Monday, May 31, 2010
You know work has taken over your life when....
You know work has taken over your life when... you start dreaming about babies and have nightmares about teaching women how to breastfeed! lol. And I'm not kidding, I actually dreamt about this last night! haha Thank God I'm coming home to MD this weekend! Can't wait!!
Friday, May 28, 2010
Sea World
So much to update on but no time! It's been so crazy busy lately. At work, we're either dying from boredom or dying from being too busy. Well, this week was a full moon and all the moms were giving birth. Our entire floor was full and we started doubling up rooms. I was a complete zombie wanting to kill myself by the end of the week.... but that's a different story for another time. This blog is dedicated to Shamu! lol
So my aunt was in town for a work conference. My cousin, who's currently living in LA for school, drove down and the 3 of us got to spend a nice Sunday together. We started out the day going to the NEX (Navy Exchange) so they could go shopping. The NEX is pretty much like a giant Macy's/shopping mall with just about anything you'd be interested in buying. The best part is that everything is at a discounted price AND you don't have to pay tax. I bought my mommy a Coach purse for her 50th birthday and my aunt bought one for herself. After the NEX, we went to Sea World! This was my very first time going to (any) Sea World. I love sea life and dolphins are my favorite animals so I was looking forward to it. It was kinda windy and a little chilly that day but sunshine all around!
The best part was that I got to go in the park for free and I got my aunt and cousin 20% off. Sea World had a "Here's to the Hero" thing going on and gave free admission to all military members. It was so awesome. On top of that, around the park there were signs that read "Here's to the Hero's". And to my surprise, right before the Shamu show, they asked all military personnel past and present to stand up and applauded us. I felt so honored and was so happy to see how much support the troops were getting from Sea World.
The show was great, it felt short but it's amazing how they train these animals. Here are some videos and pictures:
Shamu!
Dolphins!!
So my aunt was in town for a work conference. My cousin, who's currently living in LA for school, drove down and the 3 of us got to spend a nice Sunday together. We started out the day going to the NEX (Navy Exchange) so they could go shopping. The NEX is pretty much like a giant Macy's/shopping mall with just about anything you'd be interested in buying. The best part is that everything is at a discounted price AND you don't have to pay tax. I bought my mommy a Coach purse for her 50th birthday and my aunt bought one for herself. After the NEX, we went to Sea World! This was my very first time going to (any) Sea World. I love sea life and dolphins are my favorite animals so I was looking forward to it. It was kinda windy and a little chilly that day but sunshine all around!
The best part was that I got to go in the park for free and I got my aunt and cousin 20% off. Sea World had a "Here's to the Hero" thing going on and gave free admission to all military members. It was so awesome. On top of that, around the park there were signs that read "Here's to the Hero's". And to my surprise, right before the Shamu show, they asked all military personnel past and present to stand up and applauded us. I felt so honored and was so happy to see how much support the troops were getting from Sea World.
The show was great, it felt short but it's amazing how they train these animals. Here are some videos and pictures:
Shamu!
Dolphins!!
Thursday, May 20, 2010
This one goes out to...
This blog goes out to my family who I miss dearly!
To my dad: who sat down and wrote me a real letter! He even stuck a crisp $20 bill in there and told me not to forget to start saving for retirement! hahaha Oh I love my dad!
To my mom: who never tires of me calling and asking for advice on what to cook or how to cook this and make that. Always there to offer her advice, even if you don't need it =P.
To my sister: who still goes out of her way to do stupid things I request back home. I know times are a little tough now with the job and stress and all but I have all the faith in the world in you. I'm sure I'll be seeing you out here soon ;-)
To the rest of you: miss you guys and I hope to see you out here soon (before they decide they want to deploy me!) lol
To my dad: who sat down and wrote me a real letter! He even stuck a crisp $20 bill in there and told me not to forget to start saving for retirement! hahaha Oh I love my dad!
To my mom: who never tires of me calling and asking for advice on what to cook or how to cook this and make that. Always there to offer her advice, even if you don't need it =P.
To my sister: who still goes out of her way to do stupid things I request back home. I know times are a little tough now with the job and stress and all but I have all the faith in the world in you. I'm sure I'll be seeing you out here soon ;-)
To the rest of you: miss you guys and I hope to see you out here soon (before they decide they want to deploy me!) lol
Sunday, May 16, 2010
Happy Armed Forces Day
I am a couple days late but Happy Armed Forces Day! It's still hard to believe that I am now part of the United States Navy. I am proud to serve my country and the brave men and women who are risking it all to protect our freedom. Here's to all of you!
Friday, May 14, 2010
M*A*S*H* Relay
It's 9:30pm and I am completely exhausted...like wiped out. Why? I have absolutely no idea. I did NOTHING today at work. I had two patients, one of which I saw for a span of 5min before she was discharged to go home. Right now, I'm mainly shadowing since I really don't know what the heck I'm doing. I spent about an hour watching my preceptor trying to help a woman breastfeed. Wtf? I'm supposed to be helping women breastfeed? How the hell am I gonna do that? I've never had kids and this is NOT my specialty area.... oh boy. I'm a med-surg nurse, not a post partum labor & delivery nurse! Before I got here, I was really hoping they would put me in med-surg... that's what I know. But I guess being the baby Ensign and being a FEMALE, they stuck me with the moms and babies. Amy! I need your help! Being on this unit is soooo different from what I'm used to. Aside from the patient population, just one small example... I used to spend about 15min in the supply room looking for the right kind of fluids for my patient because there would be about 20 different kinds to choose from. Normal Saline, D5 and 1/2, Lactated Ringers, .45 NS, on and on. Well, now I only have 2 to choose from and most patients aren't even hooked to an IV. This is going to be one (hopefully just one before I can switch) boring year. Believe it or not, we're one of the busier units in the hospitals because when Marines aren't busy breaking bones and making orthopedic injuries, they are making babies... haha go figure.
Anywho when it was about 10:45, I got changed into my PT gear and went down to the field. For the last day of nurses' week (yay my very first nurses week!!), there was a MASH relay race. I volunteered to do the race with my unit. There's a picture of the race but I can only access it from work so I'll have to save it and post it later. The first station was a "grenade toss" aka throwing a grenade waterballoon and having a team member catch a whole one in a bucket. I got to catch the grenade (and got my shoe soaked) and then I had to do the next station which was a low crawl. Then the next person had to do an "ammo" carry, which was only 2 gallons heavy. Then we had to answer 5 trivia questions and if we got it wrong we had to do 10 push-ups or jumping jacks. When the team answered all 5 questions (or got to 50 pushups lol) the next person had to do a wheelchair race to the next station. After that, the team had to do a litter carry, which is carrying a heavy ass mannequin on a stretcher and running on the track to the next person where we had to splint a person's leg using a board and toilet paper. The last part after that was picking the stretcher back up and running to the finish line. That darn thing was heavier and harder than I anticipated. I felt sooo out of shape. Well, my teammates were hoping to just finish the race but out of 9 teams, we got 3rd place!!!! Woo hooo.
^ litter carry. Lucky we didn't have to wear full gear like that. We got to wear shorts and a T shirt. hehe.
Of course, 1st place was won by the "B52" team which were corpsman from area 52 clinic who did it in their t-shirt with camis, boots and all. They were mocho big bulky guys. They finished in 3min something seconds. I wish I had pictures but hopefully they will post the professional pictures and I can get them then.
Anywho, after that was a BBQ where we got to have burgers and hotdogs. I had both. Real healthy! Then we had to go back to work.... I did absolutely nothing the rest of the day except walk around looking for something to keep myself occupied and watch episodes of 16 and pregnant on MTV. LOL. What a day and yet I'm still exhausted as hell. Tomorrow, I'm bringing a book and PT clothes to exercise. I hope we aren't swamped tomorrow.
*EDIT*
The litter carry picture is cut off but I'm too noob to figure out how to fix it so just click on it to see the full pic. If you are nerdy... I mean expert and cool enough to know how to fix it, please enlighten this "stupid Ensign" =P
Course Layout:
Anywho when it was about 10:45, I got changed into my PT gear and went down to the field. For the last day of nurses' week (yay my very first nurses week!!), there was a MASH relay race. I volunteered to do the race with my unit. There's a picture of the race but I can only access it from work so I'll have to save it and post it later. The first station was a "grenade toss" aka throwing a grenade waterballoon and having a team member catch a whole one in a bucket. I got to catch the grenade (and got my shoe soaked) and then I had to do the next station which was a low crawl. Then the next person had to do an "ammo" carry, which was only 2 gallons heavy. Then we had to answer 5 trivia questions and if we got it wrong we had to do 10 push-ups or jumping jacks. When the team answered all 5 questions (or got to 50 pushups lol) the next person had to do a wheelchair race to the next station. After that, the team had to do a litter carry, which is carrying a heavy ass mannequin on a stretcher and running on the track to the next person where we had to splint a person's leg using a board and toilet paper. The last part after that was picking the stretcher back up and running to the finish line. That darn thing was heavier and harder than I anticipated. I felt sooo out of shape. Well, my teammates were hoping to just finish the race but out of 9 teams, we got 3rd place!!!! Woo hooo.
^ litter carry. Lucky we didn't have to wear full gear like that. We got to wear shorts and a T shirt. hehe.
Of course, 1st place was won by the "B52" team which were corpsman from area 52 clinic who did it in their t-shirt with camis, boots and all. They were mocho big bulky guys. They finished in 3min something seconds. I wish I had pictures but hopefully they will post the professional pictures and I can get them then.
Anywho, after that was a BBQ where we got to have burgers and hotdogs. I had both. Real healthy! Then we had to go back to work.... I did absolutely nothing the rest of the day except walk around looking for something to keep myself occupied and watch episodes of 16 and pregnant on MTV. LOL. What a day and yet I'm still exhausted as hell. Tomorrow, I'm bringing a book and PT clothes to exercise. I hope we aren't swamped tomorrow.
*EDIT*
The litter carry picture is cut off but I'm too noob to figure out how to fix it so just click on it to see the full pic. If you are nerdy... I mean expert and cool enough to know how to fix it, please enlighten this "stupid Ensign" =P
Course Layout:
Monday, May 10, 2010
Learning how the Californians d0 it
So the past couple weekends that I've been off have been dedicated to cleaning, apt stuff, shopping (not the fun kind), and cooking. I haven't really had too much time to go out and explore, or meet new people for that matter. On some afternoons after work, I'll drive to the beach by myself to either squeeze some PT time in and go for a jog, or just de-stress by the ocean. It's so nice to live so close to the beach, it feels like a permanent vacation. It has been lonely though and I do miss my family. But this weekend, I actually got to go out on the town and meet new people. My coworker is awesome and invited me out to play beach volleyball. She lives right on the beach!! Now, I play a lot of sports... soccer, tennis, basketball, football... you name it, but volleyball is one sport I just completely SUCK at. We had to wait a looooong time to finally get a open court (although I didn't mind haha). The scenery was great and I was thinking how much fun it would be to have a beach party at Moonlight Beach.
The funnest part was that night, after our game. There were a couple birthdays over the weekend and one of the girls rented a party bus to go downtown. The bus was equipped with a wet bar, lights, music, and a stripper pole. And the best part was, the bus dropped us off and picked us up right outside the club... no need to worry about a DD. We went down to Stingaree and since one of the girls knew the owner, we all got to go straight in for free. Yes, a group of about 20 of us!! It's also crazy how insanely small this world is because one of the girls that we went out with that night graduated in my class from high school!! Anyways, here are some pictures from the party bus.
I wish GB was here so we could all rent a party bus. How much fun would that be?
Apparently, it's not uncommon around here to rent a party bus and take a bunch of your friends downtown. I guess Californians really know how to party. I could get used to this!
To top off the weekend, I got to video chat with Taylor, Home, and Amy this weekend. Technology is awesome! Then today, I got to see Ranak since she was in town for a wedding. We got to go around downtown and just chill. Woo hoo for three day weekends. Tomorrow, I start my first 12hr shift. And it's nurses week!
*Edit* Man, I really wished I had used suntan lotion today, soo burnt!
The funnest part was that night, after our game. There were a couple birthdays over the weekend and one of the girls rented a party bus to go downtown. The bus was equipped with a wet bar, lights, music, and a stripper pole. And the best part was, the bus dropped us off and picked us up right outside the club... no need to worry about a DD. We went down to Stingaree and since one of the girls knew the owner, we all got to go straight in for free. Yes, a group of about 20 of us!! It's also crazy how insanely small this world is because one of the girls that we went out with that night graduated in my class from high school!! Anyways, here are some pictures from the party bus.
I wish GB was here so we could all rent a party bus. How much fun would that be?
Apparently, it's not uncommon around here to rent a party bus and take a bunch of your friends downtown. I guess Californians really know how to party. I could get used to this!
To top off the weekend, I got to video chat with Taylor, Home, and Amy this weekend. Technology is awesome! Then today, I got to see Ranak since she was in town for a wedding. We got to go around downtown and just chill. Woo hoo for three day weekends. Tomorrow, I start my first 12hr shift. And it's nurses week!
*Edit* Man, I really wished I had used suntan lotion today, soo burnt!
Wednesday, April 28, 2010
I don't wanna grow up, I wanna be a toys r us kid...
So you'd think that once you are finished school and start working, you'd have tons of free time right? I mean, no more studying, no more assignments, just go to work, come home and then do whatever you want... WRONG. I think I am even more busy now than I was before. A different kind a busy. One that never seems to end. I tell ya, growing up is not all it's cracked up to be. LOL.
Anyways, I guess it would make sense to start at the beginning of my move but that might take too long and I want to get to bed at a decent hour considering it's getting harder and harder to get up at 5am as the week is nearing towards the end. I'll try to go into more details about my road trip and all (if anyone is even interested) but to sum things up, in the span of two weeks I was able to:
-Drive my car cross country from east coast to west coast
-Find a new place to live
-Completely furnish that said place
-Have my belongings delivered and unpack my heap of craplo
-Get TV and internet hooked up
-Check into my new command
-Find the nearest Wooowmart (where I've been residing for a good 2 weeks now)
And last but not least:
-Find the quickest way to get to the beach
It's been a really stressful and hectic time. I thought I would be given 10 days house hunting leave once I checked into my command but they were no longer officially allowing this leave. Luckily my boss let me have off Thurs and Friday. And even more lucky for me, I got to SD a day early and started my house hunting right away. I found my place in two days. Funny thing was, after I visited all the different places on my list, I ended up going back to sign the lease at the very first place I visited. I like the area and it's really close to work... not to mention it's only a 10min drive for me to get to the beach. So after signing the lease, I had to go buy furniture. Everything from a couch to a bed. Got this done in another 2 days. After dropping enough money to make my eyes and bank account bleed, I think I am finally settled. Right now I'm waiting for visitors! It's tough being in a new place and I haven't really met anyone yet. Then again, I've only been living here for a week. Everyone around me is military pretty much (you can tell just by looking at them). It's definitely been a challenge trying to juggle two things at once: 1) Learning military life and how to be an officer 2) Getting ready to learn how to be a nurse. More about this later....
Time for some pictures. Place is a little empty at present but it's got all the essentials =)
My front door:
Live life simply!
My living room:
Another angle of the living room:
Kitchen:
Making my first meal:
And viola! Not as good as mom but it'll do (no, I did not make the thit kho)
My Bathroom:
Oceanside Pier:
Beeeeeach:
California Traffic:
Lucky for me I take the small roads to base at 6am where there aren't quite as many cars.
Anywho... will continue more later
Anyways, I guess it would make sense to start at the beginning of my move but that might take too long and I want to get to bed at a decent hour considering it's getting harder and harder to get up at 5am as the week is nearing towards the end. I'll try to go into more details about my road trip and all (if anyone is even interested) but to sum things up, in the span of two weeks I was able to:
-Drive my car cross country from east coast to west coast
-Find a new place to live
-Completely furnish that said place
-Have my belongings delivered and unpack my heap of craplo
-Get TV and internet hooked up
-Check into my new command
-Find the nearest Wooowmart (where I've been residing for a good 2 weeks now)
And last but not least:
-Find the quickest way to get to the beach
It's been a really stressful and hectic time. I thought I would be given 10 days house hunting leave once I checked into my command but they were no longer officially allowing this leave. Luckily my boss let me have off Thurs and Friday. And even more lucky for me, I got to SD a day early and started my house hunting right away. I found my place in two days. Funny thing was, after I visited all the different places on my list, I ended up going back to sign the lease at the very first place I visited. I like the area and it's really close to work... not to mention it's only a 10min drive for me to get to the beach. So after signing the lease, I had to go buy furniture. Everything from a couch to a bed. Got this done in another 2 days. After dropping enough money to make my eyes and bank account bleed, I think I am finally settled. Right now I'm waiting for visitors! It's tough being in a new place and I haven't really met anyone yet. Then again, I've only been living here for a week. Everyone around me is military pretty much (you can tell just by looking at them). It's definitely been a challenge trying to juggle two things at once: 1) Learning military life and how to be an officer 2) Getting ready to learn how to be a nurse. More about this later....
Time for some pictures. Place is a little empty at present but it's got all the essentials =)
My front door:
Live life simply!
My living room:
Another angle of the living room:
Kitchen:
Making my first meal:
And viola! Not as good as mom but it'll do (no, I did not make the thit kho)
My Bathroom:
Oceanside Pier:
Beeeeeach:
California Traffic:
Lucky for me I take the small roads to base at 6am where there aren't quite as many cars.
Anywho... will continue more later
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