New job

On Monday, I started my new job. While almost all of my nursing experience has been in the hospital inpatient setting, this job is outpatient, and out in the community. (My philosophy of anatomy and physiology can be summed up with "Air goes in and out and blood goes round and round. Any variation on this is a bad thing." Likewise, I prefer nursing practice settings in which these things happen all by themselves.)

With the job giving flu shots, my schedule was flexible. Some days it was 9-3, some days it was 1-8pm, but generally it was 11-5. This job is 8:30-5, and that's taking a bit of getting used to. (I can't stay up past midnight any more--not if I want to be a nice person in the morning.)

The Mimi has been having some trouble with this. She looks so confused when I leave for work at the new time. I know there's a small voice in her head that says "Mama is wearing her nice clothes and leaving already? I just woke up half a sippy cup ago!"

Not words of wisdom

Odd-sounding things I have said to the Mimi this month which I swear made perfect sense at the time:

"It is rude to try to stuff an emery board in someone's sock--especially while they're still wearing it."

"Give me back the DVD and I'll let you play with this hatchet instead."

"You're being a jerk. I don't pick up jerks."

"I am Ma-Ma. Da-Da is the one with the beard."

"We do not disassemble the furniture for entertainment."

"Must you be a punk [this early in the morning, in Fred Meyer, at the library, just because your barette fell out]?"

"Go ahead, throw a fit--you really think anyone's going to notice a screaming toddler in Wal-Mart?"

Rotting my brains

The Mimi likes to have background noise in the house. It doesn't matter to her what it is, but the lack of music or "television" (we don't have an actual TV but we watch a lot of stuff on the computer courtesy of our handy Netflix subscription) results in a unhappy small person who signs "TV please" emphatically until we either tell her no or put something on.
She doesn't really seem to care what it is (apart from an obsession with "kitty puppy TV" (Garfield and Friends). However, even though I am fond of Garfield, I can only take so much. So we've been watching a fair share of random documentaries. They meet the Mimi's need for background noise, as well as my need for something resembling intellectual stimulation.
So far, we've watched John Cleese's Wine for the Confused (just what it sounds like), Shakespeare's Women and Claire Bloom (a talented theatre star discussing the female characters in the Bard's work) Food, Inc. (how agribusiness is no longer family farms) and the Botany of Desire (what if plants selectively breed themselves to get us to spread them around more?) as well as countless others which weren't particularly memorable.
As long as it's not too violent, I'll watch anything that looks interesting to me. (Except for horror movies, which one might argue fall into the "violent" category.) Is "omnivorous" a word which can properly be applied to TV consumption?

Family Christmas

I've been too distracted lately to post much on the blog, but I thought I'd put up pictures of what I've been up to in the last couple of weeks.

We had a lovely immediate family Christmas Eve celebration at my sister in law's house. After trying desperately (and failing miserably) to keep Shirley out of the Christmas tree, we finally let her help decorate it. There was a definite line of ornaments all along the tree showing where she could reach!

For Brian's adopted grandmother Shirley, I knitted a variation on the Ice Queen cowl from knitty.com. I hate working with mohair, so I used my silk handspun yarn. And since it was my first time working lace from a chart, I left the beads off.

For a first project working lace from a chart in the round, it was fun to knit and surprisingly easy. I had so much fun working on it that I'm already planning to make one for myself, with the beads!

My brother in law got my name for the massive family Christmas gift exchange. Instead of a gift certificate, he gave me money for yarn. That was very nice of him, and I've already gone on a sock yarn-buying binge at Little Knits. But the way he wrapped it deserves special mention. (Yes, that is a five dollar bill sticking out of a ball of "the wildest crazy acrylic yarn I could find for you.")

I forsee someone getting an especially vibrant hat for his birthday...

Sock monkeys and sweater thieves

I have a small secret--I love socks. It's not really a secret anymore. They're the project I knit most frequently, and if wild socks are on sale at the local "Tarjay," I will stock up on them. When Grandpa died a couple of years ago, Mom gave me two pairs of his hunting socks. (Since Grandpa spent much of his life on a quixotic quest for the perfect pair of socks that kept his feet warm but comfortable, I've got my suspicions as to whom I might have inheirited the obsession from.)

They're not my size, so I plan to make sock monkeys from them for Shirley and my brother's little girl. As with any much-loved knitted item, they've got a bit of lint on them.

So before I could start the sewing process, I had to take out the sweater stone and de-fuzzify them. The resulting ball of lint was so impressive that I had to share it:

Currently I've got everything done except for sewing the limbs on . Dismembered sock monkeys in the craft closet? Pretty normal for this household.
And in other clothing-related issues, the Mimi has started "borrowing" my clothes several years earlier than I thought she would. She looks way cuter in that sweater than I do.

Shameless product placement

Normally I don't mindlessly babble about my shopping on the blog. However, I recently found a company that seems to be worthy of that.
Karma Naturals sells almost all of their products in both a full-sized version and a sample-size. So I ordered several samples of their products. (I have a hard time buying perfume in the store, let alone guessing if I'll like it when I buy it online.)
They shipped it promptly. Not only did my order arrive just as I'd ordered it (mixed-up orders are a huge pet peeve of mine) but they even included several complimentary samples with it.
And I love every single one of their fragrances! I'm most partial to the "Relaxation" one, which is a blend of lavender and citrus, but the others are good.
When I have disposable income again, I think I'll be picking up a lot of stuff from them!

Job hunting fun

I had a job interview yesterday, so I'm much less twitchy now that the anxiety has worn off. Job interviews and exams always make me feel anxious. I always do the best I can and then I always come out of them going "I have no idea how I did!" trusting that I'll find out in a week or two.

Some people offer "Go with your first instinct!" as a possible stragegy for dealing with job interview questions. For me, that's a bad idea. Why? Because my first instinct, while true, is generally not "diplomatic" enough for an interview situation.

When the interviewers ask "Why do you want to work in public health?" they would much rather hear "I want to practice nursing in the community setting." than "I'd like to work in a setting that has patients who can walk."

"Tell us why you're interested in mental health" is best answered with "I had a really good mental health instructor in nursing school and I thought that'd be an interesting branch of nursing to work in" instead of "Well, my family's crazy..."

"What has been your experience working with physicians?" should be answered with "I've worked with some very talented individuals who really cared about their patients and co-workers," as opposed to "Some of them combine the charm of Dr. House with the morality of the cast of Grey's Anatomy."

The fact that my co-workers seem to think I'm a shoo-in for the position makes me feel better about it. Now that the worst part (the whole interview panic) is over, the rest should be much easier.