Thursday, August 27, 2009

whiskey tango foxtrot

Make an acronym out of the the title and you have the kind of expression I thought to myself as I looked for my car this afternoon upon leaving the hospital after orientation.

I was extremely excited. We'd had a great day, and I was off to go have my Tb test site checked, then on to get a much needed pedicure. After changing in the bathroom I set out for the parking lot. To understand my story you should understand that the hospital sits up on a hill, surrounded by other buildings and there are parking lots at varying levels. The roads leading up to the hospital wind around so you don't have a straight shot at viewing a whole road in its entirety.

When I arrived this morning I made the first right and parked in what was probably illegal parking as it was, but as I still wasn't sure about where employess are supposed to park I thought it better than the spot where I parked yesterday. Leaving the hospital after orientation I walked down, and turned left into what I thought was the same lot from this morning. As I'm approaching where I was quite certain my car would be, I realized it was not there. I spent a few minutes searching, to include with the use of the alarm button on the car remote. Nothing...

It occured to me that I'd really messed up, parking in an illegal spot, and had been towed. Back to the hospital I went, where security was called to come and help me. The security guard walked back out with me. He asked if I was sure I'd parked there and not the lot below. So as we're walkng he asks what kind of car I drive, and I respond with the make and model. Sure enough it's not there!

So we keep walking down to the other lot.

He saw it first.

I thanked him and apologized profusely and off he went back to the building.

Really, I'm thinking I now know what dementia is like first hand! At the very least I know how Jessie and Chester felt..."Dude! Where's my car!"

Ahem...

So that topped off my first week of second year! I left after regaining my composure from laughing at myself, and went and had my Tb test checked. Then went for a much needed pedicure and it was one of the best I've ever had!

Speaking of first weeks, it was pretty good I'd say!

Monday was exhausintg. Tuesday was a lighter day, but I felt stressed as I thought I would never catch up on the reading. Yesterday we were oriented to the unit we will be doing clinicals on in our first rotation. Today turned out (aside from the parking lot debacle) way better than I thought it was going to upon realizing students from the other local CC would be doing clinicals right alongside our class! This is the first year they've had two schools doing clinicals at the same time. They've had externships where schools were mixed, but not clinicals.

Now, if you've followed my blog you know I'd thought about transferring. This other CC, where these other students are from, is the one I would have transferred to. I thought for sure they were going to be a bunch of know-it-alls making us look bad. We learned that that wasn't the case. After the hospitalschmospital orientation and a break the staff educator had us group up, after counting off by 6s. Therefore we were forced to integrate. I'm so glad they did that! It ended up being a great experience! Our group worked well together and came up with answers to our scenario without any problem. There was some stuff that they knew better, and some stuff we knew better.

I, of course, took the opportunity to ask some questions and am now even more happy with my decision to stay put. Sure there may be some things that are better about their program, but we have our own strengths as well.

Nobody is perfect!