It's been a good-news, bad-news kind of almost-month.
The good news is that we're very busy at Sunnydale (Healthcare for the Hellmouth). The bad news is that we're so short-staffed in every department except the one that does, like, colonoscopies and stuff that I've had five-patient days lately. As in, start with two, discharge those, get three.
The good news is that The Boy is moving down here in a couple of weeks, and that he has a fabulous new job that will keep me in beer to the point that I'll need to have my own floating scooter to get around the house. The bad news is that he's got shingles.
Yes, shingles. I diagnosed them over the phone after thinking to myself, "Gee, poison ivy doesn't usually occur along dermatomes along with a scratchy throat and a headache." He later went to an actual medical professional and confirmed it, and got all the meds he needs to fight off the outbreak.
Which is good, because the bad news is that I've never had chicken pox, and my titers have been falling the last few years. Herpatic encephalopathy is all fun and games until somebody goes blind or dies, and I, personally, have no intention of spending my remaining years drooling onto my own shirt while sitting strapped into a high-backed chair.
...Even though that sounds a lot like work.
Good news: I have, thanks to The Boy, newly weeded and replanted front beds. Bad news: we lost two tomato plants to unknown causes. Good news: there's a cardinal nesting in my rose bush, and she's laid three eggs. Bad news: I now have to find out what cardinals eat.
Good news: Changes are afoot at Sunnydale!
Bad news: They involve uniforms, not staffing. Manglement--and by this I mean the Tippy-Top people, who haven't, as far as I can tell, set foot in either Sunnydale or Holy Kamole in ten years--have decided that we all need to wear the exact same thing. From housekeeping to nursing to radiology, we'll all be wearing the same. damn. thing. Clinics to hospitals, top to bottom.
Good news: The uniforms are cheap. Bad news: They're in extremely limited sizes and are 100% polyester.
But, you know, what do you expect? When you're faced with a shortfall in staffing that's brought about by crappy working conditions and low pay, why *not* require everybody to buy new uniforms from the one place that you've declared will sell them? Bravo, Manglement, for addressing the troubles in our facilities in a constructive and thoughtful way!
Good news: I planted beans and peas and melons and carrots and radishes and okra this past week. Bad news: I watched a blue jay, that bastard, pull up each and every okra plant one by one and fling the sprouts around. The next batch I put in will be coated with cayenne pepper and bobcat pee. And will be hiding special Bastard Blue Jay Killing Machines.
Unmitigated good newses: The Boys went to the vet today and got a collectively clean bill of health. The exact words the vet used were "perfect," "beautiful," and "sweet." They're now sleeping off both the trauma of being cooed over and petted by six attractive young women, and vaccines. Flashes huddled in the exam room sink while Notamus tried to stand on his head in the corner of the room, but they both got over their jitters pretty quickly.
And now I am going to go Google cardinals' diets and head to bed. That's very good news indeed.
Thursday, April 11, 2013
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
9 comments:
Cardinals are mostly seed eaters. They love sunflower seeds, especially.
This has stuff on feeding and such: http://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/northern_cardinal/id
I didn't know there were any treatments for shingles. Anti-virals?
And 100% polyester is of the devil!
Cayenne won't keep away birds--only mammals have the receptors for capsaicin. So it's great for keeping the squirrels away, but birds happily eat chilis for the seeds and are not bothered by the capsaicin in the least.
Cardinals like seeds. Seeds they like. I believe any kind.
I assume Manglement is confused and now thinks they're managing a group of fast food chains, hence the identical uniforms so that you all are "branded."
We here in the "northern" climes of Kentucky must put up with the philosophy of "Management by Pre-K" -- that is that we are all unruly children who must be brought to heel by any suitable means of degradation. We bugger on. The latest dictate is, "Thou shalt not eat or drink ANYTHING at the nurses' station, under threat of unknown consequences." (Presumably termination for drinking water while on the job.) All the while the doctors parading in with their own Biggie Sized cups of Joe.
Hope the Boy survives his shingles.
I am almost excited to imagine you in little tiny scrubs.
But really, that sounds horrid.
<3
Tomaters will do that. I lost my Big Boy around Feb of this year.
Do Cardinals eat tomatoes??
Black oil sunflower seeds, the love 'em!
What boys!!!! how did I miss this.....
polyester will make you all sweat and smell. delightful thought... and all looking the same feels very communist. I like our local ED where we know the people in mid blue scrubs are the doctors - despite the fact they look gangly pimply and 16, it reassures us they are in fact not orderlies, who wear light blue. The nurses wear a fetching green, and the admin staff get to wear mufti. I wonder how they feel about having to wear real clothes amongst all the scrubs....
:)
Identical uniforms up and down the scale make it harder for customers to tell whether they're being treated by a Registered Nurse or an orderly.
Oh what the hell is with the need to make us all Betas, or Deltas, or whatever. Geez. . .
I think the hospitals just simply don't want the makers of cute, functional, breathable uniforms to make a living. Boooo. . .
Post a Comment