One really crappy week

I had a really tough three days at work this week. I had several difficult patients all three days. Thank goodness for the two or three really nice patients that made up for the difficult ones. Friday was so busy and a couple of patients kept me running. It seemed that as soon as you sent one patient home, another one was waiting in the hall while the room was being cleaned. I spent a lot of time with some patients who felt that we should have better food, a bigger room, a nicer nurse, and "what's all the noise about" why can't you shut that thing off? Why do I have to be here? When can I smoke a cigarette? I don't have to put up with that!" People who don't want to do what the doctor ordered, but want to get everything that they want NOW!

I usually don't have too much trouble with these types of people. I found that if you can let them have some choices, they start to feel like they have some control over this horrible thing that has happened. But with three or four of these, for three days in a row, I really had reached the end of my rope by 7pm tonight.

Then to cap it all off, I was walking out of the hospital to the car. I go past the emergency department to the parking lot. There was a family and one person was crying very loudly with the kind of cry you only connect with someone who's had a great loss. I've been close to tears all day and that just ended my day very badly.

Thank goodness that when I come home, Rowan has a great big smile for me. It doesn't quite make the day dissappear, but I can laugh with him for an hour before he goes to bed. He's very much into making things with wheels move around. He loves to push cars and trucks all over the floor.

Here's a picture of him eating an m&m. He got the blue all over his face :) Also, you can see some of the impetigo on his nose and ear. That has all cleared up now. He just has a little bit of redness that shows up when he's excited or hot.
I hope I didn't depress anyone too much. I just needed to vent a little to a whole bunch of people. I hope everyone else has a good week.

HE DID IT!!!!

We were all over at my Aunt and Uncle's house last night. My cousin Mary Beth was playing with Rowan and she had him standing and facing toward the dog and me. He was taking a few steps with her help and then she let him go and he took two steps all on his own!! He did it again tonight. I never thought I could be so proud of a couple of steps :)
I'm sure in a couple of weeks, I'll be saying I wish he was crawling again. It was just such a surprise after watching him stand there and think about it, but decide that he'd rather crawl.
Also, the impetigo looks so much better now. At least he doesn't look like a leper anymore. He just has a small sore on his nose left. Now I can take him out and not worry that everyone is gonna ask what's wrong with him. Whew!
Oh yeah, and he's now found his voice. He has become very loud, and he loves to tell you all about his day. When Mom and Dad were first taking him to church with them, everyone commented on how quiet he was. Not so anymore. It's a challange now to keep him in his "inside voice" :) I think it's pretty cute how he tells me about what he's doing.

long time, no blog

Ok, so it's been forever since I've been able to get on to the internet. My mom's internet service has been out since last Monday. It finally came back on yesterday, but I worked all day. Whew, this working thing can be a big drag sometimes :P

We've been trying to get used to the high humidity and all the rain this season. Everyone here in Texas keeps telling me about the horrible drought of the last couple of years and I should be glad it's not so dry this year :) Ok, but I'm thinking about building an ark. Wasn't it 30 cubits, by 300 cubits? And I don't think I can hammer that well.

On the other hand, Rowan has been dealing with some sores on his ear, nose and parts of his face. First we thought it was bug bites, so we've moved him out of his room and sprayed for bugs, steam cleaned the carpet and washed everything we could. Then, the sores just weren't healing right. I finally broke down and took him to the doctor today. Of course, we're between insurances right now. This couldn't have happened two weeks ago or three weeks from now. But anyway, the final diagnosis is Impetigo. At least it was something worth taking him in for. I feel better paying for a doctor bill knowing it's not just a worried mom thing. The doctor said that it should look better in a couple of days. So no pictures of the monkey today. He looks like he has leprosy and should be ringing a bell where ever he walks.

On the Idaho front, Eric saw an ad for a dog that needed a home. After some discussion, we decided to try Maggie out. She's another great dane, blue merle, like Morgan and only 2 years old. She's been playing with Morgan like crazy, Eric says. I think when Morgan reaches her full growth, with the 4 dogs, we'll have around 500 lbs of dog! Wow! I can't wait to meet her. Here's a picture of her.

Rowan and I will be taking a quick trip up to see Eric the first week in August. I guess we'll have to celebrate our anniversary, Eric's birthday and Rowan's birthday all at once :) It'll be nice to be in a dry climate again.