for, is that, in an attempt to minimize any damage to his ego, he didn’t ice his face or do anything that might possibly help reduce the, uh, decline in aesthetic appeal of his face (to be nice)… Now he’s [temporarily] ugly (his cheek and eye are swollen and turning some interesting colors!), he expects loooooots of sympathy. Does [partly] self-inflicted unattractiveness really deserve it?

Finally, my last award goes to a lady I met at work. I walked past her in the hall, coughing (because of my asthma not cooties) and she stopped me to tell me that if I was sick, I shouldn’t be in the hospital. Absolute genius.

And now, because I don’t have time to post everything I wanted to, I leave with two things:

1. No one comments on my blog anymore – does that mean no one reads it?

2. I have a bunch of stuff to post about work, flying and my slightly insane family, all of which should be posted in the next couple of days. If it isn’t done by, uh, Friday, you’re invited to poke me with a very large “persuasion” stick.

I’ve been walking around for weeks mumbling about how much I hate people but I finally realized it’s not quite that simple. I’ve worked out that there are two kinds of people, at least for this theory to really work.

The first type of person is one who you encounter but never actually meet. These are the people you do something small for, like the extra minute you wait at a crossing so the lady with the three kids, the dog and the shopping can get across without having to wait for the next white man. They probably won’t give your action a second thought but it never hurts to do it. I mean, they didn’t ask you to do anything and you don’t expect anything in return… You do something nice and that’s it, you’re done.

The second type of person is one you have a relationship with, and not just a romantic one. These are the people you know and care about… These people are the ones I hate. It seems that whenever I try and do something nice for one of these people, it comes back and bites me in the ass. Apparently, if you want to be a good friend; never do anything nice, always remember to throw good deeds back in the givers face, make their life unnecessarily difficult and, wherever possible, screw your friend over by taking credit for their work.

Finally, there is a secret third type of person. These people are the people who really matter and the people who I feel safe and happy with. My parents (even if they are completely insane, especially that mother thing), my boyfriend who I plan on embarrassing later in this post and a somewhat small but special group of assorted relatives and friends are all in this “group.” For these people, I will do anything. For everyone else, there’s mastercard?

As a side note, I was going to put the following into a post of its own but as it somehow ties into what I’ve already written, I may as well just put it here. There’s that, and the fact I wouldn’t want to spoil anyone by making too many posts!

The person who the following rambling is directed at falls, or at least fell, in between the second and third groups… Now, though, I’m not quite sure where they fit it. To the person who knows who they are:

I’m posting this here because I know that at some point, you’ll read it. I noticed you’d been “checking up” on me today – if, by some small miracle, you happen to find your balls, maybe you could just email me and ask how things were going but until then, dig this:

I am sick of people who behave like you. People who walk around with their heads so far up their asses, they walk all over everyone else without a second thought. It would almost be forgivable if you didn’t take pleasure from it. I mean, you said it yourself “I’m doing it for my happiness” – It doesn’t really get much clearer than that, eh?

I don’t need to yell or kick or scream because I know that I have done nothing wrong. It’s all on you. It’s your guilt, your upset, your mistake… It’s your life and you can stomp on whoever you want but know that one day, when you need one of those people, they won’t be there to save you. You have no idea just how much that comforts me…

Owing to the fact I have dinner plans and am yet to even get as far as changing out of my pajamas, I’m happy to jump right into my pants. (I apologize for the poor choice of words – on all levels)

• The first, almost big thing that’s happened to me recently is that I have [yet another] new boytoy at my mercy. We met at work (which seems to be the place I meet a lot of people right now) and, after he tolerated many months of my knitting, we ended up together. [Anyone who has no idea what the knitting means should click here now.] It all just… sort of happened, in a good way of course. While I could write thousands of things about him, the risk of vomit inducing cliche is just far too high. Maybe, when I can afford a bucket for each person subjected to my boyfriend related ramblings, I’ll post more about him.
• That brings me neatly to my next almost big thing. I have a new job, finally. It means that I’ll be working in a nice environment (even if it does have that weird hospital smell), with nicer people, nicer hours and much nicer pay. I really can’t figure out why I didn’t try this sooner.
• Generally, in fact, things are all falling into place. For the most part, I think the fact I’m far less stressed helps enormously… I have a few weekends away planned for the next couple of months – just as soon as I get new passports (Yes, I have two), the arrangements for moving to England are almost finished and finally, I have a shot at making enough money to be able to pay for college [in London].
• None of that really matters if I can’t survive these next few months living in New York. In the last week, here are a few reasons why driving around here will result in death:
  1. Many drivers cannot “make out the shapes” well enough to be able to drive independently and so feel the need for the front of their car to be touching the back of the car in front. For the majority of these drivers, the vehicle of choice is an SUV – of course such a thing is essential to survival in the harsh environment that is Manhattan.2. When you can see the car in front of you stopping at a crossing, the unwritten rule seems to be hit the gas then the breaks as hard as possible, bringing you to a stop a mere 1/16″ away from the vehicle ahead of you.3. An emergency vehicle in the immediate area is an excuse to change lanes without checking your mirrors or even looking out the window. The crunching metal you can hear? The car you just crashed into. In these instances, it is standard procedure to hit the horn and blame the incident on the other driver. Giving the finger is also strongly suggested.4. Many drivers will approach an intersection and not think about slowing down, changing into the correct lane or even giving a turn signal. Instead they will race through the many lanes of traffic cutting across the paths of other cars and swerve erratically into a side street without warning. This is perfectly acceptable especially if you can knock down a couple of pedestrians too.

Normal blogging service shall now resume.

Despite being forced into a small space (I say small space, I really mean a house smaller than the size of Manhattan although infinitely more difficult to navigate) with my family for the holidays. It’s not that I don’t like them, I can just… only deal with them in small doses before they drive me nuts. You know, the kind of nuts where you feel you should be in a padded room rocking gently. It didn’t get to the point I was imagining a straitjacket, which, just because I feel like sharing, I am able to escape from… How’s that for a party trick?

I’ve decided that this year, just because I enjoy being different and awkward, my new years resolution is going to be something somewhat less specific than eating well or working out. This year, my resolution is to find the drive and motivation I lost a long time ago. I’m not really sure how I’m going to determine success or failure but I suppose getting where I want to be is the ultimate goal. Well, I want enjoy getting there as well as being there… Oh and, because there’s no way I can’t factor in a little geek, I’m also going to learn at least one programming language properly. Now I’ve made all the necessary declarations, I feel happy enough that someone will put their foot up my ass if I forget them, not that they can actually be measured or rated…

I have two little spaniels with four little paws each. These little paws make little “clicks” on the floor as they walk around, the advantage of this being, there is no way they can creep up on you. The situation is a little different when you can’t hear their paws due to some kind of iPoddage. It seems to allow them to fly onto the couch next to you (or into the back of your laptop *snicker*) without warning or, in the case of the puppy, to struggle up onto the back of the couch and creep across to my head where she can put her cold, wet nose behind my innocent ears. I’m going to wash my hair when I finish writing this.

The new years party:

• I managed to get two enormous bruises (one on my leg, the other on my arm) at a new years party. I don’t remember how I got them, despite the fact I didn’t have anything at all to drink. Is it wrong of me to actually want to be able to call them UDIs? (unidentified drinking injuries)
• I’m amazingly bad at matching names to faces. Luckily, about 90% of guys at the new years party had one of three names giving me 1/3 of a chance of succeeding. Luckily, most of them ended up too drunk to care anyway
• I thought it would be a good idea to give my number to people without getting their names. This led to a hell of a lot of confusion when everyone started texting me the next morning. It wasn’t helped by the fact everyone had the same name and in the end, I found myself asking people what color shirt they were wearing. See, I can match names to shirts!
• I stole a number of ties and hats from people, many of which I still have. I also have Bradley’s coat, which I borrowed when I realized that a corset, hot pants and a very teeny top hat weren’t very warm. For the record, it was a pimps and hos party, it’s not my normal style!

At the moment, work isn’t so bad. January 1st was my one year anniversary of working there and also the day a bunch of new people started. So not only does that mean I’m no longer a n00b, I actually have people asking me for help instead of me asking them. I finally feel that I might actually be useful. Despite that, someone still managed to fuck up something that seems oh so simple, resulting in a group of us, including me, not getting paid. After talking to my boss who promised to deal with it, I’m expecting a nice big paycheck – I’m waiting for two months money PLUS whatever I’m supposed to get for working over Christmas. When I finally get my hands on it, I’m going to buy myself a nice, big new years gift. Just because…

Happy New Year (even if I am a week late)

The moral of the story? “please remove all jewelery” isn’t just for shits and giggles… *ahem*