:-D

Conversation I had yesterday afternoon with 2 doctors who have previously worked on our unit:

Andy (to my roommate Caroline in regards to working as a nurse on 6 Bles): "So are you off orientation and all that?"
Caroline: "Yeah..."
Me: "Of course, seeing as she's been there for a year now."
Andy: "She's already been there for a year? How long have you been there?"
Me: "A year."
Andy: "You guys started at the same time?"
Me: "Yeah. We both started in July."
Matt: "Wait! You just started last year?"
Me: "Yeah. You didn't know that? I'm technically still a new grad. We actually started when you guys started."
Matt: "I didnt know that! I didnt think you were new."

Later that night....

Me: "I cant believe you didnt know I was a new grad."
Matt: "Yeah, I had no idea."
Me: "Well, I guess that's a good thing right? That you couldnt tell I was new?"
Matt: "No, absolutely. You didnt seem like it."
Me: "Really? Well good, that makes me feel better about myself, about me as a nurse."
Matt: "Oh yeah, definitely. You're a good nurse! I never would've thought you were new!"

:) Totally made my day. :)

Just another Tuesday

Last night I decided to go out with my friends C & L. Nothing too crazy seeing as it was a Tuesday night AND I had to work today (7a-7p). ...Or so I thought... It started out pretty calm, just hanging out drinking a few drinks out at one bar and when it closed at midnight because there was no one there, we walked down the street to another bar. Then somehow all the drinks we were drinking started to catch up to us. Our other friends M, A, and their friend B came and met up with us and they were hammered so everyone just fed off each others' energy and had such a great time. It was awesome! ...Highlights:

• Happy drunks
  
• Laughing. A LOT. I dont even remember what was said but I just remember laughing ALL night long.
• the GIANT St. Bernard outside of the bar. I'm talking, literally this dog is bigger than I am. He was super friendly. We played with it.
• Drunk dancing (in a virtually empty bar)
• Making friends with the bartender. And by 'making friends with' I mean he just laughed at us because of our ridiculous drunkenness.
• Good (drunk) conversations
• Making A take shots.
• Lisa making out with my neck
  
• M: "Are these croutons??" Bartender: "um, they're sugars cubes."
  
• Conversation where I try to convince M that scruff is sexy.
• playful flirting
• M publicly cupping my breasts
  
• M & L imitating Lee (our very loud doctor who I'm pretty sure legitimately has a speech impediment)
• Trying to convince M that med students should do a rotation with the nursing staff. (i mean seriously, how has this not already been implemented??)
• M trying to explain to me why he's bombass and wicked smart for getting matched in Urology
  
• Spinach & artichoke dip at 3am
• M & I making fun of C and her loudness
• PDA ;)

Last night was epic. Based on our antics and drunkenness, you would've thought it was a Friday night. I felt like death when I woke up and had to go to work this morning (and it didnt help that M laughed at me and got to go back to sleep). Totally worth it though. I cant remember the last time I had such an epic night.

'Suuuupp.

My little cousin (and godson) Aldrich. He's already 5 and starting kindergarten in the fall! Love him. :)

Philippines (cont)

Instead of writing a post of everything I did in the Philippines, you can just refer to my facebook page whenever I post pictures. There are a TON of them. You'll get the idea of all the places I went from there. For now, I'll just list how life in the Philippines is different from city life here. (fyi: where my family lives is a small suburb called Morong, Rizal so life there would still differ from say, life in Manila but just so you get a sense of what we experienced)

• Everything (except chocolate) is so cheap. The currency is the Peso and at the time we were there, the exchanges rate hovered around $1 = 46 Pesos. When we converted things, stuff came out to $8 mani/pedis, $1.10 haircuts, anywhere from $0.75-$3 for jewelry, $1 for a beer, $98 for one night in a hotel suite in the city, etc etc. Of course, its a poor country; they dont make as much there so cost of living isnt as expensive as here and such so its hard to compare sometimes.
  
• Traffic patterns. There are no traffic patterns. People weave in and out of lanes, they honk as a way of saying, "out of my way, I'm coming through," people just walk out into the street expecting the cars to stop - and they do. People may drive like crazy, but no one gets mad. You can stop right in the middle of the road and other cars would just drive around you.
  
• There is no central air. The houses that are fortunate enough to have air conditioners have units in individual rooms and its typically only 1, maybe 2 bedrooms, in the entire house that have A/C. (I'm glad we went during the hottest recorded summer ever.)
  
• There is no hot water. Downtown in the city, hotels, restaurants, etc have hot water but I'm not sure about the homes there. In our town, in our house, there is no hot water. Not that you really need hot water since is so freakin' hot, so sometimes a slightly cool shower is refreshing, but even in the heat, you'd like for a least a lukewarm shower every now and then.
  
• The security check at the airport has a separate line for Males and Females
• McDonald's serves rice
• Bars stay open all night
• Orange Juice is the most expensive beverage to order (yes, more expensive than beer, even more expensive than a Long Island)
  
• They have different models of cars there. We saw a car that we thought was a Honda Civic, but it was actually a Honda "something-or-another-that-I-have-never-heard-of-and-doesnt-exist-in-the-US." In fact very most of the cars they have there, we dont have here.
  
• Movie theaters have assigned seats! When you buy your ticket at the counter, they show you a seating chart and you pick which seats you want (like you would for tix to a concert or a sports game)
• They dont sell cold milk. They sell things like Yoohoo (although I never actually saw the Yoohoo brand) and such that are just in cartons or cans and can be kept on the shelf/pantry.
• They dont have cabs/taxis, they have tricycles. They dont have metro buses, they have Jeepnies.
  
• They play Glee songs on the radio. :)
  
• Nurses still wear white scrubs. (I'll post about my experience walking through the local hospital later)

Anyway, thats all that I can really think of for now... I'll try to think of more later.

Philippines (Part 1)

We're leaving the Philippines and making our way back to the US tonight. The travel time including lay-overs will be about 24 hours (woohoo!) but because of the time difference, we will leave 12:30am Thursday morning and land in DC at about noon Thursday afternoon. I'll post again once I upload pictures and have more time to write, but for now listing will have to do.

Things I am looking forward to coming back to:

• cooler, less humid weather
• air conditioning
• running / working out
• baseball and all the rest of US sports
  
• salads
• not having to put on bug spray every time we leave the house
  

Things I will miss here:

• Lolo ("grandpa")
• All the fam and cousins
• the vacation style (going back to work the day after I return will not be fun)
• home-cooked meals every meal
  
• the pastries, fresh fruit, and food in general
  
• the much cheaper cost of everything here
• the in-home mani/pedi's and massages
• the ability to walk everywhere
• the small-town lifestyle

siiigh, back to the real world soon...