Chuc Mung Nam Moi! + Sooah

Happy Lunar New Year! I do not have any New Year's festivities today, but my good friend Sooah is in town for the weekend! I haven't seen this girl for almost TWO YEARS. That is way too long for good friends not to see each other. She is horrible with telephonic communication so I literally have communicated with her through Facebook messages with this girl for 22 months. We hardly skimmed the surface of all we had to catch up on yesterday at breakfast at Portage Bay.

I don't know why her eyes are always closed.

"Put on glasses, it will help you see." No.

Yes, I was that asian standing to take a picture of our food. It was so colorful I couldn't help myself!

Anyway, I have a whole weekend filled of Sooah, New Years, and lets not forget, THE SUPER BOWL!! Oh yeah, and trying to sneak in some studying for my first pharmacology exam... Happy Friday everybody!

craft time > assessment time

Today was our third day at our gerontology clinical site. Honestly, gero clinicals are very slow. It's our first so I'm not really sure how much I can do or how receptive the employees are to students. There are 10 of us students at the specific site and we're each assigned a resident to do assessments on and to follow around all day. There's not that much structure in terms of what we need to do exactly during the day, but that's pretty nice because we can just do whatever we want and see whatever we want!

Since we started coming on Wednesday, the activity coordinator started scheduling activities for Wednesday morning. Today we made Valentine's Day decorations for the old people to hang on their doors. I had a blast because my resident didn't want to go so I just made a bunch for all the other old people who couldn't make their own. I made a really hipster one for one of my favorite residents that read "Yes", "Cool Kid", "UR Cute". I showed it to him and then hung it on the back of his wheelchair. I later found out that he was wheeling himself around pointing to the back of his chair to show everyone. I'm pretty sure that's the most effective thing I did today. I had so much fun with these foamy stickers that I permanently borrowed some to make my own Valentines. I love crafts. I hope there's another good one next week.

Running struggle

The weather last week was so great and so great! Sunny, but crisp so I can bundle up and layer in all that cute winter clothes sitting in my closet. It's been making me want to go outside and get some vitamin D. So to get outside last week I went on a run (A run. One run). I have mixed feelings about running. Part of me tells me to love it: it's good for me, my heart, my brain, my bones. It helps me fall asleep at night which is awesome considering I am a horrible sleeper and it's a confidence boost waking up sore the next morning. Another part of me hates being it. It makes me out of breath and tired and I'd rather lie in bed. The worst is the showering and drying my hair and getting back to ready. That adds another half hour onto my designated "workout" time! It is truly a personal motivational struggle I deal with every time it is sunny.

I actually was doing great with regularly exercising at the beginning of the school year, but the combination of working more, winter darkness and getting sick once, I fell out of routine and just never started up again. My roommate wants me to run a half marathon with her and I'm tempted especially with the days getting lighter and longer, but I'm not making any promises just yet.

Nursing Career Fair

Nurse Swag

Today I went to my first career fair ever! A career fair, on a SATURDAY... It was nursing specific which was really neat because it catered specifically to nursing students at all levels. There were both potential employers and nursing schools and tons of free paper and pens. I felt like a real grown-up by the time I got home because I had gotten a tote full of nurse swag.

Honestly, I was was jittery and nervous, and I'm pretty sure I came off as totally awkward to some of the recruiters. It's okay though because I wasn't really looking for employment so the stakes weren't high. I was just trying to get my name out there, which wasn't very successful either because I only gave out 1 of the 10 copies of my resume. Most of the hospitals looking for CNAs or hospital assistants told us the same thing anyway: apply online. So I didn't really get much out of it, but it was nice to get one of those under my belt so next year when I'm about to graduate, I can go in knowing what to expect and what kind of nursing I want to go into.

As for now, I'm a blank open slate! I had thought I wanted to go into community nursing when I started school, but now that I'm getting exposed to all these different aspects of nursing, I'm really open to anything. I'm hoping as I go through my program and have clinical placements in different fields, I'll find a field that I fall completely in love with. We'll see!

Health care's future

First time passing medication

New fav book: Davis' Drug Guide for Nurses.

 Today in lab, we practiced passing meds for the first time. It sounds pretty easy, but right before our faculty member let us practice with the med cart, she word vomited about the importance of preventing medication errors and the 6 rights to giving medication and how our final exam includes a physical exam of us passing meds and how if we mess up, we fail the class and fail out of the program and will be $30,000 in debt with no marketable career skills... Just kidding about that last part. She didn't actually say that part, but I'm pretty sure everyone was thinking it. So everyone got really nervous doing it in front of our instructor and over thought things. I'm not sure if it's because I don't care as much because I know it is practice or if it's because I am actually confident, but I felt strangely calm about approaching the med cart and messing around with all the different stuff on it. Basically what I got out of today's lab was check, check, check, check, check, check, check, check, check, check that you have the right med, dose, route, person, time and documentation. Also, question physicians because they're human too and they make mistakes! Actually, since I started school, I am more skeptical of all healthcare professionals...But more on that some other time. Happy Friday!

I love this city

About once a month, I find some excuse to go downtown to explore. It's nice to get away from the hectic-ness that is my own life and disappear into the busy-ness that is downtown. There are just so many people: old, young, hipster, homeless, business, tourist. On a clear day, you can see across the water all the way to West Seattle. There are boats and ferries and every other person is holding a bouquet of Pike Place flowers. When I went this month, it was the day after the Seahawks won the NFC championship. The city was decked out in Hawkitecture and there were five 12th man flags on every block. I freaking love this city!

It's amazing how you can take things for granted because they're right outside your door. I grew up in the suburbs of Seattle and didn't really get to explore the city until I was 15 and bussing to downtown with a map in hand. I see the Space Needle nearly everyday now, but I've never been up it. I've never ridden the ducks and I've never been to the Ballard Locks (I think that is supposedly a hot romantic date spot). Anyway, from living in the city now for 4 years, I am completely in love with this city and it's culture. There are so many different neighborhoods within Seattle, each with it's own mini-culture that is distinctly unique. There's a place for everyone in Seattle- I just love this place and think everyone should move here (or don't, so housing costs don't rise)!!! Seattle is soo beautiful and I want to settle here when I'm old and married and have babies!!! Please let me not get old and move to the suburbs!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Long distance

Great things about dating long distance:

• Being Miss Independent, doing by own thang and focusing on Queen Me
• Not eating like crap
• Not having to "keep track" of someone else
• Becoming a hairy monster
• That feeling that you get when you pick each other up at the airport
• Love letters via snail mail
• Not taking for granted the time you do have together
• Seeing each other = vacation for one of you!

Unfortunate things about dating long distance:

• Plane ticket$
• Friday night when you don't want to do anything, but you don't want to do nothing by yourself

It's the final stretch, people! Woo I can do it!

MLK Jr. Day

Last Friday, the 5 year old girl I nanny for told me about the Martin Luther King Jr. Day assembly (wow, remember those?!) at her school. Her 5-year-old-interpretation of the assembly was that Dr. King was killed while making a speech by getting shot in the finger which resulted in his death. I was at a lost for words, not because I couldn't tell her that's not how he died, but because I couldn't even tell her how he did. I felt so dumb and unpatriotic. I felt like a dumb American.

Anyway, her mom stepped in at that exact moment and clarified the events that both E and I had jumbled up in our heads. So all is well in 5-year-old land. I, on the other hand, really need to spend more time reflecting on things that are bigger than me and reviewing my US history... MLK day means more than no school, free parking and no postal delivery!

Seahawks Super Bowl Bound!

Today, the Seahawks beat the 49ers for the NFC Championship title and earned themselves a ticket to the Super Bowl! I am so excited! I even looked at tickets to New York for February 2nd... Haha no, I have a test the next day.

Game-sealing tip

I'm probably what haters would call a band-wagoner which I'm a little sad about, but at the same time, what team doesn't want more fans?! This is the first season I actually watched most of games and it's probably a combination of my increasing interest since dating John and the hawks doing really well this season. John has had a big man crush on short little Russell Wilson since Russell's college days at North Carolina. When Russell Wilson was drafted at my birthday dinner on April 27th, 2012, John went bezerk and continues to fall more in love with him every passing day. John gets really offended when other Seattle people tell him that they liked Russell Wilson first, but John's best friend gets drunk and puts those haters in their place.

Anyway, so glad my blood pressure is at a safe level again... until February 2nd. Go Hawks!

Hello blog!

Hi blog! I meant to start a blog when I started nursing school to document my progress through the program and so I could look back and see all the fun things I did. It's too easy for this to all fly by and for me to not remember my feelings and experiences. It might just end up in one big lump of a memory that is filed under my brain as "NURSING SCHOOL". Here goes.

This is me at orientation. Boy, I love Seattle summer!

It is currently my 2nd quarter of 7 quarters in my BSN program. Our first quarter we focused on basic assessments and pathophysiology. I freaking killed it last quarter. Initially I was worried the entire quarter and I remember the butterflies/nervous-barf feeling I had on my first day of class, not knowing anyone and that feeling of competition still radiating from everyone... It's the competitiveness of getting into school that creates that vibe between everyone which is sad because I still feel like it's there. People have for sure become friends since then, but there is still competition and lots of complaining among the A type personalities and the high-strung people. C'mon everybody! Get together, build camaraderie!

Me and my comrade. #gohawks

This quarter we have our first pharmacology course as well as a nursing interventions theory/lab, and a gerontology theory/clinical. We had our orientation to our clinical placements this last week, and my placement site is SOOO NICE. It's a skilled-nursing retirement facility that sits right on Lake Washington.

View from the clinical site

Interventions lab: My first sterile dressing, dated and all!

Anyway, it's 10 pm on a Saturday night and I am tired! I will continue this tomorrow.