February 08, 2006

long time, no blog!

also known as: life as usual- never enough time...

So, today marks the midpoint of my second week back in the working world. It's been okay so far, except for a couple things...

I do not like getting up at 4:45 am!!! I was very used to waking up at 8:30 am, when it's already light outside! But, starting work at 6:30 am does have it's advantages- by the time my lunch break is over (noon), the workday is already more than half done! And, leaving work at 3:00 means I avoid the worst of rush hour, and am home by 3:30 pm.

The other negative to working is worse, in my opinion- Sedona has been having some digestive issues (stress, or something else, I don't know what yet), and today is the second day in a row that I have come home to a mess in her crate because she had an accident... I know she can't help it, but it's still gross! Yesterday, she had every stuffed toy in her crate, and they all had to be washed. She also got into it, so she had to be washed too- Today, she managed to keep a couple of toys clean, and herself too, thank goodness, but I still had to wash the towel and a couple toys again. I just wish I knew why it was happening! She seemed okay last week when I started working, but since the weekend, her bowels just haven't been working correctly (I don't want to give you too much information, but lets just say it's really runny, and leave it at that!). Maybe it is stress- after all, since we've had her, one or both of us has been home with her, so she's never been left all day, every day, till last week. Hopefully it will clear itself up soon!!!

The job itself is okay- it involves testing the accuracy of an instrument (called a compounder) that hospital pharmacies use to dispense and mix solutions. My testing involves measuring and weighing out 50 bottles of sterile water (by hand) to a certain weight, setting up the instrument with solutions of Potassium Chloride (KCl), running the compounder to dispense KCl into the bottles, then measuring the amount of KCl in each bottle. Then, the results are typed into a spreadsheet that calculates the amount of KCl dispensed into each bottle. This determines if the machine is dispensing the proper amount, within a prescribed tolerance. It's not hard, but it is very time consuming to get all the materials set up. (Completing testing on two machines a day is the norm.) And then, of course, there's the paperwork! The place is small, and a bit crowded, but seeing what goes into actually repairing and maintaining the IV pumps and compounders is kind of interesting (not that I know what the techs are doing- electrical stuff was the part of physics class that I absolutely hated).

Tom is in San Francisco this week; (fyi, last week he was in Philadelphia, but it was a very busy trip). Earlier today he called me while he was taking a late lunch; he was describing to me the scene at the Golden Gate Bridge... he said it was beautiful, but he wished it was about 30 degrees warmer (it was probably in the mid 60s... LOL!) And, he forgot his camera at their job site! Fortunately, his partner had a camera, so he will have some pictures to remember it by. They thought it would be a pretty easy installation, but unfortunately the electrical contractors hadn't completed all the work they needed, so they'll be delayed a little- he may not get back till Saturday.

Our TV went to the Great TV Repair Place in the Sky... (well, Walt's TV Repair, anyway- LOL!) And, it's not coming back- they can't get the part they need to fix it, because rear-projection TVs of that type are being phased out of production. Luckily, Best Buy honored the extended warranty, and we got full purchase price credit towards a new TV, which Tom picked up Monday (he had a comp day from work). I had no idea about the comp day, or about the TV decision being finalized- when I got home from work, there was a huge box in the living room, and Tom was putting all the video components onto the new TV stand. It's new technology (Liquid Crystal on Silicon ? I think), that combines LCD display with something called DRP (? I think), which involves a chip with thousands of tiny mirrors that makes the picture... it all has to do with how good the picture looks, and boy, it looks really good! Supposedly the technology of the TV is better than the current technology for filming movies or TV shows, so it's ahead of it's time. (This hopefully means it won't be obsolete in 2 or 3 years like the old one! We got the extended warranty on this TV, too, just in case!) It's also bigger than the old one (it's a 60 inch diagonal), so in our tiny living room, it's like sitting down front at the movies. When we get a house, hopefully we will have a bigger family room, and it will fit in just fine.

I'm headed for an all-day scrapbooking crop on Saturday, Feb 18th that will be held at a resort in Scottsdale- 9 am to 9 pm, including my own 6 foot table to work on, lunch, snacks, projects, prizes, etc. etc. Now, I just have to get some pages planned out, so I don't have to take all my supplies with me! (but, like Jude said when I told her about it, yes, I probably will take it all with me... just in case!)

well, now I'm off to surf the net for info on dogs and stress and diarrhea... lucky me!

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I have 3 words that might be of help with Sedona: Doggie Day Care. Dogs are social animals and she is reacting to the many changes going on in her little world. It would also help her social skills (or lack there-of).