Jessica, my crocheting partner in crime, was on with me for this last shift. Liz knowing she would be on with the yarn brigade brought her own embroidery project. She started it a few weeks ago and admitted that she had had this project since her daughter was little (now in her late 40s early 50s) and had never finished it. When Jessica had asked me to teach her to crochet and we spent our down parts of the night being domestically productive. Liz thought she might join in on the sewing fun and pick back up her 40+ year old project. Now after just three weeks she is over half done and promised to send a picture of the kitty when it was finished. We focused on our triage and checked all of our rooms. I just love it… Don’t put off for tomorrow what you can do today. We made sure all of our ducks were in a row then due to decreased census and being at core staffing we were able to sit and talk and crochet while we waited for the emergency department to call with new patients for us. Jessica is an amazing crochet student and picked it up in hours I am honestly amazed. The first few projects you make as a crocheter should be unrecognizable but no Jessica is starting with an afghan and the sides are perfectly strait. It does not at all look amature. I was working on crocheting washrags for a Christmas show per request from another coworker. Jessica had been watching pretty closely what I was doing so I gave her an extra ball of cotton yarn so she could give it a try. I should have photographed it. It is square and you can see the pattern pop. She gave it to me and I love it. It will deffinately be going to Virginia with us.
At change of shift we visited with the oncoming shift for a little while then Jessica and I walked out to our cars. Some times when you are going through the motions you know what is happening to you but you still don’t believe it, it just wasn’t right that we were clocking out and walking out together for the last time.
After work I bee lined it straight to Shedd Oregon to drop off my cache of washrags for the Christmas show and pick up some beef organ meet that was gifted to us by a friend. We are looking forward to eating the cow tongue in the next couple days as part of our early Thanksgiving Christmas party on Saturday. After visiting for a little while I headed to Albany Family Medicine (occupational health) for a respiratory fit test. Seriously these things are one of the biggest pains of travel nursing. I got there to descover they would not actually have a doctor in house until 11/3! That would just not work. We hopefully will be half way across the country by then. My recruiter is still trying to work out this detail.
The tiredness of no sleep all night was fading away and I was feeling cold and a little cloudy in the brain but over all good getting home to Salem around 10:30am to Chad hard at work going through our room and getting rid of the things we didn’t need, packing what we did, and organizing the shelves with what we do need but not with us for this assignment. We grabbed a gift I had for Silverton FBC and the dog and headed out. We had a short time to visit with the Silverton FBC staff before our vet appointment. Everytime I’m there it is not the same kind of fulfilling to say high and catch up for a few minutes as it is to work shoulder to shoulder. I would be so nice to work a hand full of shifts to actually be with my Silverton family. We are so thankful for their support, enthusiasm, and encouragement. You are not my whole foundation but definitely a big part of my grounding.
Myra was diagnosed with a yeast infection of her ears with the vet wanting to see her back in a week…well that can’t happen. That opened the door to talk to the vet about what we are doing and she opened right up. It was actually quite amazing. We chose a care plan that would work for our up coming plans and bade our fairwells to the vet.
Lunch must have been good because I don’t remember too much after that, just waking up around three with a kid crawling on me on the couch which was when I groggily chose to head to bed. My alarm was set for 5:30pm and I had a 6:00pm coffee date. I wasn’t thinking that clearly and didn’t change the time hoping I would be able to get ready quick. I woke with my alarm which I suppose is a miracle in and of itself and jumped in the shower. When I got out of the shower I got distracted talking to my recruiter about the plan for housing and the fit test and knew I would get to coffee late. I sent off a message to to let my friend know. I fumbled through the freezer trying to find one of the beef hearts we had been gifted so my friend, a fellow homeschooler, would be able to dissect it and have a fun learning experience. It ended up being in the bottom of the second part of the bag. Now running 7 min. behind I attempted to get a hold of my friend by calling. She is notorious for being hard to get a hold of by phone, but really this was my fault for not changing my alarm. I prayed she would still be there or maybe even also running late. I made it to Starbucks about 10 min. late with no sign of Angelina. Hmmm I ordered my coffee and sat on a high stool keeping one eye out for her. Had she been there and left? Was she running late too? Instant messenger, texting, and phone calls were not helping me and the coffee was yummy so I waited. Focussing on getting some of my blog posts from this week rolling. Hmmmm still no Angelina. I do love to people watch and had noticed a red car in the parking lot that had the lights on and people in it. But the last car I knew she had was blue. That car pulled out and it was nearing 7:00. I finished my coffee and used the restroom and decided well at least I need to get this cow heart to her. I did not have her current address as she has moved since we started traveling, but I had been there once or twice. Chad would know but he wasn’t answering his phone. I thought maybe I could find it on my own. I had an idea of the general area and the general look of the house although it was dark and that wasn’t going to be helpful at all. Voila, it happened, the first corner house was too close to State, the second was not the right color, but the third was just right. I was not sure that I was in the right place so despite the thoughts that flashed through my mind that if this isn’t the right house it might belong to some crazy person who would grab me and I would be a goner so I said a quick prayer and made my life right with God first just in case then went up and rang the doorbell. Score, it was the right place, they were home, and despite me holding a huge cows heart (frozen and in a bag) they let me in. They had been at Starbucks in the red car that I had been watching. Oh well. We found each other and it was way more fun visiting in the comfort of their home than Starbucks anyway.
Few. To bed. Finally. Goodnight.
Owens Endeavors 