driving the Element again

 

took me a month to dig it back out and scrape the hell out of the windows.  after the snow came a freeze and that freeze caused about a quarter inch of ice to form on all the glass.  it was beautiful yesterday so i went ahead and did more digging/scraping and even some snow shoveling again.  we've had another couple bouts of snow. 

after that i set up the battery charger as the Element battery gave it up on that cold stretch. about 15 minutes later it started right up.  drove it around the block yesterday. today i took the dogs to the dog park.  

went with a friend and her dogs yesterday.  we were trying for N. Biv but that parking lot was packed. weekends.  they have gotten much more busy since the covid started. people discovered the great outdoors.  i'm happy for them, but sad for me.  haha. 

so dog park the last two days. i'm cool there.  two moose sightings yesterday, only one today.  no bad interactions though either day.  Sunny Boy did snack on some moose poop. brat

he is a poodle, i expect better of a poodle, but a dog is a dog.  he is not aware of his elite status of poodle.  haha. more compliments on his cut. making his Mama proud. 

these are obviously fall mushroom and color obsession days with the phone camera. 

i ordered a set up to try the dogs out on seat belts in the cr-v. i find myself slightly concerned that i'll get rear ended and the back hatch will open and the dogs will jump/fly out into traffic. i've also seen video's of dogs being tossed about in an accident. Sunny sometimes seems anxious back there, perhaps he's getting tossed about a bit.  so seat belts.

the dogs from the doggy day care in Skagway are so well behaved in their seat belts.  it may take some time for these guys to catch on...well mostly for me to learn how best to help them catch on.  at the moment i worry more about them getting twisted and breaking a leg from that. it would be nice to be able to put groceries in the back of the car. hard to find the right car for dogs.  you have to make due. the Element is still a preferred dog car. they are lower down in the back...though Ivy insists on riding up front.  i could put up a gate for that car to keep them in the back.  i have it. 

my great nephew was extubated today so very happy about that.  RSV is a nasty bug, especially with these wee ones. hoping him a rapid recovery at this time. 

below is an example of how old decaying leaves some times look like halloween masks. 

trying to recall what lake this is...? hmm. Talkeetna? xyz? not sure.could be university too. 

got the litter box changed and the bed changed.  love fresh sheet days.  always a challenge making the bed.  Ivy usually is in the mix. she is such a happy and sweet dog.  she has loads of tennis balls but the other day she found one of the bags i have of replacement tennis balls. there she was trying to chew her way in to get at them.  how could i resist. 

my two nights of work this week. night one was on the Peds unit. no isolation patients. that part was sweet. wasn't a bad night at all. 

night two i was assigned to work in the ER doing hold patients. very early on they said i would be moving to ICU. they had to juggle around the staff to get me there though so in the end it took until midnight. 

i got a patient from another nurse and 4 hours later i got an ER patient.  they went from bad to worse as the few hours i had them went on.  don't see a good outcome there. the night for me went pretty quickly though. 

after the first night i stopped by to sign my you've been bad paper because i have 4 sick events for the year.  one falls off in February. 

the next morning i scheduled for my annual evaluation.  i am always satisfactory. i take excellent care of my patients i believe but really that never factors in to excelling as a staff nurse. for that you have to do all the extra committee's and bull that i have zero interest in.  i have managed to stay on night shift and far away from all the fluff of the job.  that fluff is what makes you shine though.  really my job is between my patients, my immediate co-workers and the families of the patients and none of those people ever really factor into your evaluation. 

management don't work directly with me.  i've been there a long time and i think overall, i am liked.  i'm sure i've ruffled a few feathers and i do speak up...i'd say holds is where my moodiness can come out. it's just the most frustrating job there and the place i probably risk my license the most. you just end up doing a half ass job on all your patients and hoping it all works out.  i know i do less of a half ass job than others though.  experience and instinct are incredibly helpful in this line of work. 

the management team in float pool is great overall so ended up laughing and chatting with them both mornings. 

around 5 am on the busy day in ICU i was encouraged to take a break.  the staff there went and got a key and showed me this somewhat secret new room they have for staff to relax in.  there is a massage chair, fake candles, oils, coloring poster.  it's pretty amazing...why don't more units have these. i took a 15 minute massage break. 

when i came out one co-worker was all, "i haven't even been in there and i'm staff" basically.  i was all i've worked here for over 20 years.  then she said, "i mean ICU staff".  i was all i'm staff everywhere...i have worked in that ICU non-stop all these years no matter where i was officially assigned.  believe me...i am staff.  she is super nice, but last i knew she does repeated travel assignments...i'd say that makes me more staff than her but maybe she's signed on now? my eyes were rolling a bit.

a dialysis nurse was working with me on my patient. he has a place in Homer.  turns out he smartly took money out of his retirement fund right before it dumped and used it to buy a place. now my brain is churning a bit.  use it before you lose it? hmm. i think you can take a bunch out once without getting dinged on it.  could be tempting. 

no idea what the economy is gonna do and interest rates have gone up.  

work has improved a bit with covid crap finally abating.  staffing issues are there so that is a different stress.  we shall see.  our nation is headed for some changes. still just hoping this is the last hurrah for the confederacy.  those fools have been angry for a long time.  the lives they think they should have just do not exist anymore. there just isn't room for their hate. the generation coming up won't have it. they have been raised more and more in a diverse and accepting culture.  they just aren't bothered by the things their parents and parents/parents concerned themselves with 

they also have access. they see that people across the globe just want the same things, aren't really all that different. we all want to live our lives free. 

Christianity is taking a bit of a nose dive.  access to information makes these old religions tougher to stick with. there were many Gods in past cultures.  many with similarities to the stories of Jesus. a group of friends (apostles) that went around with them.  a death, a resurrection.  these things repeat probably because they evolve over time and take from the past and bring to the future. Christianity did it to themselves as well.  they took from the pagans in order to wash them out. what will the new order be? other Savior Gods Osiris, Adonis, Romulus, Zalmoxis, Inanna...so many others came before.  

the hate that these Christians are clinging too.  judging, making demands of others.  freedom of religion means you can live all your funky rules but you can't force others to. there are also other religions that exist in this nation and they are not all going to want to follow the bible rules. these evangelicals are striving for a Christian nationalist society.  even if they are successful in the short run, they will eventually lose.  that is the history. lives may be lost, they may gain power for a time, but in the end.  the nation will end up more free.  just hope it doesn't cost too many lives or take too long. 

of course, a nuclear bomb could also become the end of most of it for many of us. humans will be what destroys humans.  

another mass shooting.  it was an older guy, 72. it was right by my old home town, South Pasadena.  sounds more like it was personal.  older victims, a ball room dance setting.  no place is safe really.  he killed himself today it sounds like. the right loves guns and the NRA and will do everything to protect guns and fetuses...unless one of those fetuses is in a woman killed by a gunman. 

all you need to do is take a breath and the right is done with you.  then they won't help you.  they won't help pregnant women either...so that is proof of the lie that is the "pro-life" movement.  as i've said, the GOP screwed up ending Roe, it will bite them.  they were better off with those fetuses than they are without them. all those babies being born will make demands, those demands will not be met.  

none of the things they vote in would please the current Savior. Jesus was kind and probably a liberal.  he had no use for the money that these current churches seem to hoard and collect at the expense of their poor church goers. they have found a purpose for their hatred and a group of people to make them feel okay about their hatred.  

those people....

eventually, those people are your people and it gets harder and harder to shun so many. 

Sunny gets his vaccines this week.  excited to get a weight on him.  curious. 

spent some time today chopping ice off the area around the wheels of the CR-V. it had gotten pretty thick.  used a crow bar to whack it off.  took some time. wanted to be careful to not hurt the car or the tires.  way too hard to kick off though.  it was a block of ice. 

i do enjoy a snow filled winter.  ice can be such a pain.  snow is pretty and less dangerous in some ways.

this week in the news a woman and her 1 year old son were killed by a polar bear up north.  maybe i already mentioned that.  not sure.  very sad as that seems a really horrific way to die.  

there was a bull moose at University Lake that fell through the ice.  some folks came to it's aid.  tied a rope around the antlers and eventually got it out.  one of the antlers came off and it looks like later the other one did as well...so the rescuers got a nice set of antlers for their good deed. if it was the same bull that i took photo's off a month or so ago...that was a nice rack. 

i always try to get the back deck shoveled first in hopes that less snow will come inside through the dog door.

i think it may have been a nice sunset tonight.  i came inside so i missed it. overall it seemed a bit grey out there today.  as i walked at the dog park the blue skies appeared so that was really nice.  the temperatures have been great this week. 

this is Campbell Airstrip

this looks dog park for the sunset.

a neighbor stopped by he surmises we won't have to mow our lawns this summer until late June or early July.  haha. 

Sundance Film Festival apparently released a documentary about Kavanaugh. the possible alcoholic womanizer that found himself on the supreme court. they have gone totally rouge at this point. taking their direction from the evangelicals.  there is little respect and that needs to return as a first point of order to getting our nation back on track. 

trumps justice department ignored tips about sexual allegations.  it has all been about getting their judges into position for decades. the Dems were and are way behind on this. the movie makers father worked on the Iran-Contra and the Attica prison uprising.  this film has been kept secret until it was viewed by like 300 at the festival. tips came flying in once it was out there.  many said, the people they had listed who could help prove their stories had never been contacted. 

like fellow judge and womanizer Thomas...i doubt they will step down from their positions. there is absolutely no oversight of our supreme court. it's like in the mormon church when they get their second annointing.  they can't be touched. 

will 2024 vote be split between trump and desantoad? a desandtoad in the whitehouse would be worse than a trump. he knows how to work the system.  

nobody sitting on this bench.  hopefully, things will get better before they get much worse.  

thankful for A. being born when i was.  looking a bit dark these days.  we had a carefree childhood in many ways. B. that evangelicals were just a joke when i was kid and held no power.  tv evangelicals...total joke, now they are wealthy and filling thousands with hate and unbridled greed. C. music, it really can set a mood.  off to bed. 

nice folks can really be detrimental to society. you gotta be willing to rock the boat!

 

week one done. always a great feeling.  this week i got put on call briefly, but the perk of that is that i got overtime for a regular shift and went home early so it's like i worked the entire night. lucky me. above is my female cat Miss Breezy Chatterbug. below is Sir Covid Cat. they must have elaborate names.  haha. 

i was just settling in to do some of that paper shredding i had been talking about when the call came in to head to work.  ended up in pacu for several hours. moved patients for them. wasn't too bad, but they just had more coming out from OR than they had staff for. it all worked out, i headed to ER to give breaks and after that, i went home.  an on call is a rare beast these days.

the next two nights i worked Renal care and then PICU. 

a cool rock someone else painted that i left for a co-worker one night.  

that puppy face...now he's a big boy.  he gets so many compliments on his haircut...well, i guess really i should accept the compliments since i do the hair cut.  he has always been adorable. i always figured i would doodle my poodle when it came to the cut but this cut really just seems to work for him and he is a poodle...so i found a bit of a blend  i guess since this cut isn't in my poodle haircut book.  

the war rages on still. that f-er dropped a bomb on an apartment complex. many on the right support the futin arse and see Ukraine as a democrat or something...they are just mad because trump got impeached for trying to bride Zolenskyy and he didn't go for it.  the goal was to get Zolenskyy to just say they were investigating biden and his son or some such lunacy. those on the right are petty, hate filled, ragers...and supposedly followers of the very liberal sounding Jesus. it never seems like many of them actually have heard the message of the new testament. 

was listening to someone speak about how nice people in the end enable people like hitler. this morning i was thinking it was like those people do not ask questions or demand answers, they simply bury their doubts and questions and demand nothing. this allows the evil that exists to just run through. 

it's ironic to me though because many i know who are christians read all they can about ww2 and the holocaust.  finding it horrific but then they do the same thing that many germans at the time no doubt did...claim fake news, look the other way, believe crazy lies and conspiracies blaming others.  it's the same that was done then and they are fascinated by how that happened and yet incapable of seeing that they are those people.  they aren't the ones who were hiding jews in their basements, they were the ones looking the other way as the jews were rounded up. telling themselves yet another lie. 

so they believe putin over the many actual documented truths of what is happening over in Ukraine.  it may be that over 100,000 children have been taken from Ukraine to russia to what fate we will never know. children, though treated terribly often across the globe are also a commodity. 

the right wants to breed a population but they have zero interest in aiding those children to have any sort of future. i still think it's mostly for canon fodder as they say. they didn't have any interest in risking their lives by joining the military and they certainly do not want their kids to. you need people on the front lines for all the battles...the truth is the poor in our nation join the military because if you live it will give you opportunities. they need poor.  the right also needs the immigrants they rail against. better to keep them down but those states rely on the legal and illegal people to exist. 

the truth also is the right needed the fetuses to be aborted. for all they scream about being "prolife". it damages their message to save those lives. the fetus has never needed anything from the right. the burden was on the pregnant woman. once those fetuses are born and become children they have needs, their parents have needs. the right has zero interest in fulfilling any needs but they did get a lot of mileage out of calling the left baby killers...so now that they have gotten their way they have to find new battles.  

they won't find anything as easy to bilk emotionally as the fetus though.  free and emotionally charged their base.  people just aren't going to care as much about sleeveless dresses in state houses. they do try over and over, distracting with one invented outrage after another. 

clearly the most entitled and outraged people on the planet if you ask me. big bird, disney, ovens, m&m's, sleeves, books, people dressed up and reading books to children. they must all have incredibly high blood pressures being so pissed off at such tiny things.  then they go and create even more things to be pissed off.  conspiracies with no facts to bind them to reality. they don't care...nothing needs to make sense, the more outrageous the better it seems. 

not many cabins out there. i did book one night for this summer for a family visit and one for March with friends. 

last summer he discovered the shed roof. looked pretty cute up there sunning himself.

this is at the dunes.

the last two days i've just popped over to the dog park.  easy and they have fun

pretty fall leaf in the early winter.

this looks like Reflection Lake

swans passing through.

been a moose in the dog park both days.  both times in the back trails.  Sunny today noticed the moose laying down off trail. he started to head over to say hello. he wasn't listening to well at that moment so i just started making noise and being a fool running past the area where the moose was. it worked. dogs do get fascinated by you when you behave like a freak. you just have to be willing to be a freak.  kids are similar. 

distraction is often needed in order to get a blood pressure or exam.  last night i was dancing to baby shark. it worked.  in life...be okay with possibly embarrassing yourself.  who cares...i mean really, who cares!  we are often taught to care way too much about how we are perceived. 

in truth is pretty arrogant to think that your silliness is going to be someone's big issue. 

i act a fool with some regularity. 

need to do some more rock painting.  some stamps arrived from Ukraine and i was going to send some off with a gift for my brother. wanted to paint a bear bread i'd collected.  will have to see if it's viable.  had it drying off in the corner behind the tree over the holidays.

what adventures will there be this summer.  we shall see. always lots of options. the cabins, well a lot of things do fill up quickly.  with covid waning i suspect we will be getting back to full capacity of tourism. 

little love between pets, always cute

really love when the mushrooms grow out of the stumps out there. 

here are a few examples.

another cool leaf. i like to find the individual leaves each year that make me smile . some of the older dry ones look like Halloween masks too..so those are fun.

just another type of fungi

these are from Sept 21...another great year for mushrooms.  

kind of a set up...looked pretty with the red berries.

the Tusker makes an appearance. :-) 

Sunny is becoming a good little watch dog.  Ivy is now willing to let him share duties. like when Tusker was around, they will swap out it seems. one will stay upstairs with me when i sleep, one downstairs, then they swap out. 

always a treat to find cup fungi.  there are different varieties of course. 

this below is Cheney Lake 

more pretty leaves

for sure Cheney Lake.

and will end with more fungi

will grab a quick snack before i crash for the night. probably head to bed early. Monday walk tomorrow. we shall see. perhaps the big loop...the bikes have packed that trail down quite a bit. 

better get my day ended. maybe shred a bit each day off. get on top of all this paper that collects in the house. 

thankful for A. improved treatment for these little babies with rsv... B. brainless entertainment, it is needed some days C. ice water.  always a favorite.  not much into soda or juice and all that, sometimes but mostly i just love my ice water