America is back in space...NOT!

I have a love hate relationship with the US Space program. Well, many moons ago, I was a young aerospace engineering student hopeful about the continued success of the space program. I dream of the day that space shuttles will be lifting off every week. It was designed to be the workhorse of the space program, to be used in building space stations and perhaps zero gravity factories orbiting the earth. The Air Force was planning to use it for our space defense system.

All those dreams were dashed by the Challenger disaster. The Air Force cancelled the order for 5 space shuttles. Yup, 5! At a price of $3 billion each in 1980's money. Man, a long term job in aerospace will be a sweet one. I envision a nice home and a bimmer. Ahhhh, it's not meant to be.

I did manage to be a test engineer at Rockwell and was a part of the Endeavour project. The sad part was that it was the last order for a shuttle. Soon after delivery, all the extra engineers and technicians were let go. I was one of them. Boohoo.

Last week's delays of the space shuttle launch was a sign that the space program is old and needs to be redesigned or reinvented. Nevertheless, there was a tear in my eye when the shuttle Discovery launched to space last Tuesday. I even felt a lump in my throat as I watched it on AOL's website.

I was not surprised to hear yesterday that the program is again grounded when they found that a piece of the external tank tiles was ripped of after a collision with a fucking bird. It's amazing what birds can do to a spcae program. They should be considered a pest and be irradicated from the face of the earth. They belong in museum where they can do no harm.

There are three more shuttles left. The Endeavour, the Atlantis, and the Discovery. It was calculated that it has so many parts that there is a chance that a disaster will occur every 25 launches. Well, strap a an airplane on a million gallon of liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen tanks and a couple of solid rocket booster that can't be turned off once started, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure that out. It's a one way ride. So anybody out there with a better idea of propulsion than the present technology, speak up or forever hold your peace. A giant rubber band is not acceptable as a atleast a million lbs. of thrust is required to get the shuttle in orbit in one piece. The rubber band is simple but not sophisticated enough for a space program.

Bad news came today.

It was an unexpected news. Our ICU Director gathered us in the med room. We thought it's another inspection issue as the government inspectors for hospital accreditation will be arriving soon. It was worst than we expect. Worst than a magnitude 10 earthquake. More gruesome than an oil tanker spill in Alaska. More destructive than a grade 5 cyclone. She has resigned as our director and she is moving on to a job that most likely pays more and has more opportunity.

We were devastated. I personally felt robbed. Betrayed by the thought that this job is my nirvana. I was wrong. I was looking forward to my first year anniversary. Things are going so good. The pay is not the best, the benefits mediocre, but the people are great. My boss is so rare in nursing, she listens to our gripe, she was one of us. A former ICU nurse who has worked to give us most of what we wish in terms of schedules, vacations, days off, overtime, equipment, and so on and so forth.

Her news wasn't recieved well by anyone. The night shift nurses were surprised themselves. Everyone were sighing. "Oh well, let's find another job." "Good times are over." "What will happen to us?" "who will replace her, so and so? God help us"

For the first time in a couple of months, my sense of content was gone. As the saying goes, too good to be true.

Interesting lunch break.

We were busy as heck yesterday but we still find the time to eat together. I happen to be lazy enough to join the younger nurses and they were talking about a time in the Philippines when a series of serial killers were terrorizing a part of Manila.

One nurse was telling us a story of a young nurse about 22 yrs old who was raped and murdured. This woman was having a hard time dealing with the death of her mother and grandmother. She was depressed and was very vulnerable. Like some days being a nurse, a doctor will end up yelling at you and call you "stupid" for not being able to insert a foley catheter, one of those that goes up the bladder to drain the urine. So, this nurse decided to go home at 2 o'clock in the morning. The hospital owners are usually nice enough to accomodate the late shift and will let them stay and sleep in the staff room. She decided to go home. Some of the staff decided to look after her while she waits for a ride.

Unfortunately, she didn't make it home. They found her shoes by the gate of her house and her body was found a few hundred feet in a kamote field in the outskirts of a new subdivision development. She was raped and murdered. According to the story teller, she haunted the hospital for a long time.

Babies in the nursery will all cry at the same time. As if they were pinched because they all cry in a high shrill. Slippers will fly out of no where. An autoclave machine was opened right after the the cycle. A practice that will incinirate who ever is stupid enough to try. She said that she left that autoclave 15 mins to the end of cycle and they went out to lunch. Hoping that she can unload the machine after lunch, she came back with the machine door open.

One day someone brought a weegee board. They had fun with "spirits" answering questions like who is knocking at the door? and they will get the right answers. They also asked about who has a crash with this person and that. They had a good time.

Well, one day the murdered nurse answered. She spelled her name with great speed. The board was moving swiftly as the spirit spelled her name. They tried to trick the spirit by asking it things only she whould know. The spirit answered each questions right. One of the staff members was writing down the answers/messages.

The spirit then made a request. She was asking for justice. She described her murderers. One was a tricycle driver and his three drug addict friends. They were not sure who will believe the story as the source was a weegee board. She described how they violated her with foriegn objects such as a bottle. They nabbed her in front of her house.

They spoke to the spirit and told her to be in peace and that her justice will be granted by God. Her hauntings of the hospital finally stopped. Talking about goose bumps.

Cancer
Most people know at least one person who has cancer. I just found out yesterday that one of the nurses at work have breast cancer and is on chemo and radiation. She's only in her early thirties and has a young child. It's so sad to hear one of my co workers is sick. The suffering she has to bear during the treatment and the emotional toll she has to bear thinking about her survival and her family's welfare.

My family have it's share of cancer victims and survivors. It's just one of the diseases that takes on casualties in the thousands and costs gazillion dollars to "fight". Not to mention the emotional costs that it brings to the victim and their families.

I was taking care of a middle age person yesterday who was an ex-law enforcement personnel. He (a gender I will use to make writing easier and the person's identity anonymous) is experiencing some major abdominal pain and CT scan shows major clusters of tumors in his liver and possibly pancrease. A liver biopsy was done yesterday and it will confirm if the tumors are cancerous. It will take 2 business days to get the results, so it being a Friday, he has to wait 4-5 days for the results. Arrgh, the waiting game. From the report that I recieved from the previous nurse, he and his family doesn't know what he has but they might have a clue as he came from a strong familial history of gastrointestinal cancer.

This poor person also has to deal with his 80+ year old room mate. This person is in the hospital for low blood pressure. He (again a gender I will use for anonymity) is cachectic and has very poor hygiene and appetite. After a couple of days on medication that increases blood pressure, he started to wake up and being his old self again. A cantancerous pain in the ass. Nothing I say he remembers and repeats the same stupid question, "Can I go to the bathroom?" The answer is of course "NO" in various forms and other comments that I kept to myself. He cusses like a sailor and also asks me why I treat him the way I do. I told him someone needs to save him from hurting himself.

The patient never got what he wants from me. He wants the bedrails down. A safety issue that has lawsuit written all over it. If I lower the bedrail might as well just push him off the 7th floor patio but our building is only 2 stories high. No such luck. He also wants to bend over to rub his feet. Ah, those feet are yucky looking and all edematous, I don't think that is a good request. I also learned he smokes at home while on oxygen. I can only imagine the explosion cigarette will do to a tank of oxygen. Like those hollywood movie explosions. Hehehe.

Having celebrated my 10th year as a nurse this year; no, there is no real celebration i.e. a party but a personal reflection on the hundreds of soiled asses I have to clean and the few appretiation and lots of complains on why they can't go to the bathroom the first place; I know for a fact that a patient that has heart problems and wants to go to the bathrom all ends up dead attempting or on the way to the bathroom. For some reason the anus is connected to the heart, really. The valsalva maneuver must have killed more people than rusted nail. Don't quote me on this, for heavens sake, this is a blog and not a scientific journal.

I also learned that the more you complained about not getting a bowel movement the more chances you will get a goddamn enema. One of the nastiest goddamn medical orders that I hated next to getting stool samples from commodes. I specially hate those soupy diarrhea ones that glows in the dark, yuuuuck. It gives me dry heaves when I collect them.

The poor cancer pt wanted to get transfered. He has missed numerous hours of sleep due to his room mate's heart monitor alarm going off. To his luck a number of patients were transfered out of the unit. I found him a bed next to a window overlooking a sidewalk lined with grass and shrub. He and his family were happy. This will be my good deed of the day.

Day off with the Sarge.

I was off today and around 6 in the morning the Sarge started barking and whining. My vocal acknowledgement did not deter the mutt from making his primal call.

It's hard for a dog to understand that his master is tired from working his butt off so he can afford to buy lavish toys and natural food for him. Oh no, he has needs and they need to be met NOW. The poor pooch wants to play and be tickled on the belly. He also wants to eat his mixture of canned and dry food. Warmed to a decent temperature so he doesn't have to eat cold doggy chow. After I met his needs I crawled back to bed and woke up around 1 pm. Man I feel refreshed.

I ate some left over from dinner and off we went to PetSmart. Sarge was panting hard on the way to the store. He's stressed, not used to the moving car and the wierd way the environment seem to move in a forward kind of way. Once we arrived he seemed to settle down. People smiled at him and and older guy came to pat him on his back and commented on how soft he is. His wife commented on the one blue eye and a brown one. On the way out the cashier asked me where I bought my Sarge. She knows him from the pet store, the blue eye was a give away, I bought him from. She took care of Sarge when he first arrived at the store. She said they were buddies. She went around the register and petted him. Sarge looked at her in a familiar way.

I bought him some more toys. I'm feeling guilty about leaving him at home 12 hours at a time. The least I can do was to get him new stuff. The companies who make these toys know dog owners are suckers. They price the toys at a premium.

I tried to get Sarge a bath but their grooming center needs a proof of rabies shot. I didn't have his papers with me so we went to PetCity, the store I bought him from. They were booked solid for the day but the guy behind the counter told me to come in tomorrow at 10:30 and we'll be the first one on line. Great.

On the way home, I remembered to stop by the Seiko store. They let us in to my surprise. At first, I was reluctant to let go of Sarge. I needed to try the watch I wanted so I let him go. The owner's kids happen to be around. They were so in love with the dog that the girl went out and petted him. Sarge was great. He walked near the girl and let her pet him. He also walked around easily. The watch was the one I want so I went ahead and purchased it. A couple walked in the store and Sarge acted civilized. He went over them and took a sniff of their shoes. The woman was very nice to the Sarge, "oh, how cute". She even said goodbye to him when they left.

The day was a success. Sarge was acting civilized even though he has been out of the house only twice since I got him. He seemed to be well mannered. Next stop, a pet park in Claremont.

Escape from Alcatraz. (not really)

It's not fun having paranoid schizophrenia. Hearing voices, sounds, and confusing reality with hallucinations. The CIA chasing after you. Radio messages from satellites. I don't base this on personal experience but I've observed this in my clinical work. Most patients can work and live a nice life if they keep up with the medications. Skip the meds and the world gets warped. Events no longer makes sense. People can't be trusted.

Being the blessed nurse that I am, I get assigned to one of these patients. The person, now refered to as he/him/his to make things easy to write, decided that the hospital is not a nice place to be, so off he went. This happened because the guard watching him turned his back and tried to talk to one of the nurses. I was with my other patient, changing a feeding bottle. The security guard, well, he's kinda obese and can't really run. He said " We can't really hold him." I didn't say a thing, I just kept running.

Thank God he is obese and on barefoot. It's also good that he is on street clothes, don't need to worry about nudity. Hey, I have my orthotics and have been working out lately so I was able to chase the guy. Being on 5150, medical psychiatric hold, gives me the right to hold him against his will. He can do harm to himself and to others. After a block of trying to restrain him, he finally ran out of steam.

Three security guards finally caught up with us. To make a long waiting game story short, he ended up in out psych unit. To make things interesting, my nursing director and our chief nursing officer were among the people involved with getting the person back in the hospital. Kinda embarrasing that this happened to me but my director said she owned me a huge banana split sundae. Yummy! Who said that nursing is boring? Not me.

Dog day afternoon.

I tried to walk the Sarge while on a leash. He is still learning. Unlike other dogs, he needs to be rewarded for this simplest of tasks. I tried to introduce him to my backyard. Man, he was totally scared to death of the sun. My fault, the sun was setting and he saw it as a huge nuclear bomb. I caried him outside while I reasurred him that it is okay. No luck, he crawled back to the house in total shock. He stayed out of my reach most of the evening.