Daily Post 140: All the Things

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Today went well enough. Our new tech was sent home since she had a fever. Before she left I was able to get a bunch of CVC packs made. I also started mixing a batch of acid for the clinic. No smoke poured out of the machine when I turned it on so we were off to a great start. My FA showed up for a little bit. She had a good vacation.

For dialysis, the day was pretty much as smooth as it could be.

Before I clocked out I decided to check my email one more time just for shiggles. I had a new email about the DSS Leadership course. I’m accepted for being “recognized as a teammate who exemplifies the companies mission and values”.

I no longer have to spend the rest of the week wondering if I made it or not. I’m still not really sure how I feel about it. I mean… good, I guess. I’m honored that I was chosen but I don’t think happy is really the word I would use to describe my feelings even though that’s how most people would expect me to describe it.

I’m glad I know. I’m looking forward to seeing what it’s all about and interacting with the other applicants who were chosen. I’ll know more in the coming weeks as far as when the first session will be held and what will be expected of me.

Yesterday wasn’t an awful day. It actually turned out pretty decently. I made it to the gym like I said I would. I rowed for 20 minutes. I listened to music. I felt better about going. It was a better workout then what last weekend was for sure. More positive feelings; like I actually accomplished something. I stopped at the gas station like I said I would, too. Go me. Screw you, Depression. You can’t hold me down for forever.

I cross stitched for a while after that. I’ve made a fair amount of progress on my new project. I’m going to be taking a picture of it before I begin working on it tonight so I can try to have weekly images.

I thought about going to the gym tonight, but I’ve opted not to. Instead, I have laundry started since there are about three loads that need to get done. I’ve eaten since I was super hungry when I got home. I still am so I might cook a burger patty here shortly since filling myself with water isn’t doing the trick.

I’ve spent the past “way longer than I meant to” looking at a couple of recipes. I’ve wanted a good homemade spaghetti sauce recipe for a while along with a bourbon chicken recipe. That led to looking at breakfast recipes for whatever reason. It’s like a black hole once you get started. >.<;

I talked to Jon on my drive home and told him the news about being accepted to my course. He got to tell me about his weekend and the good time he had in Ft. Lauderdale with friends.

Ox and I have plans for working on the addition tomorrow and I actually feel like we’re going to do the stuff we talked about. We’re both feeling relatively good-ish. Today is the second day in a row where I haven’t taken cold meds and I’m still alive and breathing on my own. Woooooo!

I think I’m a little more tired than I should be, but realistically I did a fair amount of lifting at work on top of my regular six-mile day of walking back and forth in the clinic.

Oh! Speaking of… I’ve noticed my feet don’t hurt nearly as bad when I get out of bed in the morning since wearing my compression socks. I used to have pin and needle sensations whenever my feet would touch the ground when I woke up. Sort of like they weren’t ready for more sensory input. It would fade within the first minutes of being awake, but it still sort of sucked to start the day with that feeling. It also wasn’t normal for me. It’s not something I grew up with or have had all my life. It’s been something new since working dialysis; specifically since being here in Nebraska.

Well, those sensations were still sort of there this morning, but they were greatly diminished from what it has been. Like, noticeably different. Different enough that I am now consciously aware that “oh yeah, I’m not in pain. Best morning ever!”

I’m hoping it’s a trend that continues until one day it’s no longer there at all.

So yeah… I’m feeling a bit better. Less sick and less sad / depressed and a lot of that started with talking to Ox and saying that Depression could go fuck itself. Why is it that curse words always seems to make things better?

It’s supposed to snow tomorrow which sort of sucks, but hopefully it’s not a lot and even more hopefully, maybe the sun will come out at some point this week and the wind won’t be awful and I’ll get to spend some time outside. Wishful thinking, mayhaps, but it can’t stay cold forever. One day it will be spring and shortly after that it will be summer again and it will be amazing.

Daily Post 137: Socks!!!!

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My older brother sent me an Amazon gift card for Christmas. I used it to buy badass compression socks for work.

I. Can. Not. Wait.

omg…

Seriously, I can’t begin to put into words how excited I am to get socks. It’s sort of sad how giddy I am and how much I gushed over them with Ox earlier and how I’m continuing to gush over them here, on my blog, to the entirety of the internet because oh my god I can’t wait to get these socks.

I feel like an adult. It’s like when you finally are able to not lose a pen long enough to have it run out of ink, or using an entire tube of chapstick on your own. Some things just mark adulthood. Excitement over socks I think is one of them and I’ve reached that point in life. If I wasn’t such a cheap bastard… I mean… frugal lady, I would be getting them sooner but I didn’t want to spend extra on shipping so I’m doomed to suffer for days, longing for my amazingly sexy, badass compression socks.

I mean… look at them…

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How could you not get excited over something like that? Work will never be the same.

Anywho… on the subject of work… I made it to phase three of the leadership application process. I will have my phone interview hopefully the 14th of this month.

I’ve been approved for my week of vacation in February. I haven’t asked about March yet. I’ll get around to asking about that sooner rather than later.

We had our pizza lunch today to celebrate passing our annual skills check. I skipped out on going to a social dinner with everyone because fuck that socializing thing. I came home and ordered socks like an introverted badass adult instead.

Today was payday, too. It’s my amazing paycheck of crazy overtime and incentive pay for working so many days in a row. I also got my Concur report for all of the traveling I did during the month of December. That was an extra $300 ish. I paid bills and then made a really nice payment on my credit card. Killing it with fire. Woo.

I still have extra but I want to hold on to it for a little bit. I like seeing digits in my account. It’s nice.

I plan to buy the headgear and new gloves that I want since when I spare at the dojo my sensei wants me to use full gloves rather than the MMA fingerless gloves that I have. I prefer my fingerless ones since I can still grip with them, but I understand why he wants me to use the full gloves instead. Muay Thai isn’t MMA. If I’m going to do both then I need gear for both. It’s like when I was wearing my Aikido gi to my Jiujitsu class. In my head, it’s sort of disrespectful.

I want to talk to my sensei about the gloves before I buy them and since I want to order the headgear and gloves at the same time, that means I have to hold off on the headgear, too. Lame. But worth it. I would rather have his professional opinion on size rather than ordering and having to send something back.

Work went really well today. I got there super early to take the system out of its disinfect phase and get the clinic ready so the new tech and I could focus on stringing the machines. She did really well. We did two of them together. After that, she did it on her own fine. I know it will take more than one day for her to feel fully comfortable with it, but we’re on the right track. We both plan to get to the clinic early again on Monday to do the same thing.

She got to initiate two treatments today with me watching. She did well even though I could tell she was nervous. She watched me initiate our ISO patient and I got to explain how to cannulate his access since his can be tricky. Closing the clinic went ridiculously smooth with three people. She’s more confident in discontinuing treatments and cleaning the equipment which means she’s also faster at it.

I told her my opinion is that all she needs is time. She knows what’s she’s doing. I’ve watched her. She does it all right. She just needs to keep doing it so she gets confidence in herself. She agrees. She says she second guesses herself a lot and she’s worried about doing something wrong.

She’ll be fine. I’m looking forward to seeing how the clinic grows and changes she becomes a more secure and stronger member of the team.

I guess not a whole lot other than that has happened. I’m home. I’m about to start watching Attach on Titin: Season 2. I’ve been watching Black Butler, which is amazing. I’ve watched all three of the seasons of Bleach on Netflix. I’m almost done cross stitching something for Jon. It’s his Christmas gift… exceedingly late, but better late than never.

I don’t know what the plans are for dinner, but that’s ok. I ordered socks. : D

And with that, I’m off to go enjoy the first Friday in a very long time where I don’t have to do anything on Saturday. Or Sunday. A whole, full weekend of no work. My mind is melting into a gooey puddle of mush at the thought of not having to do anything. The only way it could get better was if there were canceled plans involved.