Slacking

Okay, so I have been slacking off a bit. Or a lot. Or completely. But here I am, adding another post, so I am sure I will be forgvien. Actually, I have been catching up on a lot of previously slacked things.
I just got back from the bank, where I FINALLY took that stupid SS check and opened up a CD account for it. Then linked it to my online banking, so now I can check it's growth every single day! Yippee!!
Also, I started looking for appropriate places for the second annual former-Cooper-kids-get-together-at-the-coast. Feedback would be appreciated......I figure that we need to have at least 4 bedrooms-one for the Fieros, Merritts, Amersons and Mom, and some place (maybe a bedroom, maybe a playroom with bunkbeds) for Jobie and Papa. Plus, possibly Alexsandra. Four nights, or five?? Tuesday through Saturday again?? What are our priorities--right on the beach, or is across the street/ocean view acceptable?? I found some with hot tubs--how fun would that be in the evening, with coldness around and hot water to enjoy! Also, are the pets coming again, or will they be staying with sitters?? Shadow and Boo will be staying home, but I know the dog owners out there are a bit different when it comes to travelling with their pets. A lot of places I have seen don't take any pets, and some will take up to 2 pets, so that does limit our options a bit, but I am willing to keep looking for something that accommodates all the pets, if that is indeed what you guys are wanting.
Basically, Sabrina and Matt, do you want to plan on bringing the girls, and Davinie and Steve, is Cooper coming? That info will help.
I am hoping to find several suitable places then consult with Davinie and Sabrina (who are we kidding--the three of us will be making all of the decisions on this thing), and hopefully have some place chosen and booked by late August/September. So there.
I am also busy searching for suitable and affordable-but-also-quite-nice all inclusive resorts in Mexico. Ethan and I will be going in late October, and possibly Justin and Kim will come for all or part of the trip. It will definitely be a lot of fun. Lets see, what else....I am doing an online scrapbooking course, which is a ton of fun. To see my scrapbooking stuff, check out http://www.digitalcrafts.blogspot.com/ and you can see my digital layouts.

Also, Terri Schiavo died today. Such a sad story, but so glad it is finally over. Vegetative state=no quality of life whatsoever. Not something to live with, but in my belief, it is the right and responsibility of the spouse to make decisions in this sort of thing. In sickness and in health, that is what you vow when you get married. If this is not sickness, what is? Tough decisions, but they have to be made, and regardless of the wishes of the parents who are unable to let go. It is called next of kin, it is a legal status, and it should not be messed with.
So, for those of you who are reading this, fill out a living will. Let your wishes be known to your spouse, your children, your family.
If something happens to incapacitate me, I want it to be known that I fully trust Ethan to make decisions for me. I don't want anyone to second guess him, I don't want any dissention, I just want support. He knows and understands my wishes, and I trust him to do the right thing for ME and for US. So there. Now, go out and tell your spouse what YOU want.

Too, too long

It has been far too long since I have updated this poor neglected blog. So sad. So, here it goes. I went to Portland. I came back. In between, I did some scrapbooking, some catching up with nieces, and helped start mom's blog ( www.grammabon.blogspot.com ). I have updated my other blog with more digital layouts (www.digitalcrafts.blogspot.com ) and basically that is it. I had a great time in Portland. Learned a lot and was inspired, so I will not be giving up all my real life scrapbook stuff. I will do both digital and real life, because they are both fun to do.

I am now quite fond of staples and have figured out the packing tape transfers and I am learning more about taking good pictures and have become all around more crafty.

I am taking an online digital scrapbooking class that is fun so far. THey give you info on some aspect of scrapbooking, then you make a layout that shows that technique and all the students critique each others layouts and you get lots of great feedback. It is a ten week class, and I just am finishing week 2. The first week's topic was how to critique a layout, and the second week was balance in layouts--making a symmetrical or asymmetrical layout. I really understand a lot better what that means.

In a few weeks, I start another online class, this one through north seattle community college. This one is for digital photography, and I will receive 5 credits for completing the course, and it is all paid for by the state, since I am a state employee and NSCC is a state school. I am excited about learning many of the features on my camera that I currently do not understand well.

Other than craftiness, the Sonics have started back on their winning ways, which is always nice. Now that Tim Duncan is out we may have a shot at the second seed. They play in Portland tonight against the JailBlazers, then back here tomorrow against the Knicks. Both should be pretty easy games, but I hope we play hard to gear up for some tougher games coming up later. Today, in about an hour, the Huskies play in the Sweet-16 in the NCAA tournament. They are up agains Louisville, and it really feels like they are the underdog, even though they are a #1 seed. Actually, they ARE an underdog, by 1.5 points. Oh, well. Should be a great game. The national writers are predicting that this will be the most exciting game of the bunch. Pretty fast, small, similar teams going head to head.

I just got that terrible page saying that I am getting an admit. Penile something. Like I have ever taken care of a patient with a penis surgery. THis will be a first. And of course, he is my fifth patient. Figures. But, one of my other guys will be leaving in a couple hours, so that will send my load back down a bit. Well, I am sure they will call for report momentarily, so I am gonna go and look up his info so I have a bit of a background and know all the right questions to ask.

Off to Portland (again)

Getting ready to head down to Portland for the weekend for a scrapbooking convention with Davinie, Sabrina, Morgan, Raegan and mom, the babysitter. Should be a good time. I am leaving Ethan well stocked with spaghetti and pizza as a backup, and plenty of kibble for the little fuzzy guys.
I have decided to rectify my problem with my wedding negatives (which you know nothing about, since this is my first mention of it on here) by buying a top of the line scanner. It will still end up cheaper, and Ethan's creepy boss says he will buy it from us when we are done and use it to scan in a bunch of negatives he has at home, so it will be all good. It looks like it will be at a bare minimum $3 per negative to have this professionally done, and I have about 300 negatives, so that is a bit steep. And that is at what dpi and resolution, etc. Just better this way. I will play around with my existing scanner Tuesday to see how this all works, then post over at www.twopeasinabucket.com to see peoples suggestions as to a high quality scanner for this.

So, I am not at all packed, and have some running around to do, so I must stop this procrastination and head out.......

The first step

The first step is admitting that you have a problem. I have a problem. I have an inability to adequately reheat things in the microwave. I know you are all shocked, but there it is. I consistently give Ethan reheated food and leftovers that are insufficiently heated. He takes one bite then says it is freezing cold and goes into the kitchen to heat it up. And he is not being picky. On many occasion I have bit into some reheated morsel to discover that it is at best lukewarm. Being me, I go ahead and eat it anyway. Unless it is something that is icky when cold. But most of the time lukewarm does it for me.
Here and now I resolve to add at least 30 seconds onto the time my food (and Ethans) is in the microwave. Or at least 15. I don't know--when I hear it popping or see liquids boiling, I just can't stop myself from taking it out. I can just eat around the edges where it is warmer, and save the frozen middle for later.

Also today, I am admitting that mom has a problem. She can't find my other blog, so in the interest of saving myself a long phone call trying to describe how to get there, I am posting a link. www.digitalcrafts.blogspot.com Lots of layouts over there, an Orthopedic poem, maybe more stuff if I ever get creative again. Go check it out! (email me if you want to be able to add your own creative stuff-stories, poems, pictures, layouts, etc. )

The first step

Little Bunny Foo Foo

Not a good song to get stuck in your head, but now, thanks to Sabrina, it is running around mine. I did appreciate the website that speculated whether Foo Foo was a rodent collection specialist for some sort of animal research laboratory, and just doing his job when that nosy Good fairy butted in and punished him. Poor Foo Foo.

So, I must say, watch Ladder 49. We rented it yesterday, and were not disappointed. Good stuff. We got Shark Tale, too, and are going to watch it tonight. Ethan is working overtime AGAIN today, and I am at work doing a workshop (no patients! Feels like a day off to me). Ethan has managed to get in 30 hours of overtime this week, if you count today. I finally got him to quit his cleaning job. I went to the H&R block guy to have our taxes done, and found that my original numbers were correct. The tax guy advised me that Ethan was being screwed in that job, and should either quit or ask for a huge raise. He was paying over 40% in taxes on that money, what with self employment taxes and regular taxes on top, and ended up making only like $8 an hour. Not good. So, he officially quit, as soon as they can find someone to replace him at Argens. I am excited. He can make a ton more by doing overtime up here, and is not tied in to working every Wednesday and Sunday. We can vacation without worries.
Speaking of vacation, I looked up tons of all inclusive places in Mexico, and I want to go to Puerta Vallarta and stay at the Riu something or other. Looks very nice, reminded me of Sandals, and is around $1050 for 7 nights. We could go somewhere else for maybe $700, but some of those places look pretty bad, and have bad reviews. This will be nice! Still not sure if Justin and Kim will be coming, but Ethan and I are definitely going no matter what. So there.

Peanut

Wednesday

Why is it that people think it is okay to make very derogatory remarks about another race/ethnicity just because the person and I are of the same race/ethnicity? Do they really think that everyone in their race feels the same as they do? Do they think this is acceptable behavior? I guess so. This has happened several times to me at work, and it really bothers me. I enjoy my coworkers. I like most of them a lot. And the ones that I am closest to happen to be caucasian/US, caucasian/England, african/Ethiopian, African/Eritrean, Eastern Europe/Indian (not Native American, INDIAN), pacific islander/Filipina, african/Nigerian, and asian/cambodian, vietnamese, chinese, japanese, and thailand. I KNOW these people. I work with these people on a daily basis, and really like them. So when ANY issue comes up with a patient about another nurse or support person, I am already more likely to take the hospital person's side over the patient. But so many of these caucasian patients feel like they can make rude, derogatory remarks about other races and it is okay, since we are both caucasian. Okay, here it is officially: It is not okay!

Off of that subject for now, but still irritated. IRRITATED. I feel let down. It is always patients that I like, that I have developed some rapport with that do this. Never the icky ones that you don't like, it is always one that you have been joking around with and enjoying taking care of. That makes it worse. Now, I don't want to go back in there, and I told the charge nurse and we are trying to keep things easy for any non-US/caucasian person/people with accents who might come across this guy. Not for HIS sake, since he has made that pretty clear that he would prefer things that way, but for the sake of the people with accents who are not caucasian, so THEY don't have to put up with HIM. I have seen debates going around about some KKK guy in the south that wanted only white staff to work with him, and was that okay or not okay and was that discriminating against the staff who were not white, or was that protecting them, etc. And here it is in MY hospital in a slightly different form. Sucks.

Monday

Monday again. Seems like this happens every week. Possibly, it does. I am working only 8 hours today, which, after 4 days of 12's (not in a row, silly. But the last 4 days I worked were 12 hour shifts), feels very short. And, I am up on the 6th floor for a change. I have been mostly down on 5, haven't been here for like 3 weeks. Or maybe 1. But it feels like a long time, nonetheless.
We arrived this morning to see a huge white plastic tent taped in part of the hallway. Curiosity abounded, so we unzipped it (seriously, there was a zipper keeping it closed. Very ingenious), and peeked inside. Nothing interesting. They just removed a big cupboard/shelving unit and are plastering it up. I suppose the plastic is to keep the plaster smell from overtaking the rest of the unit.
This weekend, I am on a team of people who are going to brainstorm how to reorganize our supply room. They came around with video cameras to do the before look, then will tape the brainstorm process and the after look. I am a little concerned, because I took it upon myself last year to organize our supply room, used my own free time, skipped lunches and breaks and stayed late to get it worked out, since the supply people brought up a bunch of organizing stuff and just dumped it on our unit for a few weeks. I got fed up and did it for them. So basically, the supply room is my baby. I know where EVERYTHING is in there, and the system I set up is a good one ( according to ME), but the supply people never restock us and everyone is a slob, so it is a mess in there again. But the idea is GOOD. Things that go together are stored together (all urinary things together, pt care items together, IV stuff together, etc). I am just worried that the whole fancy reorganizing process is going to be all about how much it sucks now and how much better it will be once it is done. My feelings may get hurt..... The hospital is paying tons of money to have these professional organizer people come in to do this, so we will see. It is a remote possibility that they have a better idea for how to do things........

Sunday

We got our wedding negatives! So very nice. We also got CD's with the digital pictures they took. I think there are 40 or so on there, taken by the wife of our photographer. I will post my favorite one..........

Wedding photo

Friday again

Reading over Davinie's blog about travelling, I started thinking about her comments about urban/rural life. I really like it here. I find beauty in the sunrise and sunset over the downtown that I see as I arrive or leave work. I love the look of the silhouettes of the buildings with their lights on in front of an indigo sky. I like being able to do so many things so easily, because everything is at most a short drive away. I also like rural life. I remember all those summer evenings I spent sitting on the roof in Crane, taking pictures of the sunsets over the horizon, unbroken by more than just a few houses. I remember how many stars you could see, away from the nightly haze of manmade lights. I remember the quiet. It is never totally quiet here. It quiets down enough so that you don't notice any sound in particular, but never totally quiet. We go to Lincoln Park and can be amidst trees and grass and bushes and beach, but there are always dozens of other people around enjoying it with you. I remember climbing up to the 'C' every day, a practice of solitude as well as exercise. On any given day, I enjoy the aspects of both worlds. I know Ethan and I will always live in this area, and I am happy with that. We have looked at a bunch of houses lately (online), and I am excited to see many houses in Burien, just south of Seattle, with 1/3 acre lots. Some are woodsy (read: little landscaping/upkeep needed), some are huge lawns with trees to border. That would be nice. There ARE more rural/less urban areas hiding in this area, and it would be nice to find a house with a little solitude and privacy. Maybe I won't see all those start I saw in Crane, but I can enjoy the quiet.

Friday

Everyone should check out this site. I go here daily (when I am at home) to see the view and if anything is going on http://www.fs.fed.us/gpnf/volcanocams/msh/ I have like 15 websites I go to when I turn the computer on on my day off. I start with my 2 emails at www.comcast.net and www.mochamail.com , then www.seattletimes.com and www.seattlepi.com then www.tacomanewstribune.com (but I only read the sports section there), and www.theonering.net After that, I go to www.nba.com and www.wnba.com to see if I have missed any news, then over to www.nba.com/sonics to check out my team and see what the locals have to say. Next it is over to www.merritts.blogspot.com and www.fierofam.blogspot.com to see if there are updates, and based on my email at www.mochamail.com I look at my blog (I get emails on my mochamail account when someone posts on my blog) After that, the order of things changes somewhat. I try to get over to www.allnurses.com to see any new nursing news, and occasionally go over to www.fidelity.com and www.tiaa-cref.com to check out my retirement accounts. I am trying to avoid www.ebay.com since we are on a bit of a budget these days. Looking at www.wastatecu.com , I can check out my paychecks since they are automatically deposited there, or go to www.bankofamerica.com to see Ethan's paychecks and our alaskan airlines credit card. I like to check our mileage amounts at www.alaskaair.com to see where we are on the road to a free trip (currently have enough for 3 tickets round trip in the US, or 2 1/2 tickets to Mexico). For a laugh, I sometimes go to www.cheapovegas.com I love playing travel agent, and this funny website has really good info and links to all the Vegas stuff, so I get a good deal when we go there. My new favorite places to go are www.twopeasinabucket.com for all things scrapbooking and digital photography, and to www.escrappers.com for photoshop help. www.scrapbook-elements.com is another new favorite, which I am trying to avoid like ebay, but not having as much luck. It is where I can get elements for digital scrapbooking. My new blog is at www.digitalcrafts.com, and I am still working on adding things in there to make it entertaining (at least to me). Another place I am often at is www.myuw.washington.edu where I can check out my employment stuff, see my next paycheck and insurance, etc stuff.

That is pretty much where I go on the internet. I see other places occasionally, but these are my main hangouts.

I really want to go to Mt. Rainier. I want to go there with my camera and take hundreds of pictures, in search of a beautiful shot that I can blow up and frame on my wall. I love that mountain. I look for it every day. It is so pretty! The standard soft mountain shape, unlike the craggy cascade mountains in central oregon (not that they aren't beautiful too). This one is so much bigger and older and I just love it. It is not visible every day (average is 100 days a year, knowledge left over from my days at the Space Needle as an elevator operator), but this year has been so ridiculously dry and beautiful (drought later this year, but pretty now!), that I see it even more often. From rooms 3 and4 on the 6th floor of the hospital, I can see the mountain, and I point it out to the patients in those rooms. Many people are from out of town, and most enjoy having a view from their rooms.

I often tell Ethan how spoiled he is. He takes Mt Rainier for granted. He has always lived in view of it. It has always been there. But for most people, there is not an enormous mountain in view of their daily lives. I remember in Crane, there were little plateaus to see, which I enjoyed, but no mountains like this. So pretty. Anyway, I want to go take pictures of it. I think I would like doing some nature photography. I will wait another month or so, until the flowers are out and things are greener (although this year, there are tulips growing and pansies are already out and the trees are pink and beautiful and blooming--it has been so warm, up in the 60's, that nature has decided to come early), and then I will go.

New blog

I made my new blog (nothing there yet), so you can bookmark it and check back to see what interesting things I am doing there. If you have interest in posting YOUR craftiness (photos, layouts digital or real-life, etc), let me know, and I will add you to the list of people who can add posts (not just comments), and we can share with each other.

http://digitalcrafts.blogspot.com/

Thursday again

So long since I have actually WRITTEN anything here. Too busy being creative over on photoshop. I am thinking of giving up on 'real life' scrapbooking alltogether, and doing only digital. I am going to wait a month or so to decide (got that convention coming up in a few weeks), but if I DO decide to, I will either give away my real life stuff, or use it up and not get more. If I go just digital, I want to get a laptop computer that is just for scrapbooking. It would need a CD burner and some sort of intermittant internet access capability, but would be a ton of fun. I could bring it to work with me and use it on my breaks instead of reading. I have learned that it is about $3 to print off a 12x12 full color layout, with 50cents for additional copies (from one popular website with rave reviews) I also have heard that Costco can print 12x12, and many people just shrink things down to 8x8, but I don't think I want to do that. I am excited. Still learning, but every new layout I do I like more than the last one, and I am figuring out more and more tricks to make things look cool. I like when it looks like a regular layout, and you can't really tell that it is digital. My honeymoon ones are like that, I think. The Morgan layout was my first, and most simple and not quite as cool. I discovered kits with cooler background 'paper' to use after doing that, and 3d embellishments, etc. Very cool. I can figure out how to make some things on my own, but now I have 3D paperclips, tacks, eyelets, ribbon, etc. Very cool. Takes forever to do a layout, but I am such a slow scrapbooker anyway, it is about the same amount of time for me. I am excited to do my wedding album. I just last week ordered my negatives from our photographer, and they should be here soon. I am going to have them put onto CD's, then I can play away on the computer. Woohoo! So much fun. RIght now I am working on a layout of Morgan's first days. Not too much done so far, other than adding pictures to a background and making them 3D and adding a 3D tag with a cute quote I found that is applicable.
I am going to start another blog so this one won't be clogged up with photoshop layouts and pictures. I will use that one for creative stuff, and this one for randomness and new photos (not edited ones). I will post a link to the new blog once I get it set up.

Journaling

Our honeymoon suite in Jamaica