Wednesday, August 30, 2006 

Serenading my way into his heart...

Yesterday, August 29, was Arnold's birthday. I had already sent him his (early) b-day gift of chocolates, nokia 6060 phone, and nice pics of me. But, I also had a second gift for him - an original song composed by me for him. And, just this morning, right after midnite (still 10-ish in the PI, so technically still his birthday), I sang this song to him - just me and the guitar, and him listening.

He loved it :-D

So, it appears that serenading is a fool-proof way into a person's heart. And it was the first time I had ever done such a thing. I normally don't like to sing solo, fearing that my voice sucks, but he somehow found my voice beautiful.

And, if you could just see my face right now, as I type this, I have been and still am blushing. It's so damn hot in here! I've got some major adrenaline rush or something going on...I can't contain myself! Is this what they call love??? I've felt love before, but this is a different kind of love.

For once, I am not feeling "shitsuren" - the japanese equivalent of "unrequited love". I am finally loving someone, and he's loving me in return - and he makes it known to me that he is loving me in return. Everyday, he sends me messages that say he has feelings for me. And I send the same back to him.

And tonight, after my serenade, he let me know that he's falling for me. *sound of heart melting to mush on the floor* God...my ears are so hot right now!!! And, how can I refuse such statements like that! I've never heard such sweet and sincere things, so of course I let him know that I'm also falling for him.

And I think I may have sealed the deal. Before my ITE prepaid long-distance card ran out, we said goodbye to eachother. He said, "love you...", and I said, "love you too..."

I'm gonna have to write another song or something...and...I've got to find a way to get my ass over there to the PI as soon as possible. I know I've been saying I'll go back in March, but after tonight's events...that maybe too far from now. Wouldn't it be kick-ass if I met him over X-mas? I'm sure that would just make his year ^_^

8/30/2006 01:23:00 AM | |

Wednesday, August 23, 2006 

The state of health care on this island

So...it's nearly the end of another fiscal year for Govguam. 'Tis the season for "open enrollment". For me, 'tis the season of ever-increasing insurance rates and ever-decreasing insurance coverage.

I mean....what's the point of fucking health insurance, if you end up paying for everything after all?

What I'm talking about - the new rates for health insurance for Govguam workers - is always on the rise - doubling, tripling, quadrupling the previous year's rates - making it completely unaffordable for workers - and workers often go WITHOUT insurance as a result. At the same time, these higher rates do not mean better insurance coverage - in fact, it means less coverage, and more "out-of-pocket" expenses, because the health insurance companies are "losing money" if they give us more coverage.

Health care is a fucking BIZNESS. I spell it like that, because that's how I feel about it - it doesn't deserve to be spelled correctly...it's a bitch that sucks money from you, when you don't even have money to begin with.

Everyone wants to make money. Nobody likes to lose money. Prime example (that never ceases to piss me off) - Gross Receipts Tax a.k.a. GRT. This is a tax that the fucking BIZNESSES are supposed to pay the government - whatever they gross in a year, the government wants a peice of it. It is a tax that is owed by the BIZNESS. BUT, the fucking BIZNESSES are passing this tax onto its consumers - essentially making it out to be like the consumer owes the government the tax, and not them, the BIZNESS.

Making sense? Following me? By now, I am completely irate.

Back to health care - money needs to come from somewhere. The health care BIZNESS passes its costs down to the consumers to stay in the "green".

In Govguam, there are three classes of workers (I prefer workers than employees, because we do work hard). Number one are active employees, no dependents. Number two are active employees with spouse and dependents. Number three are Retirees.

The health care BIZNESS is saying that Class 3 workers are draining their profit - making them go into the "red", and these Class 3 workers are too costly, expensive, require so much care and have many health problems to treat.

I say - What the fuck did you expect? They are Retirees - past their middle age - and health problems are bound to exist - as they get older, health care needs increase. NO FUCKING NEWS HERE.

So, what does the health care BIZNESS do? They pass on those high costs to the Class 1 and Class 2 workers - whom don't often utilize or access health care. And mostly these workers are relatively healthy, not requiring much at all.

Now, do you think that's FAIR???

Everybody's passing the buck. No one wants to lose money.

Now....another thing - Govguam. Realistically, there is no benefit to being a Govguam worker. At least, I see no benefits. You work hard, you are not guaranteed a paycheck at payday, you are subject to ridicule because the public's view of any govguam worker is poor, or the view of govguam as a whole is negative. You also are not taken care of the way, let's say, the federal government cares for its workers.

So, why even bother working in Govguam?

Well...who the fuck else will do it, if not I?

So, last year...what did I do? I tried to gain health care elsewhere, not relying on Govguam's ridiculous health plans. I joined GFT (Guam Federation of Teachers) - because they had a kickass health plan (Moylan's Netcare) - affordable and very good coverage - which I used so much, because I am a rare case od a Class 1 employee who actually accesses or uses health care very much.

The PROBLEM NOW: Netcare is stopping its GFT health plan because...guess what....THEY LOST MONEY.

I say - what did you expect??? Who do you think flocked to your nice kickass health insurance? The healthy people? NO!!! It was workers like I, who needed health care, and actually USED healthcare that went to you, because you were AFFORDABLE!!!

So...where does this leave me? I still pay my GFT membership dues every payday, but now, what's the point of being a member when that nice kickass health plan benefit will not exist come the new fiscal year?

I am seriously in a bind here. Do I pull out of GFT and save me a little money on membership fees, and try to find healthcare elsewhere? I tell you right now, with the insurance rates that Govguam released recently - I will surely NOT be able to afford health care anymore (through govguam).

Or, do I try to find my own health insurance plan elsewhere? Should I try to stay on with Moylan's Netcare as an individual subscriber? Even if I did this, my rates would probably still be high and not affordable either.

The whole point to group insurance plans, like for governments, is to make health care affordable for the workers, and have the employer (govguam) pay for it as a benefit for their workers, to keep them working. But, of course, govguam doesn't like to pay for anything...it lets its workers pay for everything, and expects them to keep smiling at work...

*sigh* what a fucking mess....

Or should I go the way that many govguam workers go - just don't have any insurance, self pay for everything, or even become medically indigent (relying on the government to pay for healthcare).

I know I wouldn't qualify as a medically indigent person. I work and make money, but apparently not enough to afford health care, and not too little to be indigent. Fuck.

8/23/2006 01:47:00 PM | |

Tuesday, August 15, 2006 

Some cuteness from my boogie man

Heard a funny little story about my Boo, Mr. Boogie Man:

Justin started kindergarten today - he's going to Ordot-Chalan Pago Elementary School. It was his first day of school, and his mummy dropped him off in the morning to his class. Practically ALL of the kindergarten kids in his class were crying and screaming for their mommies not to go.

My Boo, being the Boogie Man that he is, turns to his mummy and asks her,
"Mommy am I supposed to cry too?"

His mummy tells him "No, you don't have to cry, you just have to be a good boy".

And at that, his mummy left my brave little Boo, and he started his official first day of school, without screaming, without crying.

I'm proud to be his Nonnie ^_^

that's me and my Boogie Man at Chet's wedding

8/15/2006 10:23:00 PM | |

 

I'm breaking my back for an institution that fails to pay me on time

Here's another log I'm throwing into the hellish flames of fire I call WORK...

Payday was supposed to be Friday, August 11, 2006. It is now (looks at cell phone clock) 00:58 AM Tuesday, August 15, 2006. Yet, the direct deposit of my paycheck has not been "processed" due to a "miscommunication" somewhere between the payroll department and the "banks".

Let me make this plain and simple. THAT'S JUST PLAIN FUCKED UP!!! I work my ass off for this local government-run hospital, and this is the thanks I get? A payless payday? Thanks so fucking much. Like I don't have any bills to pay...FUCKERS. If this happens again, I'm stopping that direct-deposit shit. Anyone reading this, feel free to pass this on to the media - maybe then will I be guaranteed not to have a payless payday, 'cause media exposure tends to eradicate "miscommunication". Don't fucking forget - it's a voting year - straighten the fuck up already...

Now that the shit is out of my brain (which is overworked, by the way)...

I actually have some semi-good news - we got MCV Cablenet - my surfing is super fast now *zoom*
the bad part of it - it took a few days of troubleshooting to get me a "temporary" connection for this cablenet; apparently, this old house has very OLD cables...and the "juice" in the old cables was practically nada in the beginning, thus I was unable to appreciate any super-fast online time at all.

The remedy for now - the cable pedestol is right outside our front gate - there's a temporary new cable line connected from there to my roof (like a clothesline) and into our house. The "juice" is now good, cable reception is kick-ass, and the internet is *zoom*.

But, that doesn't resolve the underlying issue of very old cables - so, the MCV construction crew that deals with re-wiring cables will have to come back another time to fix that shit.

But for now, I am happy with this fast connection. It allows me to download many more songs now.

*zoom*

8/15/2006 12:52:00 AM | |

Tuesday, August 08, 2006 

Feeling Shitty and Stressed

I don't have very good coping mechanisms/behaviors. If I become stressed (which is rather easily), I instantly shut down or turn into a monster. I lose patience with people. I am very short with them. I am easily irritable. I am mean and inconsiderate, or indifferent. I am not a very nice nurse, period.

And I, as a nurse, should not be any of those bad things, especially at work, and especially when dealing with patients.

But I can't help it. Let's face it: if I really had good coping skills, I would probably not need psychotropic drugs and psychotherapy.

So, what's the cause of such a rant as this?

Work is stressing me out. And my coworkers are feeling it too. I've been asking them recently if they've been feeling the same as I, and guess what, they are.

It's called Nurse BURNOUT. Overworked, Underpaid, Unsafe patient to nurse ratios, and highly acute cases of patients (I'm talking ICU level care). I'm getting fed up with patients, and especially their families! Sometimes, the patient is cool and all, but the family gets on your nerves. There's just too many patients that we are caring for...all of them really, REALLY sick, and requiring lots of attention and care - but with so many patients, time and care are spread really thin, and complaints and attitudes start flaring and blazing.

The nurses are really TRYING THEIR BEST. But our BEST has apparently not been enough. Also, dealing with other departments, and especially the doctors - that's more pain in our asses. Sometimes doctors are also stressed out with their load of patients, and pass on their shit to the nurses...and who are the nurses supposed to dish shit onto? Nobody, ideally, but realistically, it shouldn't, but often gets dished onto patients and their families.

In normal circumstances, nurses will recognize that stress shit and STOP themselves from dishing it out to others, but since GMH never operates under "NORMAL" circumstances, nurses are having to find another outlet for that stress shit - usually to eachother or themselves.

But when the stress shit just becomes too much, and overwhelms and permeates everything on a daily basis, that protective barrier breaks down and becomes non-existant, and thus, you have the "MEAN NURSE" or "BAD NURSE".

Am I even making any sense here?

All I'm saying is this: I am tired of work already. I force myself to go there, do my thing, and try my damndest to get home on time, all to make a lousy paycheck. When I'm at work, I feel sick. I feel stressed. I'm not happy. I try to crack jokes and make work out to be fun. But lately, it's even getting hard to be like that. I don't smile as much as I want to. I'm starting to really not care about anything at work anymore. I complain, and complain, and bitch and moan about work too much to my coworkers. They must be tired of me whining my ass off about how I hate everything at work recently.

I'M ON THE VERGE OF SOME KIND OF BREAKDOWN!!!
===============================================

In other sad news....

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STAFF ARE LEAVING MY UNIT

Okay, so it's not "MY" unit, but I have a sense of belonging to my unit at work. Yesterday, I was caught off-guard by some very sad news. One of my fellow workers, whom I think of as a good friend, has transferred to another department within GMH.

Now, you may remember a previous blog post that I wrote about, where I complained about my male nurse assistant? Well...it's HIM. He left us. Apparently, he couldn't take the stress shit anymore, and he secretly moved to another section. It was a total shock to me. He never even told me that he was leaving. I never even heard the "rumors" about his departure.

And I can't help but feel GUILTY about him leaving. I mean, we have all been under incredible stress lately, and I may have conveyed feelings of disappoinment in him with regards to caring for our female patients (view that old blog if you don't know what I'm talking about), but, I don't think I ever treated him wrong or unfair. I always try to help my nurse assistants if I can, so that the stress or burden can be tolerable. I've always liked him and had fun with him, like a friend. I even made a nice kick-ass Superman logo pic for him to place on his locker, because he loves Superman so much.

Maybe he really couldn't take it anymore, and realized life could be easier for him working in a different department. I don't blame him for wanting to go someplace where it is better for him. But I also can't help but think that he took the EASY way out of work. I guess it's just my values, or my wanting to overcome challenges and not back down. Or maybe he's not a masochist like me. Who fucking knows...

------------------------------------------------------------
PAPA IS GETTING WORKED UP FOR LUNG CANCER

Papa's been a smoker for most of his life. He only quit for good when he had his heart attack in 2004. But, I've always thought Papa would have serious lung issues just because of his history of the lengthy cigarette habit. When going through nursing assistant college during high school, I realized that Papa had what's called a Barrel Chest - common for people with emphysema. I thought that would be the extent of his lung disease, but that's not the case now.

During his yearly physical exam, his pulse-ox was checked (it measures the amount of oxygen saturation in your blood at any given time). Normally, a pulse-ox value should be 96% and above. Papa's was just in the high 80's and low 90's, which is not good. The lower your pulse-ox or oxygen saturation, the less oxygen is being delivered to vital body organs - like the heart and more importantly, the brain.

People with lung disease generally don't have nice pulse-ox values, so I wasn't TOO alarmed. The doctor told Papa he has COPD (Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease), which is the catch-all phrase used to tell someone that you just really have BAD LUNGS, in general. The doctor also told Papa he's got Asthma - as Papa does get out of breath at times, but, I've never heard Papa have any wheezing, which is common in asthmatic patients. But anyway, the doctor gave him inhalers to use/puff to open up his airways and let more oxygen get into his apparently permanently damaged lungs.

What really concerned us was the results of Papa's Chest X-ray. There was a small NODULE seen somewhere in his right lung. Now, from what I know as a nurse, that's generally NOT GOOD. And the doctor needed to confirm this nodule with further testing. So Papa just had a CT scan done - and the nodule is still there. But we still don't know what the hell it is.

So, Papa will be going for a CT-guided lung biopsy - basically, a radiologist will use the CT scanner machine to help locate the nodule accurately, then insert a big-ass and long-ass needle into Papa's chest to aspirate (pull out) a microscopic chunk of the questionable nodule. This biopsied peice of tissue will then be sent to labs to undergo further tests to confirm if it's cancer or not, benign or malignant, etc...

So, Papa's not too happy about these recent health developments. He's probably depressed. And he's probably scared about what will be found. I know I'm scared about this. We'll just have to wait and see.

-------------------------------------------------------------
THIS YEAR SO FAR

We're more than halfway done with this fucking year. The first part of this year was rather nice, compared to what's going on these days. I mean, I was sick and all, but I had the opportunity to go off-island and do something about my illness, have it treated, and have fun at the same time. I also finally graduated from UOG. I started courting someone.

But after all that, it seems life is just slumping downhill now. I'm stressed out. I need to take that damn NCLEX RN exam soon, Papa's possibly got cancer, work is HELL, and life is just hard right now.

--------------------------------------------------------------
NURSES NEED RELEASE

Nurses like me, are getting BURNED OUT, especially at GMH.
It's no wonder some nurses are looking to or possibly entertaining ideas of self-medication. Seriously. I talked to my coworker yesterday, and she's just as fed up as I. She's thinking about trying MaryJane to calm her nerves. She possibly joked about trying Ice too. Now that's fucking serious statements for a nurse to make. Nurses are more prone to getting addicted to drugs and shit. And some nurses are possibly going to take that path soon, 'cause nursing is becoming too much to handle. That is fucking SCARY. Do you want a nurse that's high on ice to be taking care of you and medicating you?

---------------------------------------------------------------
look what this nurse is resorting to...

8/08/2006 02:03:00 PM | |

Sunday, August 06, 2006 

My yearly meeting with Sabete


BEWARE!! It's the streaky people!!

Sabete makes it a point to not let a year pass without seeing me. So, naturally, this means one must track and hunt me down. It's not so hard to do...there's only 2 or 3 possible places in this world that I could be at any given time - (1) work, (2) shopping in some store, usually pay-more, and (3) HOME. So, she got a hold of me, and invited me out on my day off. And of course I said YES, 'cause otherwise I would've heard my door get knocked in, and would've been dragged out of the house with physical force ;-)

We had coffee at the beanery, had us some good conversation, and afterwards, I was off to see the band at Mac and Marti's. It was good music. They played songs that I hadn't heard in a long time, and even songs that I used to know how to play myself, on the guitar. It was great. I spent majority of the time not cheering for the band, but studying the chords they played ^_^ And after that night, I got inspired to pick up the guitar again.

After how many takes, we finally got a decent pic ^_^


I'm playing Trev's guitar for now, 'cause my other guitars either don't have strings, or are massively broken - and I'm talking about the guitar that I let my bro take with him to Africa - which was dropped off of some truck at one point and sustained major injury by means of cracking body and increasingly warped fretboard. Anyhoo, the damn guitar just doesn't sound right, gets de-tuned after 30 seconds of play, and is an eyesore.

So, Trev's guitar is an acoustic - and the steel strings are killing my fingers. My carpal tunnel doesn't help my playing either - I can't play for long stretches, and my guitar muscles are practically non-existant right now - so I can't even do bar chords for a long stretch. Basically, I need to train my damn hands and muscles back to my high-school days level. I've also forgotten how to play lots of songs. And that sucks even more, I think.


In other news...
My potential love interest, a.k.a. Arnold, will be turning 27 years old this August 29. I've already made a plan - I'm gonna call him and sing him happy birthday, sing a pinoy song to him, and also sing an originally composed song by moi ^_^ made especially for him. I've got the basic song structure down, but I need to start writing lyrics and start practicing my vocals. On top of that, my coworker Lucille, who is Arnold's future cousin-in-law, will be going to the PI this mid-month, so I will ask her to bring him his b-day present - more pics of me, some chocolate, and a cell phone!

It's not a "brand-new" phone, it's actually a phone that I bought when I was in the PI, which I intended to have grandma use but later discovered that it won't work on Guam :-( It's a Nokia 6060 - flip phone and nice style/design. It's a basic phone, it's not customizable like my 6600, but it's still a cool phone. I haven't used it at all, so I guess it's just "new".

Aren't I a kick-ass pseudo-girlfriend??? ^_^

8/06/2006 10:41:00 AM | |