Cooking With The Light's Off

I came here without any idea on what to blog. I'm clueless of what to vent out here. I don't know what to do. My head is empty and I don't have any agenda for today.

Usually when I blog I always have a pattern and topic to follow. Everything is being planned out. At least I have an idea of what to write. But right now, I have nothing to write. What's wrong with me.

Aaah.... maybe I will  tell you what happened this morning. I was cooking breakfast. Shredded broiled chicken, split peas, ramen noodles, spinach, tomatoes, onions, and garlic.

I was cooking and in the middle of the process the lights were off. My stove is electric driven and my water heater was also electric. Both where on before the light was cut out while the microwave was heating the roasted chicken. And I was sautéing some tomatoes, onions, and garlic.

I tried the bedroom outlet but it was not working. The one that only working was at at the living room so I decided to transfer the stove there and finished cooking.

Once I'm done cooking, I took my breakfast and texted my landlord that I had a short circuit again and he texted me back that he will fix it when he comes back from work.

I went to sleep and woke up sweating. It was hot all day. I felt like a fried potato on my bed. It was hot when I woke up. I checked if the light's are off and to my dismay my landlord did not fix it yet.  It was a terrible day for me. Haist.                                                                  

On Rainy Days

I hate myself. I hate how compulsive I am. I hate my weakness to online shopping. I just hate my addiction on buying stuff from online. I hate this feeling.....

In as much as I want to save money, I kept buying things online. Every time I saw things on sale from my phone, there is no instance that I won't buy something. It's sale.... and real marked down extremely.

Lately, I've spend a lot for an original Penguin polo shirts. I mean these are authentic Penguin shirts, which I grew up as a child. Only sold for 17.99 a piece. I bought 5. There's also a sale for my favorite T-shirts made by Buck Mason, originally made in America, soft and silky shirts for only 15.00 a piece which is originally priced 60.00. And some summer shorts at J. Crew which was sold for 14.99 each. Haist.... compulsion galore!

I've been paying my Paypal account for 500.00 every 2 weeks just to maintain my balance below 1000 so as not to incur high interest rates. At this time I'm doing good in tapering the balance. Yay!

My focus right now is to lessen and then curtail this compulsion and addiction. It's hard to do "cold turkey" but I have to do it so that I can save enough money in my Savings Account. At least I controlled the money in my savings but the one I cannot control is the money that coming out fast because of my hobby... online shopping.

My house if full of boxes of all these stuff that I bought online which I felt unnecessary because I have enough stuff. I guess it's just for me to feel satisfied and fulfill my thought of buying discounted things which were of high quality and that I won't be buying them at the expensive marked price. The feeling that I bought them cheap is what satisfies me, but after that I regretted buying it because I am not using them.

Hopefully, this compulsion will go away and that my life will turn out normal with no problems at all. That's all I want right now. And to save money as well for the rainy days.

Last Day Of Orientation

Today is the last day of orientation for my third orientee. Her name is JQ. I had her for 7 weeks and I am confieent she can do it on her own pretty much.

I feel good that another RN was been released in the quagmire condition of nursing. She's be nervous at first but I believed she will do right. She just needs a little encouragement and less monitoring. As long as she asked if she's in doubt, she'll be fine. And I told her that, not to assume but ask if she doesn't know.

With our 7 weeks company, I can attest that she pretty much do everything from making hands off, assessing the patient, pass meds, do some procedures, collecting specimens, keep everything on hand, etc. I always told her to check residuals before touching the enteral tubes, no matter what she is doing and to assess the condition of the abdomen. I also told her to firstly, assess the respiration first, which is the first thing to do, check the vent settings, the saturations, the chest rise and falls, the breath sounds, suction patients frequently, etc.

I also enumerated to her to do spot checks from head-to-toe and assess ABCDEFG which stands for Airway, Breathing, Cardio, Disability, Exposure/Education, Further Information, Goals. That's the only key that I always used when assessing my patients ad I am happy to pass it on to her. Which she complied with much resolve.  Yay...

As I parted with her tonight, I gave her a little memento to take on her nursing journey, one stainless bandage scissor and one stainless hemostat for removing very tight male adapters form the PICC lines. I'm glad she took it!

I also told her that if ever she needs any answers to her questions in the future she can call or text me anytime. I needed to assure her that I am not leaving her on the sides with a guarantee that I am always available just in case she is in a very tight spot.

I wish JQ good luck and welcome to the chaotic world of nursing!

Planning An Inter-Covid19 Times Trip

It's been six months already that I've been working with extra shifts and lo and behold I have saved a lot of money. Now I felt that I needed some much needed vacay so I decided to book a vacation to Cancun and Mexico City since Mexico had opened any US citizens can visit the country.

It's been a long time that I have not traveled and so I took the risk this time despite that Covid19 is still on the rise. I guess this thing will not ot until a vaccine will be out to ate the virus. But at this time since there's no luck to stop it people doesn't care anymore on what they are doing. But for me, I am very bored and tired from working 12 hours-a-day for five days.

 I've been itching to travel since at this time of the year I always plan to go on a long trip to my favorite place in this globe... Europe. I am an avid Europhile so I always go their every year. But since it is Covid19 time, and Europe is close to any US citizens, I will opt to go to my neighboring country down south. I've been there several times and I just can't help coming back there. Me and my cousin will embark the first leg to Cancun, Mexico for my extended birthday celebration.

We will spend out Halloween and Dia de los Muertos there. We will explore Cancun, Playa del Carmen, and Tulum. We will bask on the colorful and sunny Carribean Beach of Islas Mujeres, Cozumel and Tulum. We will have a blast there and enjoy our trip to the fullest for this is our first trip during Covid19 times. For sure we will appear like freed animals from the picket fences. Hahaha.

And a week after that, I will fly again to Mexico City and spend 6 days there. Just winding everywhere and compensate for the lost time of traveling this year. Thank God that the country had opened many tourists for this Covid19 scare times.

Now that America is in chaos because of the forthcoming elections I guess it will take a while for peace to settle in. The opposing liberal party was the culprit for igniting this riots and anarchy just because they oppose and hate President Trump.

Ah well, I still pursue traveling despite of the scare. As long as I took precautions and stay away from crowded places. I will make sure I will enjoy this trips and will have a blissful blast.

The Reticent Dr. W

It seems that things at work was back to where it was. I felt relieved that Dr. W had forgiven me. Now I can handle his patients. I will be more careful this time when it comes to him. Thanks to Ate Shirley for talking to him and backing me up.

You just didn't know what I felt before when he got mad at me. I felt awful and it seems that I am no good at all. I mean this doctor can flick his fingers, like Thanus, and then all my credentials will be lost. But I don't think he is as villainous and mean he is as perceived by my other colleagues.

I mean every person has their soft part, so I guess Dr. W has one. If he has none then maybe he would not forgive me. I am just fortunate that he gave me another chance and that I will treasure and learn apart.

So far the people in the administration knows about what happened and initially they instructed the house supervisor to not assign me to his patients which they followed. I thought I will get suspended that time. But lo and behold they did not. Maybe they realized that they needed me because in reality the facility is short of staff. And that's the other reason that Ate Shirley had explained to Dr. W.

Whew.... I was just lucky enough that he is a forgiving guy despite of the mean outlook. I guess he also gauged each staff whether they can be trusted with his patients or not. And he always did it to me after the incident. Good thing I was kind of responsive at what he ordered and that they were done on time without any miss. I'm just probably making an impression to him so that I can earn his hard-to-get trust.

Now, I have to keep and treasure this trust and will not try to disappoint Dr. W again. So help me God!

Lesson Learned That Sticks

The previous nights I was busy with a Parkinson's patient who I think was dying. He's having severe desaturation down to the 60's to 50's and was just steady between 60s and 70s. His blood pressure was between 60s/50s-70/40s.

For the desaturation, the RT placed him on Hi-Flo at 50 liters 70% but still his saturation had plateaud at the high 60s. They even did the ABG but it was fine. I told the charge nurse and asked her to call the house doctor. The house doctor came and ordered to place the patient on BiPap at 16/5.

I also called the attending physician but he did not order anything because the patient is DNR. He told me to call the pulmonologist which I did not do because the house doctor was already ordering to give comfort to the patient.

For the low blood pressure the house doctor ordered a low dose dopamine drip but still the patient kept deteriorating with the saturation and BP going low. After two hours I saw the monitor at the station that the patient was in ventricular fibrillation. I went back to the room finding the patient dead, not breathing and no vital signs.

I call the primary doctor again and informed him about the death and he called back and acknowledge the call. He told me to call the family which I did. At first the POA does not answer so I left a message then after two calls I called the second person and lo and behold she answered and said that she will call all the family after I explained to her that the POA did not answer after 2 calls.

At around 3AM the pulmonologist made rounds and got mad at me because I did not call him. He also got mad at the other nurse who also had a just a patient died ahead of me. He told me that next time I need to call him for any changes in condition. I apologized to him which he did not answered.

After an hour the supervisor called me that the pulmonologist was mad and that he told her that from now old I will not be assigned in all of his patients. The supervisor made a report and forwarded it to the nursing director.

I went home so down that day fearing that I will lose my job. I prayed and prayed to God to help me out. I was off that day so I needed to unwind my worries. I went to the beach to just feel the air and vent out my emotions. I cried a lot.

I went home very scared but still I prayed because I trust the Lord for my future. When I came back the next day after my off the on-duty supervisor told me about the nursing director's decision which lifted my anxiety. I told her that I cannot sleep and was very worried.

When the pulmonologist came the following day she asked him if he can give me a second chance because he feels that I deserve a second chance because I really took care of my patients. The pulmonologist told her that he will give me a second chance and warned her to tell me to stay focus all the time.

Thank God, He answered all my prayers.

Random Thoughts For Last Month

The month of August had gone by so fast. Many things had happened and was surely recorded in the annals of history. All the memories will be gone and forgotten and some will be remembered. My personal life right now is extremely boring. Maybe because of the covid19 situation happening globally. People cannot go out and mingle. And mine was only between work and home and nothing else. As much as I wanted to wander or travel, I cannot even do it because of this covid19 scare. Even going to the grocery store was limited to an early morning eavesdropping and visit wherein there is less people shopping. That's the effect of the spread of covid19 nowadays.

Watching the TV nowadays was even scarier. A lot of protests and riots in some major cities and a lot of black people were shot by the police. I mean those people who really provoked the police to shoot and kill them. After George Floyd there is Jason Blake who was shot in Kenosha, WI lately. He was charging the police and even challenged them by walking towards the them on the street raising a knife with one hand. Hence, he got shot several times at the back.

Even the peaceful protest in Portland, OR was turned into a riot destroying private and public properties and a lot of unnecessary looting. Their stupid mayor was encouraging the rioters to rally and voice their opinions. How stupid! And it came to a point where the rioters went to his apartment and burned it, demanding him to resign. Hahaha.... Now, he showed up in one of the TV network and proclaimed that Trump caused the division of the nation. WTF!!!

*******

The DNC and RNC conventions were the latest talk of the town. As I watched TV it really irked me how bias the media were. It was really obvious that they wanted to overthrow the president and they really disgusts him that much. I guess Trump is the best candidate at this time compared to Biden who is not truthful and was kinda demented now, plus his party had encouraged this chaos happening around us right now.... the riots..... the looting.... the unnecessary burning of the federal buildings.... the toppling down of religious and iconic historical statues and busts....the media bashings.... the BLM and Antifa threats....etc. I admire the president for not being affected by all of this hate and still continued to make the country stable. I also heard the speech of the first lady during the RNC convention and oh my..... there were a lot of comments especially the left side saying that it was overrated. Whatever!!

******

I heard from my cousin in Batangas, Philippines that the pigs were thriving well with only some minor problems. One of the pig was mildly coughing and they started giving him antibiotics and isolated him from the herd. She said that they were growing as expected and teh weights were well maintained. That there is no major problems at this time. I am glad that this project was successful. Hopefully, it will be continued for another cycle or maybe for several cycles. At least people there has jobs to do especially taking care of the pigs rather than just asking money from me and do nothing.

*******

It seems that my work at Sharon Care Center seems toxic nowadays. The DON is not that supportive to the nurses anymore. One time, one of the night RN called off during the day shift and the AM and PM shift texted her and asked her of her decisions regarding the staffing. Can you imagine she did not respond? So the PM RN supervisor texted her that she cannot stay over because she will be working in the other job in the morning. When the PM RN Supervisor left, the building was left only with one licensed nurse which is an experienced LVN. Then at 1AM the licensed staff called 911 because one of the patient in Station A was critical and the MD ordered to transfer her to the hospital. Then the LVN texted the DON about what had happened, and she responded at 2AM. I mean how come she did not responded when the AM and PM nurse surpervisor texted her? She is the DON and was been paid 24/7. If there is any problem in the facility she has to respond right away because she is the DON. And now she threatened the previous RN Supervisor because she left the building with only one licensed nurse. That's bullshit!

******

My sister was another big headache. She got sick last month because she's not buying her medicines despite I send her money. My niece had told me that she looks like she's gaining weight also which aggravated her diabetic condition and now she is miserable because I don't send the money to her directly but through my niece where she had a spat with her because of this. I did that because of the fact that she's not buying her medicines and it's much better if my niece will buy her medicines and give it to her. In that I can be sure that she is taking and buying the medications. Now, I don't have any problems anymore for her buying unnecessary stuff and foods that made her gained weight and is not allowed for her disease condition. At least I know now what is happening to her because my niece is spotting check her and is my watchdog. Just trying to be clever here and I know it's not the best idea but at least it worked at this time.