Learn to prioritize, people, I beg you.

I don't know how many times I've written "In order to provide holistic care, a nurse must remember to consider the needs of the patient along with the current priorities of the healthcare providers." in all sorts of BS essays.

Oh I understand the point. I know that patients are not going to pay much attention to what you're saying if they're worrying about who's gonna pick up their kids from school while they're getting chemo. I get that. That's important.

I want to rant here, because I learned the other day that some people are so afraid of losing their hair during chemotherapy that they acquire certain ridiculous looking "cooling caps". The idea behind these cooling caps is that they shrink the capillaries in your scalp so that chemotherapy drugs can't reach the hair follicles and make your hair fall out. You have to put them on at least 40 minutes before the infusion begins and change the ice packs every 20 minutes to keep the scalp at the ideal temperature.

If that was all, I would just chalk it up to silly vanity and not bother writing about it. But do you know where tumour cells just LOVE to go? The scalp. Especially with breast cancer. They freaking love it. The cooling caps are basically preventing the chemotherapy from getting to the places where tumour cells want to hang out. This is such a problem that when we see these things in the chemo clinic, we have to check if the doctors know about it and notify them so they can talk some sense into the patient.

Sometimes, the patient decides that keeping her hair is more important than the terrible risk of scalp metastases. That's when the nurses are supposed to think back to that blee-blah-bloo sentence up there. It's kind of like Frank Costanza screaming "Serenity now!" , isn't it?

So I did my job. I asked if the doctor was aware that she was using that contraption. She replied that the doctor knew but she was going to use it anyway. My poker face was awesome. I charted. I hung up the meds. I stayed completely uninvolved in the massive ridonculousness of her relatives measuring the temperature of ice packs, figuring out how to put it all together and strapping that thing onto her head.

One nurse muttered in passing, "Her hair isn't even that nice." It was a catty comment trying to hide the genuine frustration that we were all feeling, I suppose. What a terrible waste of money, energy and resources.

Your hair? It's not as important as your health. I thought that was pretty much a common sense kind of thing. Obviously not.

Serenity now.

Snippets of a conversation you would have overheard if you were seated at a certain table at Fran's 2 Saturdays ago

Anonymous: I just wish I could check if his Blackberry really did delete everyone like he said or if it was just me.
Judy: At this point in the romantic comedy that is your life, you would wait until he leaves his phone at his desk, casually saunter over and frantically dig through it for the information that you seek, but he would come back unexpectedly and you would have to shove the phone into your own bag and then a whole bunch of hilarious misadventures would ensue.
Anonymous: Like I even could. He keeps his phone in the back pocket of his pants.
Judy: Yeah and I'm sure that would deter you. o_O That would just add to the hilarity as you try to extract and then replace the phone in said pocket.

-----

Anonymous: Too bad he has a girlfriend.
Judy: At this point in the psycho drama that is your life, you would go over to his house, clonk the girlfriend over the head with a stiletto, wait for him to come home, clonk him over the head as well, tie him up and then demand to know who he loves more; you or her. Then you would probably buy and subsequently boil a bunny to show him how serious your feelings are for him.
[Okay, so that bunny bit was stolen from something else.]

-----

Anonymous: I just wish I knew what was going on. Does he really like me or no?
Judy: At this point in the romantic drama that is your life, you would meet him outside in the POURING RAIN, you in a modest dress that suddenly becomes ever so slightly see through in the precipitation and he in a light-coloured shirt that becomes clingy and reveals his toned physique. You would tell him that it's too late, he's left it too long and you've finally given up. As you turn to leave him in a teary huff, he grabs your arm, pulls you back and kisses you ever so passionately. Even as you protest, "No no, we musn't, it's too late", he scoops you up in his arms in a princess hold and carries you back to his abode, where the camera delicately pans away to the window where the storm is starting to subside, for it isn't that kind of film, oh no. The next morning, the camera pans back from the window along the streams of sunlight to the bed where you are vowing to love each other forever and ever, but then! The audience hears a slight plaintive cough. It turns out that you have both contracted pneumonia for not drying off properly like sensible people after your lovers' quarrel out in the rain.
Anonymous: BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHA! Pneumonia?
Judy: After months of suffering from this debilitating respiratory infection, one of you dies just as your love was starting to blossom.
Anonymous: What? NO! I want a happy ending.
Judy: It's you who dies.
Anonymous: WHAT? Why me?
Judy: You want HIM to die?
Anonymous: NO, I DON'T WANT HIM TO DIE!
Judy: Well it's got to be you.
Anonymous: But WHY?
Judy: For the tragic effect, of course! He had JUST realized he loves you after such a long time period of stringing you along and being wishy washy. And THAT is when he loses you. What is more tragic than that? You're dead.

-----

[2 weeks later]

Anonymous: And he was just smiling at me. There we were, just smiling at each other on the subway.
[Looks at Judy expectantly.]
Judy: ...
Anonymous: ...
Judy: What, is your life a shoujo manga? Give it a rest.

The Summer of Judy

You know that Seinfeld episode where George loses his job at the Yankees and decides to spend the summer putzing around willy nilly?

Well, it's turning into a Summer of Judy for me. I had originally planned on having a nursing job by now and studying for the licensing exam in October, but due to some unfortunate circumstances (which I have droned on and on about to so many people that I can't even muster the energy to do it once more in writing), that ain't happenin'! The delay is so infuriating that I was getting flashbacks to the days of Science in Society class when I was threatening to bonk my brains out with the pointy end of a scanner while Linda laughed and laughed hysterically, both of our minds on the verge of crumbling like delicious cinnamon dusted graham crackers.

So I've been spending my energy taking Japanese classes and studying nursing stuff from time to time so that my brain doesn't completely rust. And, since I am a poor student and in need of money until a bunch of bureaucratic nitwits tell me when I can start working in my field, I've advertised myself as an English/French tutor on a Korean message board. Ahhh, it's like being back at U of T all over again. Except the fact that I refuse to teach chemistry and math now. Thank goodness.

Oh, and you know how in that same Seinfeld episode, George slips on an invitation and hurts his legs? Guess what I did last night. I slipped on Robert's floor and twisted my ankle. Yes, the same one that I always twist. Thanks to my nursing interventions, it is not as swollen as it would normally be. But yes, it hurt so much that I cried last night for 10 minutes or so. So we all know what's going first when I'm 70-something and have osteoporosis. Something to think about.

I'm home!

Yes, I am home. Oh blessed home.

Robert arrived in Montreal by train on Monday night. Poor guy. He helped me move to Montreal three years ago (2 trips in the Subaru Forrester, so crammed full of stuff that it was threatening to expl0de its contents all over the 401) and endured a most hellish trip to Ikea with me. Honestly Ikea, why is your one location in Montreal in the ass-end of nowhere, accessible only from the madness that is Autoroute 40?

Tuesday was spent eating delicious pizzar from Amelio's and packing up all of my stuff. Robert did most of the bulk closet and kitchen packing while I did the cleaning and the little finicky stuff.

We woke up around 7 on Wednesday morning so that we could drag our sleepy butts to the U-Haul location in the east end of Montreal instead of the one at Pont Jacques Cartier. So much for your promise of giving me the most convenient location, U-Haul. We got there by 9am, as planned, picked up the cargo van and Robert drove it back to the apartment ever so carefully. He had back pains, so he couldn't turn around completely to look out the back and lack of windows made it impossible for him to check the blind spot on his right side. That made the drive through downtown Montreal FUN. TIMES.

We had everything packed in the van by 11:30am and then we had the fun task of making our way through the other half of downtown Montreal to get on the 20. At one point, a cyclist ran a red light as we were crossing the intersection and gave us a mini heart attack. I may have called him a son of a bitch. I don't tend to use that term as an insult towards a specific person, so I don't know what my exact feelings were at the time. The way he was zipping through Ste-Catherine indicated to me that he clearly had a death wish and we would not have been at fault if we had run him over. However, I would have been obliged to help him after turning his sorry ass into road goo since we were still in Quebec. But if I were muttering all kinds of mean things while doing chest compressions, could anyone reproach me for that? I don't think so. Damn cyclists.

Things went smoothly enough after that. We stopped at a St-Hubert in Dorion just outside of Montreal for brunch and the 401 moved along nice and smoothly. Until we were a few kilometres away from Kingston. The traffic slowed to a crawl and Robert estimates that it took us about 40 minutes to move 2 km. The thing about U-Hauls is that there's only an FM-AM radio. Robert had his Ipod, but I had forgotten to charge my Zune. I thought I was going crazy with boredom. Thankfully, Robert's laptop was fully charged and he had his external hard drive full of Scrubs episodes. I watched about 5 episodes while composing the following.

5:13pm - Robert and I have been stuck on the 401 for the past 2 hours now. From what I can tell, we are just outside of Kingston. The 401 is closed. No explanation has been given. We have moved approximately 2km in 40 minutes. Robert says that the 401 better have collapsed if there is all this fuss. I can only surmise that there is a possible zombie uprising up ahead. In which case, we're pretty screwed, because the only food supply that we have with us in the U-haul cargo van is a package of ramen, 3 servings of uncooked flour noodles and a ziploc baggie of dried anchovies used to make fish stock. And I have finished the box of Junior Mints that I bought in Montreal. We have no water. To either side is a densely forested area and we have no viable weapons. We are in the worst case possible situation for a zombie outbreak. At this point, it would be just easier to get our butts bitten by zombies and join the winning side. If our zombie selves somehow make the 300+km trip back to Toronto and bite your butts, just remember that we only did what we could.

5:24pm - If I become a zombie, the first people I'm biting are smokers. Robert doesn't mind smokers, but hates people who throw their cigarette butts everywhere. Just saw a man jump out of his idling SUV and head off into the bushes. Thought he had mysteriously received news of the zombie outbreak and was abandoning his car to take his chance in the wilderness until Robert pointed out that he probably just had to pee. Am rather glad of the fact that am thirsty and not in need of relieving my bladder. Robert has taken to reading a book during the 20 minute intervals between inching forward.

5:31pm - If there is a zombie uprising and if I do end up surviving this traffic nightmare of 401 with some kind of weapon, I would want the soundtrack of my zombie mercy killings to be Knights of Cydonia. It would be kickass. Thought: Why am I so into zombies lately?

5:48pm - Seem to be moving ahead at about 70km/h all of a sudden. Robert is very perplexed. I would come up with some kind of zombie-related reason for this, but am strangely unable to muster enough crazy at the moment. As soon as the above was written, the traffic has slowed back down. Actually saw two cars ENTER the 401. Poor suckers.

The signs later informed us that the 401 had been reduced to one lane for 7km, because they were working on expanding the highway. So avoid the 401 around Kingston this summer at all costs. Once we got past Kingston, everything was smooth sailing again. We got to Toronto around 9-ish and got off the 401 at the Bathurst exit. The thing about Bathurst and 401 is that you can't get off directly onto Bathurst from the 401. You get off on Wilson and that takes you to Bathurst. We got on Bathurst and drove. It was taking longer to get to Finch than I thought. I distinctly remember saying, "St. Clair is after Lawrence, right?" but I must have been too tired because I didn't register at all what that was implying. It was only when I saw the huge red and yellow sign for Honest Ed's that I screamed, "We're at Bloor! We're at Bloor!" It was UNBELIEVABLE. Does this happen to everyone or is it just me? It seems like whenever I go on a road trip, some crazy thing happens and I end up spending the night in the back of the car or unpackaging a headboard in the middle of the Ikea parking lot at 10pm. We finally got to Robert's house (we weren't in any shape to unpack any luggage, oh no) and just crashed. This experience has thoroughly ruined my desire to move anywhere more than say, 50km away. But it makes for a crazy story, no?

Plus, I'm home. That's always awesome.

A declaration.

To: You people know who you are

Please, for the love of beans, stop over analysing stuff. Especially relationship-y stuff.
You make me oh so tired.

Yes, I am your friend. I consider myself a damn good empathetic willing-to-cry-with-you-if-something-bad-happens type of friend. But I am only willing to do so if there is truly something to empathize about.

If you believe that the guy you rejected but now have feelings for but he was seeing someone but then you have reason to believe from the oh so reliable evidence from Facebook stalking that he isn't seeing that girl anymore so maybe you have a chance again- You see? I can no longer form sentences to describe your situation. And I used to be excellent at forming seemingly run-on sentences that were actually quite sensible.

The point is, if you do this to me, I will sit there with my smile-that-isn't-quite-a-smile and say, "Ah."

Maybe in the process of becoming a nurse, I have learned to differentiate between "hard evidence" and "you are analysing the way someone waved at you across a dark room?" level of foolishness.

Do me a favour. If you are interested, ask the person out. Do it. And no, a text message asking if the person is "free" sometime in the future to do "something" is not good enough. SMART goals, people.

Specific-Measurable-Attainable-Relevant-Time-bound

If you didn't include all these components into your significant discussions for plan making with someone, then I can't be bothered to listen to you whine when it falls through. And I don't believe in coddling anyone. You can find someone else to help you cling to false hopes or any sort of delusions by saying, "Oh yes, she will totally come back to you one day. TOTALLY.", because I don't do that.

I. Don't. Do. That.

So don't call me heartless and unsympathetic and wah wah wah. Because it's not just one person who is filling a balloon with honey-coloured daydreams that aren't at all realistic. It's MANY people, each with their own individual balloons and it is SUFFOCATING me.

At one point, I had to resort to scream-praying to God, okay? I haven't prayed since grade 6, okay? I don't even believe in God. I did that because of you. And your yammering. And believe me, I'm not trying to burst your bubble. I'm trying to deflate it as gently as I can.

So please, help me preserve my sanity. By doing so, you will be helping to create a sarcastic and fun Judy. Someone you can truly rely on to congratulate or comfort you when something significant happens.

Help me help you.
Help me help you.

Love and hugs, your friend.