Huh..."Year Zero" really isn't half-bad.

[fredericks]

Links o' the moment:
1. Television Without Pity's recap of the final Wire eppy, "-30-". Goodnight, Moon. *sniff* Btw, my nominee for one of the best moments? Daniels and McNulty riding the elevator together. "To be continued..." for the effin' WIN.
2. HarperCollins has placed my favorite Neil Gaiman novel, American Gods, online. The complete work, online for a limited time only. Read and be merry.
3. Six reasons the Irish aren't so lucky. Cracked.com is indeed teh crack.
4.Hawaii on a boat in seven days. 2009. Here's to making it happen.
*

Work. I've mentioned I'm amenable when it comes to last minute schedule requests and calls for help re: working short shifts. This past Wednesday one of the assistant managers called me and begged me to work on Wednesday because they'd had two sick calls, leaving four nurses on the floor. I agreed once she gave me Friday night off (my floor can't budget OT for nurses anymore, it seems). So I worked Wednesday and then Thursday. Thursday was a pretty shitty night: I was on a "heavy" side (meaning patients required a lot more hands-on care re: changing dressings and/or full assist while ambulating) and ended up sending a patient up to the MICU in the middle of the night. Her oxygen level dropped from 91% to 60% in what seemed like moments, and I got sorta yelled at by the NP for not calling the RRT like he asked. I actually started to call them, but all of my senior coworkers AND the manager on the floor told me not to bother, since I placed the woman on a non-rebreather and she started sat'ing 98%. They insisted I call the NP and tell him to come up and re-evaluate the patient immediately, which he did. He then called in a MICU consult after placing her on BiPapp and doing an ABG, thinking they'd just check her out and write a note for the attending MD. Nope - up to the unit she went. I left feeling like shit, knowing that I should have called the RRT like I did in a similar situation in the past and, man, I really thought I'd posted about that situation but I guess I didn't. I spent, like, ten minutes going through my history looking for that post. Hmm. Because of the MICU transfer and the time sap it ended up being I stayed until nearly 9AM doing paperwork. It was cool only because I expected to have Friday off.

And I DID have Friday off. My problem? I need to learn how to say "no". A manager in charge of staffing called me at 6PM on Friday, begging me to go to and work an OT shift in the ER hold. I know I recently posted about my experiences there. Needless to say I told her no. But then she continued with the begging, saying she would let me work on my floor and give me OT from the ER's bank, and float a nurse from my floor to the ER. The idiot that I am, I said I'd come in. Mind, the only reason I ended up fielding her call in the first place was because the phone dropped on the floor after I sleepily fumbled for it and opened up, automatically answering the call. I went in and got placed on the same heavy side and had another shitty night, not leaving until 9:30AM or so. Not. Fun.

Life. I've had Saturday and Sunday off, but I slept through both days. Now I'm up hanging out in an otherwise quiet living room, Sportscenter playing on its endless loop on the muted television (the Nuggets completed beasted their way through that game, didn't they?). I forced myself to edit an friend's grad school essay (talk about a blind/blind situation, I know), but have otherwise spent the time fighting sleep until a more doable time (say, 8AM). Nothing else new, no real interests. I have found the time (ha!) to indulge in Super Smash Brothers for the Wii (who knew the Mission mode would be more fun than the melees?), but not much else besides that. I'm happy I didn't do the whole resolution thing this year, because, omg, I've done nothing with what I've been handed up to now. I would guess I'm suffering under some sort of depression, but I'm relatively high-functioning at work. Things just sorta turn to shit when I have enough time on my hands to ruminate on life: I have no energy, I can't focus enough to complete tasks (to keep things in LJ perspective - it's taken me three or four tries to write this entry, and let's not think about the number of friend's posts I click "comment" on and then disgust myself with the inanity of my words), and I'm one click away from blasting the angsty music (Aenima seems to have run away, sparing my family that bit of agony). I think it comes down to forcing myself out and about and putting my foot down about certain situations. Hells, it can't hurt.

Holy crap - I've been maintaining this thing for nearly five years. Talk about a freakin' long-term relationship. I should do some big retrospective on the anniversary date. Or just write another bitchy post about work.

Comments

[captainschlumpy.livejournal.com]

ugh, that sucks. I used to have the same "can't say no" problem with my old job. I always felt obligated (in my own head) to go in whenever called. I've come to realize that it really only bites me in the behind. Also, that Irish link was awesome! I always thought "luck of the Irish" was a stupid saying. We're not terribly lucky at all! Today I plan on pretending to be offended by the "drunken leprechaun" image the holiday gives us! Are you free at some point this weekend? we should go for coffee or something. I'll call you. I have plans Easter Sunday but I fri, sat, and most of thurs free.

[fredericks.livejournal.com]

You're of Irish descent? I couldn't guess from the name. Awesome. :) I love corned beef and cabbage, and the sucky thing about St Pat's Day being during Holy Week is that, since my family's traditional Roman Catholic, no meat's allowed to be prepared until Easter. There's no real prohibition on alcohol, although I do have to work tonight. Dammit. The ER is going to be stinking with all the drunks, I'm sure.

Sure. I work this Thursday and Friday, but I'm off for the next five days after (*really* off, as in I'm not fielding a single call from work). We should meet in Chinatown (by the 7 Main Street station) - there's a massive Starbucks right on Main street I like that we can crash at Saturday afternoon-evening. We'll powwow sometime in the middle of the week? to iron out details if that works for you.

[captainschlumpy.livejournal.com]

Yup, my mom's family came from county Galway during the lovely potato famine! Concannon, Carrico, and White. My father's family is of the evil British, coat of arms and everything! It's a constant battle with myself! powwow mid-week sounds good, as does Chinatown and starbucks. :)

[darker-one.livejournal.com]

I haven't read TWP for ages. I should check out their Wire finale review.

What did you think of the last ep? I enjoyed it, but I thought that a few of the characters didn't get as much screen time/resolution as I would have liked. And some of the montages were a bit much. Still, I think they did a pretty good job of wrapping things up.

[fredericks.livejournal.com]

I didn't expect *every* character to get screen time in the finale, but I think TPTB did a good job of bringing in people from previous seasons during the course of the final *season*, which works better IMHO. I was surprised Landsman and Daniels were in attendance at McNulty and Lester's "funerals", seeing as both of them were blatantly played by the men, and the whole "fake out" with McNulty on the pool table annoyingly knocked that fourth wall right over, but I thought that entire scene rang true and I felt like they could have ended the show right there. I like a bit of closure as much as the next unimaginative American, but, like you, I thought a couple of the montages were pushing things. In fact, it could have ended with McNulty stopped on that highway looking out on Baltimore and I would have been *good*. I think Simon was keeping the fan uproar over the Sopranos two minute black screen ending in mind when he basically handed us a wrapped-up ending.

I could have done with more Prez, but the hint of him I got was enough to satisfy my soul (even if it was a bit cheezy - the man really became a hardass in one year? you're kidding me). And I would have *loved* to see Avon make an appearance, but meh. I wasn't a fan of the flatness of the whole journalism storyline- for four seasons the writers gave us multidimensional characters, and then we're left with a news editor who's blatantly "good", against blind executive editors who are blatantly "bad" - for shame, writers. And, actually, I would have loved to find out what happened to Lester and McNulty after - you know, did the shit *really* end up hitting the fan? But I liked what I got.

[darker-one.livejournal.com]

I guess the one I would have liked to see more from was Bunk. Oh well. All we learned about him was that he is still working murders.

And I totally agree about Prez! As if he turned into a badass teacher that fast!

The newspaper men were very poorly written as a whole. I didn't think they were introduced very well, and with the exception of Templeton and Gus, they were all very interchangeable. And most of the affection I felt for Gus probably came from my love of Clark Johnson.

[fredericks.livejournal.com]

You're right. Then again, Bunk has been shortchanged in regards to character development since Season 2. We got a hint of him being either married or in a long-term relationship with another woman, stepping out on the woman, and then (hilariously) attempting to burn the evidence back then, then a couple of one-offs with his kids and McNulty's kids hanging out, but that was about it. The excellent actor Wendell was, though, you sort of felt like you knew everything you needed to know about Bunk. He and McNulty need, like, a friggin spin-off. Maybe McNulty could be a PI and Bunk works cases with him on the side. I would pay to see that. Hells, I feel obligated to bring that to the screens of the public. :)

I don't know what was the cause of the whole laziness with the newspaper storyline. I mean, this is the show that made me get all weepy over the fate of stevedores, and it fumbled the journalism bits? I can tell in future viewings of this season I'll just FF past all that stuff.

[drjayphd.livejournal.com]

I may or may not have just cracked up here at work at #3, for the record. :D

Also, I need and must, at some point, play SSBB. The Wii-owning friend must have us over soon, if only for my sanity (and so I can piss them all off because I'm just better at it than 'em)... ;)

[fredericks.livejournal.com]

If you can swing it, I'd suggest buying a Wii SOLELY for SSBM; that's how damn good the game is. When you're stressed nothing beats knocking the shit out of 100 Kirbys. Seriously.

[atraxia.livejournal.com]

i miss you freddie!!!

i was at a work dinner last night - and hawaii came up. a fellow went on that exact cruise and said it was horrible - bad service/food and too much time on the boat. everybody recommends just flying straight to maui and hanging out there for 10 days. just a thought. (i have a travel piggy bank fund going - woot!)

[fredericks.livejournal.com]

How was Florida? K!!!

I just like the whole cruise aspect. I picked up a couple of guide books in the library, and most of them recommend spending around two weeks hopping from island to island or just hanging out on one island for a while. Cruises get sort of shit on. Hmm. Perhaps I should buy a clue. :)

And the plane tickets to ATL suddenly jumped, like, $150 in price. It's insane! I should have purchased them when I first saw them.

[twoworldsin1.livejournal.com]

Congrats on the 5 year anniversary :) I tried to do a retrospective with mine, but I kind of got hung up right in the middle, due to present issues.

Edit: You know that part about "the inanity of my words"? Yeah.

[fredericks.livejournal.com]

I'm getting to the point now where I just say what first comes on my mind. But it's hard to fight years of training.