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. 

able to stock up on eggs yesterday...

 

head back to work again tonight for my stretch.  much less stress than a year ago. still some anxiety at the start of each run.  residual effects of all we have all gone through these past years. as covid stress wanes it's the newer stress of low staff and potential for poor ratio's. we have not been hit up here as badly as it's reported in the lower 48 though. 

a major issue in my mind and current experience is with the covid it became even more clear how poorly staff are really treated in the big picture.  the smucks like myself who sign on and stick with it are treated with minimal regard really. so for the past few years we watched nurse after nurse with often less experience and dedication get large contracts, bonuses and whatnot.  it made the core staff feel highly underappreciated watching this total inequitable payment for work play out before us. they get bonuses of thousands of dollars and we get a few hundred. i think there is just no way to have that play out and i think that is what we are watching play out across the lower 48.  a basic f-u to upper management. 

as i got called in last year for my annual evaluation it wasn't all the hard work, the extra efforts, the staying when so many others left.  it was about me being less than 5 minutes late to my shift one night and sick calls. is suspect this years evaluation to be more of the same.  

i could have left, i still can leave.  it's worse other places and i do just want to stick it out in many ways and just get to retirement. what these hospitals are setting themselves up for is having their entire nursing staff say screw their bull and they will be required to negotiate with individual nurses or travel nurse companies for their entire work force of nurses. nurses who live in the community are often more invested...i think it better serves the patients to have a good supply of core staff. 

as i said, things here just aren't nearly as bad as it is in many places.  we shall see how it all goes. the ones coming out of school programs also have a lot more school debt that they need to pay back.  they need more money to do that.  the nurses themselves over the years have made getting higher degrees a priority as if that was all we needed to get respect they wanted.  get a bigger degree.  

associate degree nurses were like myself.  more likely to become core nurses in hospitals. the further up you go degree wise, the less likely you are to stay in a job.  so for years the hospitals have employed staff who have ambitions far above and beyond bedside nursing and so guess what, surprise, surprise, they leave the bedside...in many cases to try to pay for the degrees the hospitals encouraged them to have. 

so we shall see what this week brings me work wise. 

eggs...they are in short supply of late. CostCo the other day was totally out. yesterday i hit the grocery for eggs before i headed out on walk.  success.  so go early. i do enjoy eggs. 

i am good for a bit now. these are from Sept 21. so far behind. always enjoy the fun mushrooms of each fall. 

it's a hunt i take in every year with gusto.

did a winter camp out with friends overnight Sunday.  roads were in pretty good shape coming and going. temps were a bit chilly heading out but warmed over night.  always night. a dusting of fresh snow. 

we had a beautiful sunrise in the morning.  all the dogs did pretty well. i'm always anxious getting them from the car onto the trail and back. it's a super busy road where you park and so it only takes one dog taking off to have a lovely trek become a tragic trek.  all were safe and nothing bad happened. 

good to get out and get some laughs in.  we all need that. i have many really good friends. life has been great to me friend wise. 

last night i hit the Wildlife Wednesday lecture at the zoo.  this one was on Round Island. given by one of the rangers that's been out there now for several years. i don't think i'd met her yet. the new and the retired managers were there.  the director over it all is going to retire later this year. 

it does sound like funding has been much more stable these past few years. still not from the state but funding has come through.  explore.org was out there last summer and will return hopefully this summer.  they will talk to them on Friday i guess. 

the boat captain that helped me travel out there the first few times passed away this last year.  so sad for him and his family.  will always remember him peeing in that nalgeen just before taking us into extremely rough seas.  we survived but it was a rough ride and very scary. 

feeling like i need to make some moves towards developing the non-profit.  it was started as a rag tag thing.  it's time to start to try to build it into something more professional.  not sure what all i am capable of. the hope is that we get more board members and that eventually one of those board members is enthusiastic and capable enough to take over for me one day. 

would also like in get some youth in there that are more capable of the modern things, making a new website, setting up a better system for donations. working towards having events that bring in money that can go more directly to the sanctuary. things that are probably more suited to someone with more experience and expertise than i am. 

i think i can be proud for what i have accomplished though.  for someone with zero skills in this non-profit world i did manage to get it set up and got the feathers ruffled that needed to be ruffled.  i wrote a few articles that were not only published but well received and effective. 

too many papers collecting in the house.  how does that happen.  i really need to do some serious purging of all the paper and crap here. it just becomes a fire hazard.  shredding and purging...next stretch off goal. 

love these mushrooms.  every year they surprise me. 

grooming session on Sunny after we returned from the trek.  kept his hair a wee bit longer for the cabin just to make sure he was warm enough. it was hot in the yurt though really.

he fell asleep so i snapped a quick video of him sleeping while i shaved him. i thought it was funny. i posted it to the poodle page on facebook...of course, the critiques soon followed. snobby, judgemental people all over the internet.  haha. i handled it well i think but this morning i just removed the post.  it was just meant to be cute and funny.  i had reminded a few people that it was literally 21 seconds long of a hair cut/style that i spent hours, off and on doing. that is the world we live in now. people hide behind their computers and try to lord everyone with their expertise. maybe those people just have small and unhappy lives. 

started taking down the Skelly group. want to make them valentines ready. not that i really care about valentines day. i'll be working.  but who doesn't love hearts. 

various classified documents are being found in Bidens old papers.  have no idea what level of classification they are or why he had/has them.  his team is finding them and dealing with them appropriately it sounds like.  they were first noted right before the last election.  there is a part of me that distrusts the right so much that i wonder if these have been planted.  who knows anymore.  trump still has many documents that he hasn't returned apparently.  of course, the right, who were quiet or outraged at the inquires into the trump classified documents are now happily chomping at the bit to take down biden for these.  

of course, his few documents compared to trumps boxes upon boxes are of little matter to them. anything they can get their hands on news wise they will scream out about like biden just gave the nuclear codes to china. 

it's also a great deal about intent. trump and his team were asked for over a year to return things, refused and ignored, and then a search warrant was issued due to the sensitive nature and their non-compliance. the right all just blamed the fbi and the dems and looked the other way at the same thing they are now acting outraged about. 

the main difference between right and left at this point is that the left is for anyone who breaks laws to be held accountable whereas the right is for only holding the left to account and ignoring anything from anyone on their side. as long as it benefits them politically, who cares.

there are some calls for a new representative on the right to step down because he basically lied about every aspect of who he was and all that was on his resume.  they could care less really because the margins are slim in the house and they need his vote. 

the right is less about governing and more about chaos and destruction....so they are already creating committees to investigate those who are investigating many in their party who took part in the insurrection. how convenient.

the dogs are getting anxious to get out there on the trails. i haven't gotten much done.  

these are more from the big snow storm and the after affects

most of the trails have gotten a bit wider but still you drop off pretty deep if you come off that trail. side trails are still only the width of a wide balance beam.  the main trails are much more manageable. 

the element remains fairly dug in.  battery dead.  really need to get that charged back up. 

the ever building to do list.

Ivy in deep

me, happy out walking and enjoying all that fresh winter air

love the snow laden limbs

the view out my bedroom window got more and more blocked the deeper the snow

so far i haven't hired anyone to remove the snow from the roof of the house. not many have. 

the snow has shrunk back.  some wind, dries out the water so it shrinks back on it's own.

have slept great this week. was tired after the overnighter.  amazing how just changing locations can alter your sleep. the dogs were super tired to.  we all get used to our routines i guess and any change is stressful in some way to your body. 

i don't clip him too short ever really.  

will probably just hit north bivuoac again today, though it is getting later already. 

am i due for another lazy day?  it's pretty out and fairly warm.  

the dogs are not into lazy days.  some one posted on tiktok that dogs have much shorter lives and those daily walks mean so much to them. it is an added motivation.  there is a cute dog walking van in Skagway that has taken the internet by storm.  super cute. a few of the poodle looking pups maybe from his litter that ride the bus.  they are for sure from the same breeder. our little connection to the mo mountain bus. haha.

grateful for A. these sweet faces that bring so much comfort, joy and companionship to my life. B. that the walrus are still being monitored. C. all the fun treks and experiences that i have been lucky to enjoy in this magical place.