We had quite the view from our room this morning. We all slept in more than usual. The kids have not been getting to sleep until close to midnight since Friday night as we were getting things ready for this assignment and packing the car then, we have been pushing on until dark which doesn’t happen this far north until 11:30pm usually we push on but the kids fall asleep in the back of the car in the dark. It turns out that if it does not get dark they stay awake indefinitely. After this many late nights in a row it is finally catching up to them.
We were across the street from Target and Starbucks so I dug out the laptop to take a few required tests at Starbucks while my crew found some breakfast and looked around Target for a new camera for Caleb. I did not know how many tests to expect but anticipated that it would be the normal four or five. I don’t know if it was because at this hospital there is a different vender manager than my own company (although there was also a different vender manager with my last assignment), but the list of tests went on and on, I counted them up and there was 32 tests…. Some of the tests were sixty questions long some four questions long. Most of them I had to get 100% on to pass if you didn’t get 100% you had to retake it and the questions were different each time. Some were multiple choice, true/false, fill in the blank, and some had multiple answers and you had to select all that applied. You can see why I was getting frustrated…one of the questions I got wrong because the answer was The Joint Commission and I only put Joint Commission.
This is a small portion of the list of tests it scrolls down, way down.
These are a normal list that employees in the hospital setting have to take every year, I get the pleasure of taking them every three months. There normally isn’t this many, and I have taken a lot of them for my agency, some like fire safety and restraints I have taken already this week for my agency and here I am taking them again. The way many of the questions were worded with their fill in the blanks and multiple correct answers I would have to scan the attached document (many pages) for the correct answer so I wouldn’t have to take the quiz several times. They don’t relate to my field of expertise, and questions like how long the Ebola Virus is present in seminal fluid after a patent has recovered from the desease and no longer considered contagious in any other way are not things I have a lot (insert any) experience with. The few tests that were applicable to my specialty were crazy as well. How far apart are the contractions in the photo below?
There was about 10 minutes of strip showing and the intervals ranges from the above one minute to three minutes with two intervals being one and two intervals being three. The answer options were:
1. 1-2 minutes
2. 2-3 minutes
3. 3-4 minutes
4. 4-5 minutes…..
Hmmm I have a 50% chance of getting it right. I selected the 1-2 minutes and of course got it wrong, but you can clearly see in the photo that those two contractions are infact one minute apart. I ended up passing the test, but everyone that I got wrong I could tell you why my answer was right and I was willing to fight for it as they were only going to give me one chance to pass the test. At one point I even called my recruiter because it was rediculous. I have had tests that were way out of date for current best practice and evidence based practice in the past, but I have had two chances to pass it and what ever I got wrong on the first I could remember the incorrect answer and give them what they wanted on the second go around in order to pass the test. With my blood near boiling with frustration, and shakey having had only coffee, a banana and a marshmallow dream bar all day I called it quits at 2:30pm Chad and the kids had been to a few stores, had breakfast, then later had lunch at Carl’s Jr while the kids played in the play place and were again sitting in the car outside of Starbucks waiting for me to finish. I climbed in the car and turned on the hotspot on my phone and kept testing as we drove up and checked out Palmer, I was feeling sick to my stomache as I was hungry and coffee just doesn’t settle for me if I haven’t had anything else. I took a picture of the Palmer water tower for Steph and Chad noted how bad I was shaking. I joked that it was ok to drink two cups of coffee when I’m not at work since it always affects me that way my patients don’t appreciate it when I have to start IVs with the shakes. I’m a good shot and I still get them, but they interpret them as nerves until I apologize for my coffee shakes. So, I try not to drink more than one cup of coffee per half shift when I’m at work. All the same I needed to get something on my stomach. Chad had remembered a sushi place on our way back through Wasilla where he could run into and just get one order of Caifornia rolls to go. I worked on some more tests and let Trevor and Hillary know we were on our way. Chad came back with a box and exclaimed that they better be the best California rolls in the world as they were a whopping $17. I gues he didn’t even look at the menu and the prices just ordered California rolls. We opened up the box to discover this.
I have never seen purple rice, a quick internet search states that the purple rice is black rice that turned purple when it is cooked it is higher in some vitamins and sweeter than white rices. They were loaded with crab, and raw asparagus I would not have known they were supposed to be California rolls and would have not believed it, but Chad doesn’t make a habit of lying to me so I’m pretty sure that is what they are supposed to be. So good so good. They calmed my stomach and I was able to keep plugging away on the tests. Luckily we had cell service all the way to Anchorage and the last several tests were things I had experience with so I didn’t have to scan pages of info to answer each question. I finished the last question of the last test as we pulled into our friend’s driveway near 4:00pm. A nearly 8 hour day of just testing, I understand that it is a accreditation compliance issue but good grief. We enjoyed visiting with Hillary, Trevor and their beautiful little girl. We haven’t seen them since I was way pregnant with Eve so it had been a while. Trevor was one of Chad’s roommates at NNU, it was fun to see them on their own turf. They suggested pizza for dinner at a local favorite called Moose’s Tooth where they brew their own root beer. The pizza was great and Caleb decided that we must try to make our own root beer. It was so good to visit with friends that we almost never get to see and meet their new family addition. Thank you guys for dinner and the time to fellowship, we so enjoyed it.
Owens Endeavors 
We were so happy to see you guys. I hope we get to visit with you more while you are in AK!