Free beer on the forth

Steph tagged me with a meme.

Pic the fourth meme in your cache and describe it. Sounds like a interesting meme.

Which is good. I feel kind of quiet today. It will be my last day at my job. Last day as a registered nurse. I can't help but feel a little weepy. Who am I kiding? I'm a mess.

A good mess though.

But, on to the meme.

I couldn't pick my fourth picture in my file. My kids are 99% of my photos. I don't want to expose them too much.

So this is my and my daughter. At my graduation ceremony this May.

She tackled me after I left the stage.

I am the luckiest Mom in the world.

Hands down.

I think the photo really speaks for itself.

But.

If you want more info on this photo. Click here.

If you want to see the other meme's, click on the labe, Free Beer.

Ya'll have a good weekend.

Got any good plans?

A swift smack

This is twice now.

Twice in eight years.

For the past four days, I have been bemoaning the current status of a Tribe Called Hall. The toddler boy Mac and his Mommy will move up to my parent's in two weeks. A few weeks after later, the little girl Pancake will follow. After about two month's time, Mr. Hall will join us.

Long ago we had made a pact that I wouldn't spend weekends alone with my parents. It was too stressful for me. He should always be there. As a buffer and sanity saver. But he can't come up right away. How am I going to live with them without him?

He stays behind to ready the house for sale. We will see each other on weekends and the drive will be brutal. Four hours. But, my job has to start because the loans are roaring back.


sigh.


And that song up there, in two paragraphs, is what I have been singing for four days. He has listened and stepped it up husband wise. Taking extra care by rubbing the feet, doing the dishes and letting me take the second shower of the night. More hot water that way. I still don't quite understand how that works.

Then, as I started the song tonight, I turned to hang up my jacket. And it happened for the second time in eight years. A swift smack on the bottom.

He spanked me.

And he is really strong. It really, really hurt. It was as singular surgical strike. I buckled.

Then he calmly said, "Look, this is wonderful. All this change is bringing us, the kids, to a better life. You know that you are good at this job and yes it will be hard at first as we move and you learn the ropes but really, suck it up. This is only temporary, all that matters is that we are moving forward. There is nowhere but up."

I believe that is technically called knocking some sense into someone. Mr. Hall has a very husbandly way of handling me. Of helping me get over my crazy whiny energy. Very strong, very deft. All alpha and all love.

And he is right. This is awesome. I love what I will be doing and dammit if I haven't worked so hard to get here. My kids get all sorts of GranmaGranpa love. My parent's and I have actually discussed ways to not kill each other. They have promised to let me cook the 'healthy stinky' food. They are actually being tender about the whole deal.

And it is nothing but awesome. I have the hand print to prove it!

This is my life, right here

These are the items in my trunk. Note the stroller. The yoga mat. And the big, red, Swiss army backpack with the Litmann Stethoscope. Next time you watch ER look for the big L on the stethoscope. That would be Litmann. They are the best stethoscopes on the market for the money.

For those of you just tuning in, I currently work as a home health nurse. That back pack has a TON of nursing supplies from blood pressure cuffs (click on the words for illustrations of the following items) to sharps containers to otoscopes to wound and debridement kits. (For more on wound debridement, and you know you want to, go here ;) It fits everything a nurse needs while tending on the go. It is a great back pack. Steller even.

And not the brown jacket, better picture here. I wore it into a patient's house who was a heavy smoker. She funked up my jacket! And then, I put it in the trunk and my entire trunk got funked up.

The smell got better after airing things out, but jeez!

This is why I am not dressing like a grown up at this job!

O-and the box, a booster seat for Mac because his too darn big for the high chair anymore. Which is a shame because you can strap kids into the high chair and make dinner. No so with the wee booster seat.

Crazy old people stories as viewed by a nurse

As I transition from registered nurse to psychiatric nurse pracitioner, my stories will also change. So far, I've spoken mostly about my current home health job. This is pretty easy to disguise as most patients have the same diagnoses and live in two dimensional houses. Not so easy with the mental health population.

As a psychiatric-np I will, for the most part, listen to people's stories. Everyone has a different way of talking. And while you can line up ten people with sinus infections and pretty much get the same symptoms, the same is not true of ten people with depression. Or schizophrenia, or OCD. Everyone is different and reports their symptoms accordingly.

What my patients give me, are tiny broken Robin's eggs. They have been sitting on them for so long, trying to take care of them all by themselves, they have actually squished them. Make no mistake, no one comes to my office voluntarily. Their families have given them ultimatums, their work is requiring it or the legal system says see me and cooperate or it's jail. Sometimes they are resigned to their fate. Sometimes they spit nails they're so mad.

All in all, that is the art of nursing. How to open those that are closed. It begins with meeting them where they are, what they hold dear. And putting them firmly in charge of the game. I am just a tool to help them self-actualize. To become who they want to be.

It is a skill I learned during my first health care job, a 'personal care worker (PCW)' with the mentally retarded or developmentally disabled as they are now known. I have never had such job satisfaction as when I taught someone, at age 56, how to dial a phone. Or helped a 34 year old have less outbursts in public so she could go to her beloved taco bell. It lit a fire in me that has been burning since age 19.

I moved up from PCW to certified nursing assistant (CNA) in a nursing home. This is truly God's work. Tending to dementia patients and their fragile bodies. Although, some of them were a good 300 lbs. The CNA's job is to help feed, dress and keep clean those that cannot for themselves. Nothing will influence my prescribing behavior more than this. To this day I cannot wrap my mind around 90 year olds needing 14 pills a day. Big horse pills too. Crushing them up in applesauce because they can no longer swallow properly. Wait, that is when I was a registered nurse in the nursing home. I helped people on their way out when I worked there. I watched life slip out of those I cared for. Death, like birth, is a miracle.

Either way, my first exposure to wild stories from the elderly was in the nursing homes. Those that have 90 years and a brain full of dementia can wind some interesting yarns. They also interpret things differently. I will always remember opening the door at six pm so Mable could feed the chickens. And while she hadn't lived on a farm for 30 years, I still delighted in hearing how it went. How the big ones always bullied the little ones. She even had names for them.

I was kind about these types of stories. Half the people would just ignore their stories or roll their eyes. "Crazy old people stories", they'd say.

And I suppose, someday it will be my turn to tell stories. I plan on outliving each and everyone. Well, not my kids, but . . . I have lots and lots of crazy stories. No one will believe them I'm sure.

Like the story of how, when I was 19, I left for the big city. I moved into a studio apartment with an artist. I had an army cot in the walk in closet that I slept on. He slept in the main room and had padlocks on all his stuff. The artist was a creepy guy. He went to a very expensive art school in the city. He liked to do 'art installations' with dead animals. One such project involved a pig's head he got from the local butcher. It was kept in our fridge for a week. He sewed an anarchy patch on it's forehead.

Pfft. Artists.

See, now who is going to believe that story from an old crazy lady?

The odd never ends

Random bits of dialogue heard at the House of Hall:

Mrs. Hall on cell to Mr. Hall: "Ok, babe, see ya soon." Hangs up.

Pancake: "Mommy, you didn't say kisses smooches!"

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Mr. Hall on why he won't try veggie burgers:

"I don't support food that is trying to be other food. I mean, you don't see carrots pretending to be bread or beets trying to be strawberries. I love vegetables, I love eating them, but not when they are trying to fake me out as a burger."

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Mac: "MAMMA OPEN DOOR!"

(It would be his first sentence I believe, man o man how cool is that? My son can now connect words to make sentences!)

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While Mrs. Hall is backing up the car and putting on her seat belt at the same time:

Pancake: "MOMMY! I didn't know the could start when you aren't holding the steering wheel!"

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As Mr. Hall explains why he needs to go to the battery store because his truck battery died after work.

Mrs. Hall (interupting the story): "Ok, um, how hard do I have to listen to this story? I mean, you got home right? You didn't call me so I am assuming that it worked out somehow, I mean, um, do I have to help you at the end of the story or what?"

Mr. Hall: "No babe, all you had do to is listen to the story, but I see you don't really wanna. Love ya anyway though."

************************************************

OK OK. I realize just how rude my statement was. But come on, I had just spent 48 alone with the kids and they were in bed for the night. I was settling in to watch 30 rock on hulu (thanks Mr. Ajooja for making it's existence known to me!)

So no, I didn't listen to his story in the end. Dead batteries firmly fall under the MR. section of the marriage. Ok, moving on then .....
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And last but not least and I swear to God this is true.

Pancake:

She actually came into the room, all scared for me.

She actually said, "MOMMY, MOMMY, are you ok?!!"

We had to explain that everything was ehem, just fine.

;)

hee hee hee

Pancake picks a song, Mr. Hall provides subtext

The song:



The very weird subtext that I have no idea how Mr. Hall knows these things but he knows a lot of things that I had no idea about:

CLICK HERE

So far so Good

When I arrive in the office, people ask "How's it going?"

My stock reply is, "So far .. So Good."

I find it more pleasing to say than "Ok" or "Good!". It will often elicit a chuckle.

"The day is young!" They say back, with a wee gaffaw.

har har har.

It is rather pleasing for both parties.

But let me get a little personal here and tell you my day. So far.

And I write this, because I love every minute of it. :)

Woke up at 5.30 am. Mr. Hall works some weekends. This means he rises at the butt crack of dawn and keeses me. Buh-bye babe, see ya Sunday night.

These weekends, as a De facto single Mom, use to give me the galloping terrors. "How am I going to do this alone with two kids?", I'd say. Now it is like breathing.

I begin to cough and hack, spasm style. I pop some sugar free Halls and dive head long into a Sopranos dream. If I wake near the morning hours and fall back asleep, my dreams are guaranteed to be ultra vivid, 3-d and disturbing. This is no different.

Photo by Annie Leibowitz

I hear Pancake's pitter patter and hear her gently calling me. She is next to my bed asking me where Daddy is. "He's at work sweetie. Now, you can come into bed or go down stairs and watch PBS kids." She is almost six, she can work the remote all by herself.

She leaves and I hear her scooping dog food. I feel proud of her because I didn't have to tell her to "let the dog out and feed him two scoops." She is actually doing it, by her ownself. I slip into flashes of my Sopranos dream.
She begins to talk to Mac. Grrrr. "Paaaanncaaake, waking up your brother was not one of the options, either come here and cuddle or go downstairs for PBS kids.", I call. Mac is almost two, he needs his sleep. So does Mommy.

At this point, if you are a parent, you surely must realize the futility of this statement. The war is lost people. The kids are up. It is eight am. Actually, not too bad!

"Moommmy, Charlie is feeding the dog... I thought it was Daddy."

At this point a lot of things go through my mind. First, "CRAP!" The food dish we have is pictured below. Last time Mac was messing around the the dog food, he got water in the storage section and I spent a week cleaning it and drying it out. Apparently, the food will grow mold if you don't clean it properly the first time.

Our dog is much, much bigger.

Well, turns out I should have just listened to Mr. Hall on how to clean it properly, but what does he know?

Next thought, "CRAP!" Mac can now open his door. He also went down two sets of stair cases into the basement to get at the food. I am impressed with his motor skills.

I rise, cough a lot, and peek down stairs. Mac is scooping and unscooping a handful of food in and out of the dish. The dog, looking so pitiful, dutifully waits behind Mac. Being teased with this ritual.

Dog gets let out. THERE WAS NO WATER IN HIS DISH!! Wee hee!

Mac is brought up stairs, changed (not to bad for a morning diaper), baby gate firmly put back up.

"EEEEAT, EAT!", says Mac. He is learning about five new words a week.

Fruit and cream oatmeal made, kids plopped on table. I go upstairs to search for a Kleenex box in earnest. I hear Pancake saying, "Mac, can you say Mama? Can you say Daddie?" He does and they delight in their morning conversation.

I tie my hair up, bra on, hot washcloth across my face.

Oh my gaaaaawwddd, that is heavenly.

Bangs wetted, smile across face.

Mac doesn't do that bad, got most of the oatmeal in his mouth. He wants more, and whines. I remind him that whining get him upstairs for a time out. He stops, ponders, and says, "Peeasee". Good boy Mac! So proud, so proud!


Pancake asks again, as she will about forty more times each day, "How many more days till Halloween?"

We reaffirm out costume choice for trick-or-treating. The tribe called Hall goes in unified costumes. Last year we were all red devils. This year:

Zombies!!!

Click on the word 'Zombies' to find out why we are so stoked!

Then we chill for a while, I am determined to drink coffee before we head to the park. DETERMINED!!!

I hope there are other kids at the park for Pancake. There is such an age difference between the two I can't properly play with her because I am chasing Mac.

And she will show me, all proud of herself, that she can climb on the monkey bars. First skill learned at kindergarten.

Now, if she can only learn how to use the swings by herself.

So, How's it going with you?