Wuv changes evwything

2003-06-05 - 9:01 p.m.

Today is Day #5 of Random Guestbook Signing Week. Do you know what that means? It means that today is Thursday which means that tomorrow is Friday which means that it's almost the start of a nine day vacation!!!!! I know what you're thinking. You're thinking, "Geez, this girl is always complaining about how she always has to work and how she has no time off and gets so little sleep and she whines and whines and you know what? That's such a lie. She's always on some sort of vacation! Didn't she go to New York only a month ago? Wasn't that a nine day vacation also? And didn't she go to Asilomar two weeks ago?" Well, let me just say that my trip to New York was actually a month and a half ago, so you can just stop thinking all those negative thoughts right now, you hear? ;)

8:16 a.m.

This morning I talked to the lady who is in charge of keeping track of my sick days and vacation days. She informed me that I have 40 hours of vacation time and 88 hours of sick time left. How did I get so much? How did I get so much more than anyone else? Then I looked at a calender and do you know what I discovered? If I use all my time, if my projects were done, and if the Mole hadn't told us back in July that we can't take the last week off, then tomorrow could be my last day here. Not counting the two ops shifts I have left. I'm going to use the vacation to take all of next week off, but I'll probably end up wasting the sick time. Too bad. But who has time to take that many days off? Tomorrow is my last day in the hospital anyway since after my vacation I'll be working in the poison control center. I can't take any time off while I'm there because they are already displeased that I will only be there for two weeks instead of the customary four. Maybe I can talk to the Mole and see if he will bend on his no taking the last week off rule. That would be awesome if I could be done now!

9:04 p.m.

At lunch I talked to the Mole about the whole sick days thing and basically he just laughed. So I'm taking next week off, but I'm wasting the sick days. That's ok, really. I mean, working in the poison control center is really a once in a lifetime opportunity, after all.

Today we had a new attending on our team. I actually think he was covering for the other attending who had somewhere else to be. In any case, this attending is an excellent doctor, but he's such a jerk. I know he's a jerk to everyone so I shouldn't take it personally, but sometimes it's hard. Some doctors have good bedside manner and some have poor bedside manner; this doctor had no bedside manner. On rounds today he didn't talk to a single patient. Usually we talk to them and tell them exactly what's going on and reassure them to the best of our abilities. With this guy as the attending we talked about them in front of them in medical-ese and then walked away. Luckily, the residents aren't quite so cold. They would hang back and pat hands and assure the patients they would be back to talk with them some more and explain everything. Several times while we were discussing things this attending would spit out comments about the evil, anti-patient, pro-monetary savings pharmacy department this hospital is saddled with while giving me a dirty look. I was amazed at his rudeness. It was like a physical slap in the face. He would say these things and then walk off leaving me stung and stunned. Ah well, as my grandfather would say, it takes all kinds to make a horse race.

However, during rounds, when I wasn't being insulted or entertained particularly in any other manner, I made up a new game. Yes, my "Rent" obsession continues. I was casting the characters of "Rent" using only members of my CCU team. It was very amusing for me. I would tell you all about it, but since you don't know any of the people, it wouldn't be amusing for you. I'll just tell you that I ended up casting myself as Mimi. Mostly because I couldn't imagine me kissing any of the other women on the team and Mimi is the only straight woman in the show. Although I'd really have to practice to pull off Mimi's little ass dance effectively. What was really amusing, though, was imagining the guy I cast as Angel doing "Today 4 U." Especially since he has a goatee...hee hee...

Guess what else I did today. Remember the MPJE I went on about in boring detail yesterday? I took it today. Between yesterday afternoon and this afternoon I read the entire Nevada pharmacy law book cover to cover. Stimulating stuff, that. The test ended up being pretty hard though. I swear there was stuff on the test that wasn't in the book. Oh well, I don't know if taking the test will have any usefulness for me, but I took it anyway.

This afternoon there was another "Friends of the Library" booksale at my local library. I have books coming out the wazoo around here, but I went to the sale anyway. I can't resist. I ended up buying nine books for a total of $5.50. None of them are books I'm terribly excited about, but all have definite potential. Since I do have so many books around here and since I got these books so cheaply and since I'm not too attached to any of the books I just bought, I posted some of them at Swappingtons. Those of you without accounts there, you really should sign up (it's fun and free!) and tell them Eucalia sent you. Those of you who do have accounts there should run over there and see if I have any books listed which you might be interested in.