I'm not dead yet...... Really!

To all of you who have cared enough to miss me - thank you!!!! Sorry I've been off-radar so long, but it's been a chaotic couple of months. The short version....

1. Mike and I are engaged!!!! <> We've set a date of March 11, 2006, which gives us plenty of time between his exams and the holidays and stuff.
2. Charlie the kitten broke my PC monitor. I came home to find the monitor broken on the floor, and him with a bald spot and cut on his forehead. So my at home internet use is now nonexistent.
3. Work has become insanely asinine. I can't even articulate how much I hate both my job and my workplace. The latest debacle - something got screwed up, so the paycheck I was SUPPOSED to have direct deposited Thursday nite, now isn't going in till Sunday nite. So my rent check will bounce. Fuckers.
4. The holidays were insane, but fun. Ate way too much, drove to Ohio, drove to Iowa, bought presents, gave presents, met family, had a blast. But it's taken me this long just to take down the tree.
5. The ex is selling the house. Not sure why this bothered me so much when I found out, but it did. AND the fucker threw away my Christmas ornaments. You know, the ones your parents give you when you move out! Asshole.

Mostly lame, but there it is. I'm not dead, but I'm afraid my blogging will continue to be severely curtailed for a while. Oh, and I'm moving at the end of February, so I'll be even busier then. (Just moving in with Mike, same complex, new, bigger apartment.) But I'm not dead, and would love to hear from you all. Hope things are well and good and wonderful!!!!!

Iowa

Went to Iowa last weekend to meet Mike's family. It was actually quite a lot of fun!! Mike thinks they all love me, which is good. And I like all of them, so it all works out.

And we ate at this kick ass "grill your own meat" restaurant. You go to the cooler, pick a ginormous steak, and throw it on a huge grill for as long as you like. Mike's brother grilled for all of us, and it was DAMN good. My only reservation about the whole deal is that you KNOW that people have a couple of beers, and suddenly the grill is very dangerous.

Also saw the Capital Steps, a mostly equal opportunity political satire group. Mike's dad, a staunch Republican, didn't seem to enjoy the same parts of the show that Mike and I did.... Imagine that.

Yeah, it was a good weekend. But if you've never been there, let me tell you - they aren't kidding about Iowa. It really is ALL corn.

Postmortem

Wow. Tuesday and Wednesday were quite disheartening for me. But I am taking some comfort that, at least THIS time, it was a real election, with real results. No funny business, no hanky panky -- well, at least not much.

While my initial reflex was to take Mike and the critters and move to Australia, that inclination has passed. Now, I want to stand and fight. This "mandate" business scares the CRAP out of me!! Look at what they did when they DIDN'T get a majority of the popular vote. Now that they picked up a whopping 51%, the sky's the limit.

Yup. The bumper sticker stays.

Vote!!!! Please.

Yall know where I stand, but to be honest,

I just want you to vote, no matter who for.

Though if I find out you voted for Keyes, I may thump your head.
Go forth. Become empowered. And democratize.

My cousin's wedding

So I know I mentioned that my favorite cousin got married. This occasioned a trip back home to Ohio, which I usually enjoy anyway. This, coupled with the chance to see extended family that I haven't seen in forever, well..... I was excited!

The rehearsal dinner was Friday, and the wedding was Saturday. Both were just great! It was the first time I had met my cousin's wife, and she was so sweet and kind. And both of them were just so very very good for each other. They reminded me of me and Mike - they just so obviously loved being around each other! I cried a lot at the wedding, and reception. The bride was just gorgeous. And another cousin made a beautiful toast at the wedding to his brother, which choked up everyone.

It was great. I had a wonderful time. I'm so happy for all of us, getting to share that joy in love and life and laughter. That's the part of getting married that's important to me - feeling that joy, and sharing it with (and seeing it reflected in) those around me.

Oh, and I got a cool bumper sticker: "Defend America. Defeat Bush." Yay me.

Parrot

So we hired this girl to work in neuro a while back. She had worked in research medicine, and done all sorts of cool stuff, and we were fairly excited about having her.

Well, things didn't work out quite as we had expected. She was very high strung, and quit once in the first week because the doctor told her she needed to be on time, and only had half an hour for lunch. Yeah, *that* kind of high strung.

So one day last week, I walk into work, and run into another neuro tech. "You should come see our new friend!" he tells me. I go back into their surgery prep room, and there is a PARROT sitting on a chair in there. No cage, no tether, nothing. Just sitting on the chair. Oh, and shitting on the chair, as well.

Now, I like parrots. As long as they aren't mine. (Kinda like kids!) But this bird had no business whatsoever being in our hospital (where we don't treat birds), particularly unrestrained. Even more ridiculous, nobody knew it was there! And you guessed it, it belongs to the high strung girl.

Well, eventually somebody figured out the parrot was there. The powers that be get involved. She refuses to leave the bird at home, because "she's too intelligent to sit at home in a cage for 14 hours". I buy that, except we told her when she interviewed the hours were long and varied. So she quits. Again. But then somebody convinces her to come back, and the bird gets a whole women's bathroom to herself for the rest of the day. Nobody would use the bathroom that day....

Doesn't show up at all the next day.

Early this week, she calls back. Says she didn't mean to quit, just to go part time.

That poor parrot.....

Ex stuff

So I emailed the ex to let him know about Cleo. I also asked if he had a pic of her, so I could put it with her urn. I didn't hear from him at all until Sunday night, when I got an email saying that the pics, with four boxes of my stuff, were on the porch and if I didn't get them by Wednesday, he would toss them.

I can understand why it is that he would hate me. (Reasons I don't care to go into here, but I think they're valid.) But it still hurts. I care about him, and hope he's doing well.

And it was really damn hard to go to the house. My roses look good, except one has black spot. And my vine took off. But none of it's mine any more, which made it really really really hard.

I think all of this is why Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind made me so melancholy - because I understand how memories can be so damn bittersweet.

Eternal Sunshine

Watched this movie last night. Not sure what to think. Not a happy story, or even a nice story, by any stretch. Some neat quotes, though.

I guess I was just disturbed by the idea that people would erase their memories, just because they're painful, and lose the ability to learn from them. And then found myself wondering if any of my exes would do that, to forget me. I suspect the most recent one would. And that made me sad.

For later

Parrot
Wedding
Jersey Girl
Cleaning
Ex stuff

New Job

Also, started the new job. That's sucked up a lot of my time, and I don't have a desk anymore, so no computer access during the day. But....

In some ways it's better. Better hours, definitely. Hell, I have today off!!! Yay me!!!! But I'm frustrated. My co-workers are all 'certified', meaning they went to school and sat for the national boards. Me, I've just worked at this for like 5 years. So they assume they know everything, and I know nothing. This really really really annoys me. But I'm trying to keep a lid on it, and just keep reminding myself that I'm going back to school soon.

The other thing is that the doctors aren't very efficient. Certainly nothing like what I was used to in neuro. I'm finding if I nudge them ("Can we do this ultrasound next?") that they're responsive, but I don't always have time to do that.

Oh well. At least I didn't have to stay till 9:30 Monday night, like my replacement!!

Charlie

Yeah, I know, I've been remiss. Many, many reasons, but the biggest is - I got a new kitten. His name is Charlie. He's darling and funny and loves my other critters. He's black and fuzzy, and will probably have long hair that will shed everywhere and give him hairballs.

Emma was afraid of him at first, but they've gotten over that. Last night, as Mike and Emma and I sat on the couch, he jumped up with us, curled up between Emma's forelegs, and fell asleep.

It's done me good to have a baby around. Distracted me from missing Cleo. And he has some of her mannerisms, but not in a painful way. More in a remembering-how-much-I-loved-her way.

Pics to come, as soon as I get a camera.

Balance

Fortunately, I got some balance at work today, in the form of newborn (2 day old) kittens. It was just what I needed, to see new lives starting. And a darling orange tabby kitten who's neurologically not right, but so very sweet. I love him.

Yeah, today hasn't been all bad. But I still wish it were over!

Codes

We have three different codes here. A green dot means go for it, crack their chest, internal defib, the whole nine yards. A yellow dot means drugs and CPR. A red dot means no code, just let them go.

I had a red dot code on me today. I almost resuscitated her, not thinking about it. But she needed to go to heaven. Her owners were trying to get her a kidney transplant, which is great. But she also had awful heart disease, which meant she couldn't breathe. This made her a crappy candidate for the transplant.

Since she was a no code, and I happened to be the one to see her start to die, I got to stay with her through the whole process. It was awful, and I won't describe it here. Suffice it to say, I hope that if I ever get to that point, someone just gives me a ton of morphine and lets me go. The owners didn't want us to euthanize her, but to just let her "die naturally." I don't think they understood what that meant. At least, I hope not.