Our Work has Come Asunder

Well, I think I'll do a Thanksgiving re-cap.  We'll start with last Tuesday.

I have been floating to different facilities a lot lately.  I don't mind; I like the variety, and I appreciate getting my hours, but it can be difficult sometimes too.  Last Tuesday was pretty good, though at the end of the day I was told that we were in for "the worst storm in 20 years."  There was a blizzard warning, which I have never heard of in Utah.  My supervisor offered me a "snow day" (a day off) on Wednesday, which I took advantage of.  I went home and started packing, thinking I could outrun the storm and make it to Logan that evening.  Once I got myself and Benjamin packed and loaded in the car, it started to snow.  We stopped at the McDonalds near the freeway for some chickie nuggets for the boy, and in that ten minutes between our apartment and I-15, visibility went down to almost nothing.  It was some crazy snow and wind, and I drove about two miles before I realized how stupid it would be to drive during this thing when I didn't have to.  So we turned around and came back.  We left on Wednesday morning, and to my surprise, there was only about two inches of snow on the ground.  Really?  After all that?  I was a little disappointed, to be honest.  I was expecting a couple of feet.  Oh well.

So on Wednesday, we went up and hung out.  I don't remember what we did the rest of that day, though Rach, Wow & the diva brigade came that evening.  Thursday was nice.  We started cooking early, and we were almost ready by 1pm (it was closer to 2, but that's okay).  I was put on potato duty.  I'm not really sure why I decided to do all 20 lbs of potatoes, but I did.  And my fingers haven't entirely recovered yet.  Actually I didn't do all of it, but I washed and peeled and cut and boiled them.  Mach mashed them so I could go take a shower.

Dinner was excellent as usual.  Rebecca's yams were particularly excellent, and the rolls were super-fluffy.  My friend Shannah Leigh was in town visiting her in-laws, and she came over to chat for a bit after dinner.  It was good to see her; we were BFFs in High School, but we haven't been able to see much of each other since then.  She is a superstar.

I had to come back to SLC on Thursday, since I was on-call that night at Primary Children's.  They called while I was on the road, so I drove right to the hospital.  I was there for about three hours: not too bad.  When I came back to my apartment, I decided I should just go to Target and wait in line.  I knew there would be a lot of people who wanted the same TV I did, so I left about midnight (after having received a very special picture message from Dave . . .).  There was a bit of a line already, but it wasn't bad when I got there.  Luckily the people in line with me were friendly.  We talked and joked and commiserated on how cold we were.  Around 2:30am, it got really cold.  One gal's father brought a propane flame heater, which was AWESOME.  It made the cold bearable for the last hour or so.  The fire only lasted for about 15 minutes, but man--so nice.

Around 3:30, everyone started getting excited and the line started building and squeezing together.  It was kind-of exciting, and when the doors opened, it was a mad rush.  If I hadn't run, I would have been trampled.  Seriously.  At least I got what I went in for (a 40" HDTV for $299!!), and I was out by 4:30am.  I had to tie it into my trunk and I drove home really slowly.  I unloaded and went back out to Best Buy.  I got a bluRay player and some DVDs there.  I came back, and it was about 6:30.  I sat down for a couple of minutes and realized I was really tired, so I slept for a bit.

I drove back to Logan on Friday, and hung out with the fam for the rest of the day.  Saturday was nice too.  Most of everyone left early in the afternoon.  Benji and I left a bit later, since I needed to be back for church on Sunday morning.  When I got back, I realized I had Allen's keys.  I was super-excited about that.   So we went to church in the morning, and left on Sunday afternoon to drive back up to Logan.  When the weather is good, it is normally an hour-and-a-half.  It took about two hours on the way up, and closer to three on the way back.  And, incidentally, we got a lot more snow out of the "winter storm" on Sunday than from the blizzard on Tuesday.

It was nice to have five days off in a row.  It has been a long time since I have had that long off!  It was kinda hard coming back to work, especially when I had to work at IMC on Monday.  It was fun seeing my friends, but it's not easy jumping into something you haven't done in nine months.  It was interesting.  A lot of people said they hadn't seen me in a while; I don't think they even realized I had left.  There are lots of people who work there, and I tried not to make it a big deal when I left.  It's just funny.  Even the anesthesiologist noticed that we hadn't worked together for a while.  I told him he has just been very lucky for the past nine months.  Anyway, it was a pretty good day.  Then today, I worked at the main OR at Riverton.  It was a pretty good day there too, but I am exhausted.  I'm glad I actually get to work at my home unit tomorrow.  I'm happy to float, and I'm glad I can be useful and that my services are appreciated elsewhere, but there's a reason why I choose to work where I do.