A Mixed Bag

I have just come in from a most frustrating shift at the Nursing Home. I was working with a woman whose communication skills were poorly lacking. She constantly replaced a sentence with a word and expected that to suffice. At other times she would keep repeating the same thing to me despite my acknowledgment of what she was saying. At one point I even had to raise my voice to her over a resident as she appeared not to have heard my response to her repetitive statement! Very unprofessional of me, I know.
There is also so much cliqueness and bitching that goes on amongst staff. I find myself becoming increasingly adept at ignoring people!
It is the residents however, that so often make it for me (cliche though that may be!). A resident told me tonight that I do very well.............for my age!
Thanks 90 year old Daisy!

More fractured ribs

Last night when I got home from work, I had the phone call I had been expecting, although I didn’t realise how much I was expecting it until it came.

There was a message from Dad on the machine saying that Mum had had a fall and was in hospital. It was nothing major, but she had broken five ribs and bruised her shoulder. This in itself wouldn’t have required her hospitalisation, but she also had some blood in her lung, so they wanted to monitor her for infection and blood clots.

I saw her tonight and she looked quite good. She wasn’t distressed or confused. She was annoyed that she has had her share of falls outside on hard concrete which bruised and battered her, but it took a fall inside on wall to wall carpet to fracture her ribs!

She seems to be handling the pain well – and don’t I know about that pain having fractured my own ribs in the past
….well, one rib…….
......................................well maybe it was only bruised, but could well have been fractured!

Recovered Documents

Amidst my feeling of disequilibration, I had a mini IT crisis at work. Of course it wasn’t really a crisis and at any other time it wouldn’t have felt so, but it is times like these when the proverbial mole hill appears mountain-like.

I had been working on a number of documents using a USB stick and a laptop at another site than my office. I did the silly thing of creating it on the USB stick with the plan of copying it in onto the laptop, rather than the other way around. Before I got to copy it three of the four documents somehow corrupted and I couldn’t access them anymore.
When I got back to the office I asked the IT person there if she could help. She had a quick look but said it was beyond her, so suggested I send them to the IT department at our head office, which I did. That was last Friday. When I got back into the office on Tuesday I had an email from him saying, in essence, sorry but there’s nothing we can do.
I could have done them again, but that would have meant another half a day wasted. I was feeling immobilised by the situation. Last night however, I was round at my man’s, who is something of an IT whiz – AND HE RECOVERED MY DOCUMENTS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Another reason to love him!

Disequilibrated

This doesn't quite explain how I feel at the moment, but I like the word so I thought it would be a good title!
I completed an essay recently and was going through some of my old ones to double check my referencing. When I was looking at the old ones I realised that I only did them last semester. It felt like at least a year ago. That was a reflection of how I'm feeling about study at the moment. It doesn't really feel connected to anything at present. I don't feel like it's leading me anywhere. I don't feel like I'm learning anything from it right now. I feel like I'm going through the motions.
At work I'm feeling a bit anxious about the project I'm working on. It's coming closer to the end (December) and I don't have as much of a sense of the end result as I would like. I guess I had hoped that I would end up with something solid and concrete that would make a major impact on the industry. That 'ain't gunna happen! It may be that I end up with more questions and answers, with yet further recommendations.
I guess I'm wishing for some more stability in my life, perhaps even some more direction. When I feel like this my natural response is to stop moving, to stop searching and just remain where I am and do very little...and yes, wallow a tad as well. Somehow I do end up moving on again, I feel the ground is stable enough to keep on in some direction.
Don't worry, this isn't major. I go through disequilibration from time to time. It's just uncomfortable for a homely cancerian like myself.

Skipping

I love seeing children skip (not with a rope). I actually like seeing anyone skip, however I can't remember the last time I saw an adult skip, which is fair enough, I always try and skip unseen!
To me, the act of skipping is the epitome of lightheartedness. It's a reminder to me not to take life too seriously.
Today I witnessed a pre-schooler having a temper tantrum in the street. Her mother kept on walking. The little girl then started after her. She broke into skipping. I found this an interesting juxtaposition, one that I wouldn't have thought could co-exist - skipping whilst crying!
Maybe it's possible to not take life seriously in a serious manner!