Swimming lessons!

The Mitchell pool.

Waiting in line, tickling the little girl in front of her...
Waiting our turn
Putting our face in the water! Yay!
Mommy and Bellas favorite puppy.

Day at the circus!

There was a circus in French Lick this week. It was the one that is based in Peru, IN. So here are some pictures!

Some are not very good, I'll try to narrate as well as I can...

This is an Afgan hound jumping a hurdle.

The kid had just done a flip after being tossed into the air by the other guy. It was something to see! They did several flips and even flipped followed by landing foot on foot.

The monkeys. Joe'l wants one now....

Brothers from Moscow who rode horses and juggled.

Here they are both riding a different horse and juggling back and forth

More Circus pics

The elephants!

This was announced as "the only elephant still in a circus trained to balance on a ball". OK

Bella with the Ringmaster.

Tigers! Rrrrr

They didn't do anything in the show inside.

A happy littl girl on 'Okra' the elephant.

Misc. pictures

I had a good fathers day. We went to a new church, then ate out, then came home and napped.

Tonight I worked on the chicken tractor, getting close to being done.

Here's some pics:

Bella and I at my graduation.

Bella and Granddad playing "school bus".
Bella and Lauren riding a concrete buffalo.
Bella went to her room to play. We guess she got tired, cause she put herself to bed on the floor. I moved her to the couch.
Bookends?

A day to relax!

I'm home today, I'm so glad to be back home. Joe'l is home too, and Bella. Joe'l is sick to her stomach, she might have what I had the other day. She's asleep on the couch, Bella is playing in the floor and I'm sitting on the loveseat. We're watching "Little Bear". They are looking at a Cardinal on "Little Bear", and actually have the right bird calls, I'm impressed!

I am waiting for my Authorization To Test to find out when I get to take my boards. I'll be glad to get it over-with. I can't function at work as a real nurse until I pass the boards.

This evening I'm planning on going outside and working on the chicken tractor some more. But right now I'm just gonna lay on the couch....

Wedding anniversary; and Oh, I am so sick!

Today is our 6th wedding anniversary. It is hard to believe it has been that long.
I love you Joe'l, you have made me who I am. I couldn't have done it without you.

I was at orientation today, about 1130 I got suddenly very sick at my stomach. I felt like I was gonna vomit. I told our instructor I was gonna have to leave. So I got here to the condo at noon or so, I laid down on the couch and fell asleep, but I got up a little bit ago and still feel very sick. I don't know what the problem is.

Yucky! And I don't get to see Joe'l on our anniversary. :(

"To Bury a Raccoon"

So we've been having some large 'coons visiting of an evening to eat the cat food. These things are big, 15+ lbs. I'd guess. They growl and hiss and get all upset when more than one of them is there at a time. I've taken to shooting them, so they don't hurt the cats, or wake us up. Also, do you know the diseases you can get from 'coon droppings? Bad, bad stuff!!
So anyway, I've shot three of them. One ran off, I tracked it for quite a while in the woods, but it was dark and Ihad to get up for work the next morning......anyway...
One I buried in a hole I had previously dug. The other went behind the house . A couple of days later I went and found it, took the backhoe and dug a hole, buried the coon. Another job completed easily thanks to the backhoe. Almost.
Joe'l comes out of the house and says we don't have any water. How odd. I know the water line is WAY over there, and I wasn't near it. But I forgot that the electric wire runs a different way. Guess where the coon died. Right on top of the electric trench. Guess where I buried it. Right in the electric trench. Guess what I cut while digging the hole. The electric wire.
So I had to dig up the hole, luckily I found the ends of the wire long before I found the coon remains! So I went and found all the required parts and equipment to repair the wire. Fixed it, reburied it, water worked.
I went back outside and finish graded over the area, then went about doing some other things.
Joe'l comes back outside, no water again.
I dug again and found the wire, pulled apart at one patch. Apparently while I was reburying the wire, and driving over it, the dirt compacted letting the weight of the tractor pull on the wire, pulling it apart again.
I fixed it, again, reburied, and left it.
That was last weekend.

This entire last week I was in "Orientation" for my new job.

Pictures

Our chickens, several weeks ago.

Our little girl being goofy!

My day

Captains log,
Stardate: 8002.3.6,
Today was a waste of my time. I was at orientation at my new job. Oh what a bunch of drivle (is that how you spell that?).
Anyway, more on Joint Comission, state board of health, etc....just a bunch of stuff that doesn't really make any difference in my job.

So tomorrow I get to start with "New Nurese Orientation". I'm excited.

I'll post some more pictures in a bit.

Patrick

New Orientation

I've been doing some "orienting" at my new job in Martinsville. I'm working in the ICU. I have "New Employee Orientation" yesterday and tomorrow. Wednesday through next Tuesday is "New Nurse Orientation".

I'm staying at the Condo this week, Joe'l and Bella are supposed to come up Wednesday or Thursday. It gets lonely up here by myself.

Where have I been?

I've been all over!

School is finally over, done, complete. I'm thrilled. I'm ready to work.



What's happened in the meantime:

Joe'ls health has kinda stabilized, so that is good. She's taking her Tracleer and seems to be doing well with it.

Bella is getting big! She is tall. She started Teeball a couple of weeks ago. She's doing pretty good for a kid that has never hit a ball before.

We got chickens!!

I got a new tractor!

I'll get pictures up soon. I hope....

Lots of work

I worked yesterday. I was here for close to 16 hours. I got home at 5am then got up at noonish to come back in for another 12 hour shift. We'll see if I can go home on time tonight.
I'm pretty sure I will, unless something really bad is here or coming in, Joe'l has a doctors appointment in Louisville at 11am.
I'll post results from that tomorrow.

Last week of class coming up

I only have one more week of classes, and my Final exam to go, and I get a month off for Christmas break. I can't wait, I'm so tired of school. Not that I don't like it, I'm just tired of work and school, school and work, back and forth....ugh!

Epiphany

I've been working in the lab here at BHOC for a couple of months now. Last week I was sent in the little lab car (it's a Pontiac Vibe, it is actually pretty nice) to a nursing home to draw blood. I got there and tried to draw the patient. My first attempt caused the vein to rupture and cause a big bruise. While I was looking for another place to try I realized that I was the only one there. I didn't have someone else to call and draw the blood like I do at the hospital. It was up to me to get it. I moved to her other arm and found a large vein near the surface and was able to fetch the blood out without any more problems.
But that was the first time I realized that it was up to me and no one else to complete this task. I'm sure I'll encounter this more once I'm a nurse, but it was a frightening experience. I was very happy that the second attempt went much better and I was able to complete my assignment.

Working tired, waiting for the girls

I'm at work, I'm exhausted. We had a car wreck come in at about midnight lastnight. I stayed to help with that, I got home at 4am. I had to be back here at noon. I was late cause I slept through my alarm. There isn't much going on, so I'm just sitting here, about to fall asleep.

The girls should be home pretty soon. I think their flight was supposed to get in at 2:34 or so, it is just about that time now. I'm hoping they stop to see me for a minute on their way home.

I gotta go find something to do or I'm going to fall asleep.

Back home finally

I moved back into the house for the most part lastnight. Joe'l and Bella are still in PA, but I made the move. I worked on unpacking clothes and moving furniture and items the guys that worked on the house had moved around. Most of the kitchen furniture is in Bella's room. Most of our clothes were in the kitchen. It is just generally a mess. I hate "tidying-up" I don't know how to do it. The concept escapes me.
I'm at work again tonight.

Joe'l and Bella should be home tomorrow afternoon.

When can we go home?? Where's my wife?

I don't remember exactly when it was....it has been so long ago my memory has gone dim. Anyways, one of the water filters that I put on the waterline in the utility room (to keep the crawdads out of the sink) busted and flooded the house. The floors in the Utility, Bath, Hall, Kitchen and Bellas bedroom were all ruined. The carpet in the Living room got a little wet, so it was dried and pad replaced. The floors in all the rest of the house were pulled out and replaced.

The guys that ripped up the floor in the bathroom were hating me. I screwed the Lauan down every 6" square, then used water putty to fill all the dips from the screws.

I think we've been out of the house for at least 3 weeks. I don't remember what day the water came. We've been living with my parents since.

Joe'l and Bella flew to PA for Thanksgiving, I'm working the night before and the night of, so I wouldn't have been around anyway. I'll be having Thanksgiving at BHOC this year! I better go sign up for that....

Sad news at work...

One of our nurses who was diagnosed with cancer a year ago passed away today. She was 35. She left behind her husband and two sons 12 and 3.
She was a cheery, happy person. We'll all miss her.

Long post, lots to catch up on

School is going ok. I'm passing everything so I'm fine with that, I don't have to have A's, like some people.
Bella is wonderful, she is a joy to be around most of the time, just kinda cranky when she's tired.

Here is the latest on Joe'l:
Most of you know, she has Pulmonary Hypertension, also called Pulmonary Artery Hypertension. She has the congenital form, she was just born with it. The problem, as I understand it, is that the Pulmonary artery that goes from the heart to the lungs is not dialating the way it is supposed to. In order for her body to get the oxygen it needs, the right side of her heart has to pump extra hard to get enough blood through to her lungs. Imagine trying to fill a barrel with a garden hose that has a 4" piece of pipe taking the water out of the bottom. The pressure in the garden hose would have to be ENORMOUS to get the same volume of water.

She has had a perfusion scan, this involves inhaling a radio-active mist, then laying in a large radio-activity detector (basically) it shows how the mist is transferring to her blood from her lungs. This test was fine, also her pulmonary function tests were fine (how well her lungs expand and exchange O2 and CO2, pressures and the like). She had a high resolution CT scan of her lungs and blood tests to rule out blood clots. After all this she had a heart catheterization. This consists of threading a small tube from the femoral artery (in the groin area) up to the heart. Once there the surgeon can deploy a variety of devices through the tube to do a bunch of different things. In Joe'ls case they took some samples of tissue in the area and pressure readings. They also injected some Calcium Channel Blocker drugs into her while taking pressure readings to see if these would help bring her pressure down. CCB's are used in treatment of the more common peripheral hyptertension (High Blood Pressure). These drugs did very little to help her.
After searching on the internet I found a clinic in Louisville, which is about as far away from us as Bloomington is, but has much larger hospitals and more specialty doctors. We have had two appointments at Kentuckiana Pulmonary Associates with Dr. McConnell. After the first appointment he prescribed Norvasc, a CCB for Joe'l. She had very minimal improvement with this drug, and after a couple of weeks she was feeling the same as she was before taking it. We had another apointment and the doctor has put her on a drug called Tracleer. It is a known tetragenic, which means it causes major birth-defects. It is also very hard on the liver. She has to have monthly pregnancy tests, be on two forms of birth control (and not the pill, as the two drugs don't get along well) and have monthly liver enzyme tests to see how the drug is affecting her liver. It is the lesser of the evils involved.
The doctor also wants her to lose some weight, but she can't exercise because of the strain it will put on her already strained heart. So we are both eating smaller, healthier meals.

Any way we look at it, there is a rough road ahead for our little family.

How NOT to fix something

First a quick course on hydraulics. They work off pressure. A pump creates pressure. In a properly working system that pressure stays inside the system, even after the pump quits pumping.

While trying to test the pressure of the hydraulics on my dads tractor, I forgot the above paragraph and shortly after turning the tractor off, removed a plate through which hydraulic fluid runs. I got a face-full of hydraulic fluid. My eyes shut before the fluid got to my face, and my glasses kept it away from my eyes. What wasn't covered was my nose and mouth. I had a mouthful and plenty up my nose.
I was working out in the driveway, and now temporarily blinded tried to make my way to the house. I yelled for Joe'l a couple of times but the house is so tight that she couldn't hear me. (Plus the A/C is going, and she was in the back of the house)
I made it pretty far with my eyes closed and didn't trip over anything. I kept yelling for Joe'l and she did hear me and came to my rescue.
I got in the house and got my face under the tub faucet. I had her call the poison center, they told her to have me get in the shower and flush my eyes for 30 minutes. So I got in the shower and flushed my eyes and nose for 45 minutes, then Joe'l called them back and they said as long as I could see things should be ok.
I called Dr. Harmon my eye doctor and he agreed that as long as things were ok now I should be fine. Hydraulic fluid is fairly inert he said.
I flushed my nose out with salt-water for a little while then got back in the shower to get the fluid out of my hair and off my neck.

Lesson learned.