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Good grief!
Dec. 16th, 2011 10:05 pm*pokes head out, sniffs the air*
Good grief, it's been two weeks since I had time to post anything at all! I can't believe how fast the time goes by. Seems that when I'm not working in ICU or out at the farm, I'm asleep. Not much energy left to do much else. I haven't even turned my computer on for almost a week; just took a few minutes during my breaks at work to check email, and maybe have a quick peek here. I counted, and out of the 31 days in December, I'm working 16 twelve hour shifts. Did my fourth one this week yesterday, and this morning I got a call asking me if I wanted to do one more today..nope. Today I was out at the farm cleaning stalls; just a little R&R for me today, LOL. The usual Christmas slowdown hasn't happened in ICU; we've been really swamped. Yesterday I ended my stretch of shifts with a bang, working an hour and a half overtime, missing my dinner break as well. I'd admitted a very ill young man, and had got him settled in; he was in an isolation room so I was doing some charting at my desk outside the room (the room is glassed in). All of a sudden his blood pressure skyrocketed, so I rushed in to check him; the IV pump that was delivering the medication to keep his blood pressure up had for some reason started pumping it in at a very rapid rate. This made his blood vessels constrict and raised his pressure to dangerously high levels; I called the doctors and the next couple of hours were hectic to say the least. The poor man was very unstable and in considerable danger of having a heart attack or something worse because of that malfunction of the pump. I felt sick about it, although I know it was nothing I had any way of preventing. Luckily, we managed to stabilize him, and things were better by the time I left at 9 p.m. I had to fill in an incident report, which is a major hassle; we have online forms and they take a lot longer to do than the old fashioned hand written ones. I came home exhausted but totally wired, so I started cooking. Made a big pot of soup for today. When I'm in that frame of mind, cooking is very relaxing and therapeutic for me.
I did at least manage to get my Christmas cards written and mailed; today I dug out my tiny little Christmas tree, and found a collection of Christmas stockings that I plan to take out to put on the horses' stall doors. We do try to brighten things up around the old farmstead this time of year. There are two big holly trees near the house, so I'm going to cut some branches with berries to put on my door, since my Christmas wreath fell apart last year. We are all being very frugal this year; no one has a lot of money, and we've decided to just buy little gifts. I can't say I feel particularly festive, but I have been cheered by all the beautiful displays of lights that people have put on their houses; I passed by several on the drive into town tonight. Made me feel like maybe doing a little decorating myself.
I think we'll have a green Christmas. No snow anywhere but on the mountains hereabouts, and today was quite mild, if a bit drizzly. I don't mind, it's a lot easier to get around.
All the horses are doing well; today they were all in because it was quite wet, and the paddocks needed to have time to dry - the horses don't mind, as long as they have lots of hay to eat. Makes it a little less work, too. I put the young girls in the arena (one at a time) for a run while I did their stalls...they're all getting so big. Sera is almost two, and she's so tall I can hardly reach her head if she lifts it up! We heard the other day that Goldie and Dusty's father, Goldwing, has qualified to compete at the 2012 Olympics, very exciting news. They both have inherited his jumping genes, and Dusty looks so much like her mother Kismet, sometimes I think it's Kizzie standing there. She's inherited Kismet's sweet nature, too; a good thing, because she's a very big horse. I took Midnight's blanket off before he had a run in the arena, and hurray! it looks like he's lost quite a bit of weight. He was so fat, it wasn't good. Looking much better. I spent a few minutes in the arena with him, just free lunging him a bit. He was a good boy. Teddy and Buddy are doing great; it is so good to see them playing together like young horses should.
Well, that's about it; not much more of interest to tell. My life is such a whirlwind of activity..sadly, it's more work and less play. I'm hanging in there; hopefully the new year will be a bright one for us all.
Good grief, it's been two weeks since I had time to post anything at all! I can't believe how fast the time goes by. Seems that when I'm not working in ICU or out at the farm, I'm asleep. Not much energy left to do much else. I haven't even turned my computer on for almost a week; just took a few minutes during my breaks at work to check email, and maybe have a quick peek here. I counted, and out of the 31 days in December, I'm working 16 twelve hour shifts. Did my fourth one this week yesterday, and this morning I got a call asking me if I wanted to do one more today..nope. Today I was out at the farm cleaning stalls; just a little R&R for me today, LOL. The usual Christmas slowdown hasn't happened in ICU; we've been really swamped. Yesterday I ended my stretch of shifts with a bang, working an hour and a half overtime, missing my dinner break as well. I'd admitted a very ill young man, and had got him settled in; he was in an isolation room so I was doing some charting at my desk outside the room (the room is glassed in). All of a sudden his blood pressure skyrocketed, so I rushed in to check him; the IV pump that was delivering the medication to keep his blood pressure up had for some reason started pumping it in at a very rapid rate. This made his blood vessels constrict and raised his pressure to dangerously high levels; I called the doctors and the next couple of hours were hectic to say the least. The poor man was very unstable and in considerable danger of having a heart attack or something worse because of that malfunction of the pump. I felt sick about it, although I know it was nothing I had any way of preventing. Luckily, we managed to stabilize him, and things were better by the time I left at 9 p.m. I had to fill in an incident report, which is a major hassle; we have online forms and they take a lot longer to do than the old fashioned hand written ones. I came home exhausted but totally wired, so I started cooking. Made a big pot of soup for today. When I'm in that frame of mind, cooking is very relaxing and therapeutic for me.
I did at least manage to get my Christmas cards written and mailed; today I dug out my tiny little Christmas tree, and found a collection of Christmas stockings that I plan to take out to put on the horses' stall doors. We do try to brighten things up around the old farmstead this time of year. There are two big holly trees near the house, so I'm going to cut some branches with berries to put on my door, since my Christmas wreath fell apart last year. We are all being very frugal this year; no one has a lot of money, and we've decided to just buy little gifts. I can't say I feel particularly festive, but I have been cheered by all the beautiful displays of lights that people have put on their houses; I passed by several on the drive into town tonight. Made me feel like maybe doing a little decorating myself.
I think we'll have a green Christmas. No snow anywhere but on the mountains hereabouts, and today was quite mild, if a bit drizzly. I don't mind, it's a lot easier to get around.
All the horses are doing well; today they were all in because it was quite wet, and the paddocks needed to have time to dry - the horses don't mind, as long as they have lots of hay to eat. Makes it a little less work, too. I put the young girls in the arena (one at a time) for a run while I did their stalls...they're all getting so big. Sera is almost two, and she's so tall I can hardly reach her head if she lifts it up! We heard the other day that Goldie and Dusty's father, Goldwing, has qualified to compete at the 2012 Olympics, very exciting news. They both have inherited his jumping genes, and Dusty looks so much like her mother Kismet, sometimes I think it's Kizzie standing there. She's inherited Kismet's sweet nature, too; a good thing, because she's a very big horse. I took Midnight's blanket off before he had a run in the arena, and hurray! it looks like he's lost quite a bit of weight. He was so fat, it wasn't good. Looking much better. I spent a few minutes in the arena with him, just free lunging him a bit. He was a good boy. Teddy and Buddy are doing great; it is so good to see them playing together like young horses should.
Well, that's about it; not much more of interest to tell. My life is such a whirlwind of activity..sadly, it's more work and less play. I'm hanging in there; hopefully the new year will be a bright one for us all.
