Tag Archives: work

Late From the Beginning

30 Jun

I’ve gotta say, it kinda sucks to be running late from the moment your eyes open in the morning. I don’t normally work Thursdays so my big epic plan for today was sleep in, gradually get up, work on a scene I was going to perform in the evening at an acting class, come home and chill.

Well, all that got turned upside down when I got a phone call at 7:23am from one of the ladies at work reminding I was supposed to be working the 7am – 3pm shift.

Crap.

Never have I moved so quickly so early in the morning on such a small amount of sleep…approx 2 hours of sleep in case you were wondering.

Talk about regretting staying up till 5am! *rolls eyes*

By the time I got ready and battled my way through traffic I was an hour and twenty minutes late for work. Ugh. When I walked in the big boss was sitting at my desk, doing my job. Lucky for me he is actually a super decent guy and instead of being mad he made a little joke and was fine with what happened. Phew!

I thought my adrenaline rush would come to an end as soon as I got to work but alas it did not, which in hindsight is probably a good thing since it kept me energized for work. It was a busy day with me running all over the place and to be honest I’m not completely certain how I didn’t fall asleep on my feet…soooooo tired.

sleepy

I guess never discount the affects of adrenaline, caffeine, and the knowledge that you don’t have a choice but to keep going, shrug.

The whole time I was at work I fantasized about having time to go home after work and nap before my acting class but obviously lack of sleep made me delusional because no way in hell was there time for a nap, or dinner! Poor tummy.

So on to the second rush of my day where I was going home to change and do make-up before heading off in rush hour traffic to the downtown core, basically where all the demon traffic from hell is.

I guess if I wanted to look on the positive side I could say that the busy traffic helped me to stay awake and alert while driving…yeah, lets go with that! lol

Acting class went greeeeeeeeat! I was riding the high from it for a couple hours after class ended, however now, after I’ve been home a little bit, managed to scarf down some food and finally chill the tired is creeping back in and it kinda moved the excitement from class off to the side. Ah well, I’ll get it back next week!

We were given sides (sides are scenes from a script) to prepare a day in advance and the teacher really liked what I did with my character. I could go in to all the acting deets but I don’t think many of my acting friends read this so I’d probably be boring you all to death. Lets leave it at I did well, and this class helped remind me why I keep trying. In case you are wondering why, it is because it is something I am not only good at but love. I can’t wait to see what is the next scene I get! 🙂

For now though I think I should focus on sleep, I’ve been awake 17 hours after only getting around 2 and a bit hours of sleep, I’m pretty sure my brain is turning to mush lol

brain mush

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Thanks, You Shouldn’t Have…Really…

3 Jun

I got a huge bouquet of gorgeous flowers from my manager the other day. Seriously, so pretty, and massive, and probably costly.

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The bouquet is so large I had to seatbelt it in to my suv, it was an interesting drive home lol

From one angle...

From one angle…

Something yellow

Something yellow

White rose

White rose

Pink daisy

Pink daisy

Something in a colour I like

Something in a colour I like

Group shot!

Group shot!

Something white

Something white

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I am not really a flower type of person so while I appreciate the sentiment and the beauty of the flowers I would have been just as happy, if not more so, to have gotten something else…like a gift card to Safeway or something. Isn’t that horrible? For some reason I feel like that is horrible when really it is just a personal preference.

When someone gives me flowers it makes me wonder why they feel the need to give me an armful of dead things that are going to take up space in my tiny cramped apartment and do nothing more than wilt, slowly showing on the outside just how dead they are on the inside. What did I ever do to you that you felt giving me something dead was a good way to show your feelings towards me? sigh.

Yes, I am aware I am not normal. 😉 lol

Thing is, my apartment is very small and there is nowhere for these flowers to sit that doesn’t put them in the way. I don’t mean slightly in the way but massively in the way. They have to either sit on the stove or on what teeny tiny counter space I have beside the kitchen sink, neither spot is ideal. I use the stove, oddly enough, so I have to move them off the stove every time I want to eat and that teeny tiny bit of counter is where other things generally live so the flowers have taken up residence on a tv table that stands in the middle of the kitchen, generally being a pain in my ass. Sometimes they even end up on the floor but they aren’t safe there, I live with a cat, anything on the floor becomes fair game to him lol

The reason behind the flowers was because I have been doing extra work for my manager as well as helping out with a variety of things and generally having to do the work of three because of training new staff. Its not that I thought management hadn’t noticed, I just hadn’t thought of it at all so being surprised with the flowers and being told what they were for was really nice. Its always nice to be told you are appreciated. They came with a lovely card that will last far longer than the flowers. 🙂

So yeah, here I am, probably the most ungrateful person to ever receive flowers, finding more joy in the heartfelt written card than the gorgeous floral display taking up the middle of my kitchen space. Go ahead judge me, I probably deserve it. 😛

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Should You Exercise When Sick?

9 Mar

My work is swarming with germs lately…by lately I mean the past two weeks. There is some nasty bug that is making the rounds and whoever catches it basically is doomed. It’s nothing horrible like the noro-virus, it’s just a nasty cold. Whenever a resident is sick we request they call the front desk and have their meals delivered so as to not spread their illness to everybody else. It doesn’t seem that unreasonable of a request in my opinion but you’d be surprised at how many people come down, sneeze and cough their way through their meals, through the various fitness classes, through the movies, through all the different social activities we have going on and then are surprised to find a couple days later we have a huge increase in the number of sick people. sigh.

I stupidly thought I wouldn’t catch it because hey, I’m not a senior, my immune system is strong. Ha-bloody-ha! I got sneezed on, as in, directly sneezed on last Sunday and woke up this past Tuesday incredibly sick. This bug just flattens you. With how poorly I was feeling, and how hard it was for me to do anything, I can only imagine how much harder it is for the residents who get it.

I was so sick I missed both my dragon boat practices this past week, which sucks! 😦 …and is a true indication of just how sick I was/am.

When you’re sick, do you wonder how much, if any exercise you should be doing? I always do. I always think I should be pushing through, forcing myself to exercise, to go to my practices, to go for a hike, because exercise is good for you, right? But sometimes you are just sooooo sick that it feels like exercise just getting your butt up off the chair to get a glass of water.

So I went searching and I found this handy dandy visual aid to help me figure out if I should be exercising when sick, and if so, what types of exercises I should be doing. And of course I am sharing the visual aid with all of you because I am friendly like that. lol 🙂

page one jpg

page two jpg

page three jpg

page four jpg

page five jpg

In case the words are too small to read just click here and it should open a new tab with all five pages in a larger size. *crosses fingers the link works* lol

Hopefully you all stay healthy and don’t need to know this for a while! 🙂

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This Is For Adults?

19 Jan

My work has decided I have to take the Food Safe Course. That is a course that people who work with food have to take to make sure we don’t kill people. My job wasn’t supposed to have me working with food all that much but as the job changed over time it resulted in my having to make breakfast two mornings a week. Breakfast is porridge, freshly baked pastries, muffins, then there is the bread for toast and the juice, coffee and tea. Not a big deal, but because I am now slaving away a bit more in the kitchen, in an industrial professional kitchen, I have to take a course, sigh.

I don’t really mind having to take the course since I get paid for it. It is estimated to take approximately 8 hours to complete and it is all done online from the comfort of my living room chair. I have to have someone watch me write the exam, make sure I don’t cheat (those untrusting souls! lol) and it is time sensitive, once I start the course I have a specific amount of days to learn everything and write the exam. I’m not worried about it, it’s just learning, I’m sure I’ll be fine.

What took me aback a bit though was the “text” book I received in the mail today. I knew it was coming and was expecting a text book, like what you would get in University or when you take the First Aid/CPR courses. You know what I’m talking about, lots of words, perhaps some small diagrams if they are needed but mostly a bunch of reading to get through that is boring but necessary so I can pass the test.

Instead, this is what I got…

2015-01-17 01.04.20

I should have known from the cover that my expectations were too high…

Seriously?

Seriously?

I feel like they gave me a colouring book! I mean c’mon, this is ridiculous. And before you think this is the only page like this, it isn’t. Every single page has cartoons drawn on it and the pictures take up half if not more of the page, of every. single. page.

Since when does education come in the style of a comic book?

I can’t decide if I should be insulted because they seem to feel they need to dumb down the way they teach the information they are trying to get in to my brain or if I should be amused that my education on this topic is going to be taught while I am colouring in pictures because there aren’t enough words on the pages to keep me interested…*confused face*

I’m thinking I’ll lean more towards being amused…it’s healthier than feeling insulted, or if not healthier it is less likely to give me wrinkles! lol 😉

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A Work Party

4 Dec

Last Friday was my work’s Christmas party. I have been with this company, at this location, since it opened but this is my first year attending the party. Why? Because the people at head office always choose to have the party on a Friday night and I work that shift. No matter what they do there will always be staff that can’t make the party, that is what happens when you have a company that is open 24/7 but it surprises me there isn’t more effort put in to making sure it’s not always the same people who don’t get to go to the party. This year I got to go only because the casual girl who we call on when we need a shift covered had her birthday plans change, she took pity on me and offered to work my shift because she knew I wanted to go to the party…she knew because I had already asked her to work for me but initially she said no because she thought she was going to be out of town for her bday (which was the day after the party).

So yeah, this year I got to party, yay! I didn’t know what to expect, the previous years my friends at work always downplayed how the party turned out so I wouldn’t feel so bad for missing it lol

This year it was held at the Pan Pacific Hotel which is a fancy hotel in the downtown core. The space was really nice, huuuge windows overlooking the water, a decent sized dance floor and a nice large space for all the tables and the food.

There was a photo booth with lots of funny hats and glasses an stuff to wear, they’ve had this each year, lemme tell ya, that photo booth was never empty lol I’m not exactly sure why it is such a popular thing, I mean yeah, it was fun, but the amount of times I was dragged in there when once or twice would’ve been fine…having said that I have four of the picture strips and they make me giggle everytime I look at them. 😛

goofy people! lol

goofy people! lol

The food was super yum, it was a massive buffet with a carving station at one end where an oh so lovely turkey was sliced up for our eating pleasure. 🙂  I attempted to make healthy choices while choosing my food and I think I did fairly well. Some food choices (like the cheesy potatoes) were obviously not healthy but I don’t feel bad about those choices because the rest of the plate was covered in veggies, and salads, and protein…so a little bit of cheesy potato won’t kill me lol There was a separate loooong table covered in all the deserts, oh so many deserts! 🙂

Here is how the food portion of my night went:

Get a plate of food from the buffet.

Eat about half my dinner when I get dragged to the photo booth for a picture.

Return to my table after an absence of less than 5 minutes to find my dinner is gone. Servers cleared away my plate. Sadness.

I decided that meant I should start on dessert so I go to the dessert buffet. I got a small slice of a fruity thing (I’m not really sure what it was…) and was reaching for something made of chocolate when someone got all “omg you have to come dance to this song!” so I take one bite of the dessert, put it at my spot on my table and make my way to the dance floor.

After one dance I return to my table to find my dessert gone, servers had cleared away my plate.

Arg!

One of my friends encouraged me to go get another dessert but I didn’t want to be that person who went to the dessert buffet twice. She went for me and got me an amazing slice of chocolate cake that was super rich and covered in fruit, there was kiwi, and strawberries and mandarin oranges on top. I got about two bites in to it when someone was all “you hafta come to the photo booth!”.

You would have thought by now I’d learned my lesson but nope lol

Off to the photo booth I went, took goofy pictures, returned to my table only to find an empty spot where my plate used to be, sigh.

By this time I decided to quit the food, it was obviously the Universes way of telling me to stop eating lol I went back to the dance floor and stayed for who knows how long, remembered that I still had half a glass of wine and decided to go finish it before that also got nabbed by the servers but alas, I was too late, the servers had taken my wine.

Of all the thefts I was most distraught about the wine lol A person’s alcohol should never be taken, that is just…inhumane! 😉

Despite the over eager servers and the constant theft of my food, it was a great night. The group of people I work with are a fun group and we danced most of the night, luckily the DJ was good! lol

It started snowing around 9pm, it was so pretty, made the drive home a bit treacherous but meh, that’s winter for ya!

The pictures below are from a couple days after the party when I was walking to work in the morning, see how pretty? 🙂

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2014-11-30 06.56.43

 

Oh I forgot! I got tons of compliments on my hairdo, I did this updo that was a combination of a couple different things I saw in various YouTube tutorials and surprisingly it turned out well. I wish I had thought to get a picture of it…I started a braid on the left side of my head that wrapped around the back of my head to end in a side pony on the right side of my head. Then the hair in the pony tail was twisted, tied in a knot and pinned in place so it looked like a loose bun. I topped it off with a clip that had a flower on it with a faux diamond centre, it was put just above the bun. You’d think the clip was there for decorative purposes but it was actually to make sure the hair stayed in place lol I was paranoid the entire night about the bobby pins falling out and the bun coming undone but it held up the whole night, dancing an all! 🙂

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Mail Day!

26 May

It’s not often I get fun stuff in the mail, usually I’m getting hounding letters from the student loan people, bank statements, boring stuff. But today I got two fun things, yay! 🙂

The first is a package my parents sent me, it had a letter written by both of them, newspaper clippings, some Weight Watcher info in case I wanna try again aaaaaand a package that came to them but is for me. That package within the package was the tab for my BMO Run medal! Yippee! The back of my medal has a spot that has been waiting oh-so-impatiently for the tab to fit in it. The tab shows my name and my official finish time, which is good cause otherwise I’d forget lol. 😛 I want to show you a picture but my full name is on there soooooo sorry but the picture of it won’t be put on here. Don’t be offended, I still love ya! 😉

The next package had this:

First is the postal envelope...

First is the postal envelope…

 

Then comes the pretty envelope...

Then comes the pretty envelope…

 

And finally the super pretty wedding invitation is revealed!

And finally the super pretty wedding invitation is revealed!

 

It is my cousin’s wedding invitation! I knew it would get here eventually, and I already knew I was going to the wedding, heck, I planned an entire trip to the UK around this wedding, but getting the invitation was still exciting lol It made it that much more real. 🙂

The mail was pretty much the highlight of my day today…is that sad? I’m gonna pretend that isn’t sad lol 😉 I had a super busy work day, I hate when I have to actually work at work, sigh. Then I did some quick grocery shopping, or at least it would have been quick if I knew what a zucchini looked like (don’t fret, I got help and now I know!), then homeward bound was I. My landlady was in the backyard when I got home so I chatted with her for a while then eventually made it inside to my little slice of personal space. I was hungry enough to want to gnaw my own arm off (well ok, not quite that hungry but getting there!) so I made a super fast meal of maple flavoured baked beans on toast. Mmm! I love how it is a classic British dish but I Canadian-ize it by using the maple flavoured baked beans, it’s the best of both sides of the pond! lol

Since then I have done nothing interesting which would be why the opening of mail was the highlight of my day *rolls eyes*. Never fret, I will have more interesting days later this week, I’m just getting a bit of a slow start to the week is all, resting up for the really good stuff…or something like that lol 😉

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No I Wasn’t Skiing!

6 Jan

The amount of times I got asked at work today if I was using crutches because I hurt myself skiing is, well, un-countable! lol As if that is the only reason a person would be on crutches? *rolls eyes*

one of my crutches, I feel it needs a name but what to call it?

one of my crutches, I feel it needs a name but what to call it?

I also got offered in a kind of joking way the use of one of the resident’s walkers because she wasn’t going to need it for the day. Hmm, what else? It was suggested I get a wheelchair or a motorized scooter, it is now a running joke that I should move in to where I work since I am experiencing a medical problem generally had by seniors, I was given all manner of nicknames and I amused many people just by being on the crutches.

That being said I also experienced amazingly nice offers of help, people stepping in to make things easier for me, hugs, sympathy, get better wishes…so I guess all the being poked fun of was worth it for all of the nice stuff. I had multiple residents tell me that if I needed help with getting things done to call them and they would come down from their suites and give me a hand. These aren’t bored-to-tears-looking-for-something-to-do people in case you are wondering, these are busy-have-their-own-lives-but-are-so-thoughtful people that they would take time out of their day to help me.

Sometimes the simplest action or offer can really make a girl smile. 🙂

Work was tricky because of (1) the crutches and (2) the hip discomfort. Notice it has been down graded from horrible horrible pain to discomfort? Yay!

The anti-inflammatory+pain pills seem to be helping a bit, they are causing oh so not lovely side effects though, which sucks. I’m constantly straddling the choice of which do I want to deal with: the hip pain and loss of mobility or the side effects? You’d think I’d be all about getting rid of the hip pain and mobility issues and screw the side effects buuuuuut they are pretty unpleasant so I’m torn…

I was late with my pill this morning and had a raging headache because of it which concerns me. If after only two days of being on these pills missing one gives me that nasty of a headache what will happen after I’ve been on them for the full length of the prescription? *worried face* Also, they are giving me a gurgling tummy which while not painful or anything is kinda weird…oh! Don’t forget to add the almost constant nausea which makes it difficult to eat so I can even take the stupid pill, sigh. There are other side effects but I’ll stop the list here lol

I’m intending to do some internet research on these pills, see what is being said about them and I may go to the walk in clinic and see a non ER doctor about them, make sure they are really the right choice for me. Not that I don’t trust that second doctor that I saw who prescribed them but, well, I don’t trust her, shrug. She didn’t seem to really care about how much pain I was in or seem at all interested or concerned about what I was going through. Maybe I am asking too much of her but the doctor I saw on the first visit definitely cared about what was going on with my hip. The second doctor seemed to think I just wanted some pills and to be let go. The moron. I really want to know why this happened, did I do something to cause it, can I prevent it from happening again, how can I speed up my recovery, stuff like that…that second doctor, she had no curiosity left which is just sad, and annoying. Plus, I really want to know what the hell is in my hip?? A calcification? An infection? A tumor? What the fuck is it?!?! It’s In. My. Hip! It’s freaking me out! Nobody said the C word, and I’m sure if there was even a hint of that it would’ve shown in my blood work (messed up white blood cell numbers an all that – thank you high school biology lol) but still, when you are told twice there is something showing on the tests and that something is in your hip well…it makes a brain wander down some not so pleasant paths…

On a lighter note my cat just stretched and fell right off the ottoman he was just moments ago passed out on lol

I’m hoping when I go to work on Friday (Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday are my days off) I will be sans crutches *crosses fingers* cause they are so annoying, and attention grabbing in a way I don’t like, aaaaaand if I’m still using them it’ll mean the hip isn’t getting better as fast as I would like. So positive thoughts people! Positive thoughts! 🙂

Something else that kept getting commented on was how my outlook was good, how I was in a good mood despite what was going on and how I wasn’t letting this get me down. Those comments just confuse me, lol. Even if I was in a negative head space because of what was going on I can’t let that show at work, like I’m gonna be a cranky-pants in a professional environment cause I’m hurt? Uhhhh, no! But also, it’s all about perspective. Sure this sucks, sure I don’t like it, sure I’d rather it didn’t happen but it’s not the end of the world, it’s not a death sentence, it’s not even a permanent change in lifestyle sentence. It’s a I’m-hurt-now-but-will-most-likely-get-better sentence. What’s so bad about that? The second ER visit, a guy got brought in on a back board, wearing a heavy duty neck brace, who had a skiing accident. He went flying and landed head first against a boulder. The doctor told him if he’d hit just a little bit harder or at a slightly different angle he’d be paralyzed from the neck down. He has two fractured vertebrae, is on flat bed rest for potentially months, has nerve damage that should heal (but ya never know) and his biggest movement for the next while will be getting put up to a ten degree angle so he can eat and drink. He won’t be leaving that bed (or at least the bed they transfer him to) for a long time, his life right now is permanently changed and who knows how his long term life will be affected.

My hip problem compared to that? It’s nothing. I went to a nail appointment after work today (to get my shellac polish removed), hobbling along on my crutches. That guy can’t even scratch his knee with his fingers, or sit up right, or go to work, or walk, or hug his family and friends, or go to the bathroom without a nurse helping him, or shower, or or or…I’m thinking you get my drift lol

There is always somebody who is worse off so before getting all woe-is-me think about all the things you can still do. All the things you still have. Then maybe give yourself a little hug and a pep talk and go on your merry way, but send some positive vibes out there for those who are worse off, cause they could probably use them. 🙂

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No Party For Moi, le sigh.

29 Nov

Tonight was my work Christmas Party. It was at a gorgeous hotel, gourmet food and drinks, dancing, prizes to be won, mingling with all your work friends in a social setting, getting to dress up and feel pretty…

Guess who wasn’t there?

Me.

Again.

Grr.

I didn’t get to go last year either. 😦

See, the party is always on a Friday, I always work Friday evenings don’t I? Why yes, yes I do. Which effectively means I will never get to go to the over-the-top work Christmas Party.

Last year I was promised I would get to go this year since I had to work it. I was ok with that. Someone has to work during the party and last year I was perfectly fine with it being me since it does land on my shift. Also, the promise that this year I would get to go meant I wasn’t forever missing out on the event. Turns out the only “plan” made to let me go to the party was to ask the casual worker if she would like to work this evening. She said no for the perfectly legitimate reason that it is her birthday. That was the only attempt made.

Know what makes it even worse? I wasn’t even told! I had to ask if I was going to get to go and I got informed in an oh-so-casual way that nope cause K doesn’t want to work it the shift is yours. Lovely.

If they had told me earlier I would have asked both of the other ladies that share my job duties if one of them would be willing to swap shifts since last year I had to work the party and isn’t it only fair that I would get to go this year? Hell, one of the servers at work came up with a way to make it so I could go (it involved fiddling with shift times a bit), but management said no because, well, they can? They didn’t give a reason. Blarg!

I know it is stupid to be upset about it, after all it is just one party in the grand scheme of life but it is my only Christmas Party this year (my friends don’t really “do” Christmas Parties), my one chance to get to dress up, be at a formal dinner, go dancing…all that fun Christmas Party stuff. Plus! My friends at work (most of them anyways) left for the party right after their shift ended so they got changed at work, which means I got to see them all dressed up and wave them off into the night while I stayed behind. They all looked so great! They insisted I get in a group photo with them, it’s nice they wanted to include me but I looked at that picture after and there they are all glam and I’m not. I’m just in normal boring clothes. *pout*

I keep trying to look at the bright side, I am saving calories by not going to that meal, I’m sitting in my living room comfy in pj’s with a cup of tea a cat and my laptop while they are desperately trying to find excuses to slip their shoes off cause their feet hurt (well, the ladies anyways, the guys are probably fine lol), I don’t have to suck in my tummy all night and wonder if I look ok, I don’t have to find my way home late at night in the cold rainy air…um yeah, that’s pretty much all I got…and to be honest it was a stretch to find those reasons lol

Aww man, I just got texted a group pic of my friends from work all dressed up at the party, screw my bright side at not being there, I wanna be there! *pout*

Ok, pouty child moment over…

What gets me though is one of the staff members who doesn’t do my job offered to cover my shift so I could go. That would have meant she worked a 12 hour shift! She doesn’t even know how to do my job but she was willing to chip in so I could go because she thought it wasn’t fair I couldn’t go again. Management told her no because she doesn’t know how to do my job, which ok I do agree with that decision but what struck me is that she selflessly offered but the two ladies who also work the same position as me, who both were soooooo full of sympathy that I had to work tonight, who are the only two people in the entire place who could have actually helped me be able to go to the party did not think to offer.

Makes a girl think about things…

There we have it, my first (and only) Christmas Party post for the 2013 holiday season. Fairly pathetic. One day though! One day I will be a successful actress and will be turning parties down because there will be so many offers! Until then, it’s just me and the cat and the laptop chillin in the living room cause that’s how I roll. 😛

don't mind my pj's! lol. I couldn't get the cat to look at the camera hence the almost profile shot :P

don’t mind my pj’s! lol. I couldn’t get the cat to look at the camera hence his profile shot 🙂

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Extenuating Circumstances

15 Nov

extenuating

I don’t normally fail on day two of a challenge. Especially when I gave the challenge to myself. I did all kinds of things to make sure I not only rocked this one but I had fun and it was as easy as it could be.

Inspirational wall? Yup!

Goal Pants? Yup!

Groceries bought? Yup!

Food cooked a day in advance so I wasn’t running around crazy before work? Yup!

Calendar put on wall for easy visual tracking? Yup!

Lose It! and Runtastic App brought up to date and actually used? Yup!

Goal written out and taped to wall so I can remember why I’m doing this? Yup!

See? See how organized I was?!

Thing is, you can’t plan for everything no matter how hard you try, and sometimes things happen you weren’t even aware you had to plan for…more importantly, brace for.

It was a bad night at work today. It started off fine, like any other Friday evening shift. I was having a good time (I find my job fun), was mentally planning for errands I had to do after work, thinking about all kinds of random happy things when a sound I absolutely dread occurred.

The emergency alarm.

Crap.

Usually the emergency alarm turns out to be a false alarm or a situation I can at least deal with.

Tonight…not so much.

All those years I have been keeping my First Aid/CPR up to date, all those scenarios I am trained for, well, for the first time ever I had to utilize those skills, had to actually do what I had been taught in all those classes.

You know what I learned? Sometimes, no matter how hard you try, nothing works. 😦

I watched someone die tonight. While I was working on her she just…went away…I can’t get over how she was there and then she wasn’t…

Paramedics and firemen came, they worked on her also, they tried so hard but she was gone.

The rest of my night was spent doing my normal work stuff and handling all the things that go along with the death of a resident.

So you see, extenuating circumstances, they can mess with the best made plans, and ya know what, right now, I don’t even care that I messed up my eating for the day because I got reminded that there are things so so so much more important than the stupid, self involved, whiny crap I talk about on a daily basis.

After work I had to hit up the grocery store, besides what was on my list I bought a Chinese Almond Bun and a Lindt chocolate bar. Bad decision? Yes. Right way to deal with how I was feeling? No. Right now do I care that I totally blew my eating plan on day 2 of my challenge? No, cause ya know what, not everyday I watch someone die and frankly, not so sure I know how to deal with this.

All I can do is give myself time, and call my mom (which fyi, I will soooo be doing tomorrow! Would have done tonight except for stupid time zones that meant she was sleeping by the time I got home)…I have this mentality that my mom can fix anything, I know there isn’t anything in this situation she can fix but I also know I’ll feel better getting to hear her voice, hers and my dads.

So for now I have a sore stomach from the chocolate, I have teary eyes and I have the overwhelming urge to go to sleep and escape thinking about what happened today.

Tomorrow will be better, right?

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A Slightly Delayed Thanksgiving Post

15 Oct

So happy belated Thanksgiving from me to you! 🙂

To be honest I am not a huge Thanksgiving Holiday person, it was never a big thing in my family and a lot of times it seems people use it as an excuse to overeat, shrug. Having said that, my Thanksgiving meal is pizza and if that isn’t overindulging in a bad for me food well then I don’t know what is lol. 😛

Since I work weekends and my family are all a province away (or farther) I spent Thanksgiving weekend doing what I normally do. Working. With a boat race thrown in for good measure. Which, if you consider how much racing I have done this past summer, the boat race this past weekend still counts as what I normally do lol.

It was a different boat race then normal though, a fun race! As in, no medals, no stress, just an end of season festival where instead of racing in dragon boats we race in canoes and the third race of the day is an obstacle course. The races are in a river, a cooooold river! Almost every year a boat tips, teehee, and the shortest race is 1000m. The entire day can be summed up in one word: Epic.

Let me describe the awesomeness of the obstacle course to you, or at least try…

We start off facing a bridge but are a fair distance away from it, the race starts! Everyone battles to be the first to get to the bridge because from the bridge pumpkins have been dropped in to the river, you have to scoop a pumpkin out of the water before passing under the bridge. Harder then it sounds! After getting your pumpkin you complete a 1000m Y-shaped turn, go back under the bridge, do a loop around a buoy then beach your boat, one person gets out, takes their paddle with them, balances a cup of juice on the end of the paddle and runs/walks from Spot A to Spot B without spilling. Once they get to Spot B they are given a bag of cranberries. Then they run back to the boat, hop on in and you are off! We then do another loop around the buoy, go back under the bridge and paddle till we cross the finish line. The entire length of the race is (I believe) 3000m…I’m always a little unsure about race lengths in this festival. Suffice to say, this race is long, and oh so much fun! Because there are turns during the races at this festival, and we are all in canoes instead of dragon boats, there are crashes on the water, boats getting tipped, general mayhem and minor levels of violence, but all in good fun! 😀

The pumpkin scooped outta the river after being dropped from a bridge. This pumpkin has had quite the adventure!

The pumpkin scooped outta the river after being dropped from a bridge. This pumpkin has had quite the adventure!

By 7pm Saturday night I was exhausted lol A long day racing, with longer than normal race lengths, all I wanted was my bed. 😛 I heated my muscles a bit when I got home since they were already seizing a bit then crawled in to bed, oh man that felt good lol. Sunday though I woke up for work and did not feel well. 😦 I thought it was just cause of being tired from the day before but alas, I was wrong. I seem to have caught some sort of bug, I’m not sure what it is. I had no appetite all day Sunday but ate breakfast and lunch when at work cause I kept thinking if I don’t eat I’ll be hungry when I no longer am on break and then I’ll be screwed. When I got home from work I had a nap, a freakishly long nap, started at 3:30p and lasted till about 8pm! Who does that?! I got up for a bit, had tea and toast (my cure for pretty much everything), felt sicker because of it and went back to bed. Slept till I had to be up for work at 5:20am Monday…that is a lot of sleep! Despite all that sleep I spent Monday tired and not hungry and headachey and just not feeling well. My main thought during all that? “Crap! No Thanksgiving pizza for me if  feel like this! Sadness!” I was really looking forward to my pizza but just the thought of food made me feel sick, let alone having to actually eat it, ugh.

Luckily today was a day off, yay! I let myself sleep till my body chose to wake up, which anybody who knows me knows that means I slept in lol helped a friend for a tiny bit of time with his move then spent the rest of the day alternating between staring like a zombie at the tv and dozing off in my living room chair while attempting to get fluids in me by sipping ginger ale and water. I know I am unwell when I don’t drink endless cups of tea! I’ve only had two cups today, and the second one I didn’t really want, I just felt weird not having drunk a lot of tea so I made it and forced myself to drink it cause duuude, you can’t waste tea! 😉

I’m hoping tomorrow I’ll be better, I don’t want to waste my days off not having the energy to do anything!

Despite catching whatever the heck it is I caught I had a good weekend. Any weekend I am on the water racing is a good weekend in my world. 🙂  Saturday night, as I was moving slowly around my apartment because my muscles were already letting me know just how sore they were from the day I realized something I was thankful for, which seemed pretty well timed considering it was Thanksgiving weekend.

I am so thankful that I am physically able to take part in the various activities I take part in. I may bitch because muscles hurt, or I’m lazy and don’t want to go to the gym or it’s cold on the water but I am well aware not everyone can take part in dragon boating, or hitting up the gym, or zumba, or boxing, or hiking or any of the other stuff I do because of physical limitations. I had a long amount of time where I was one of those people. I couldn’t walk. My knee was messed up too badly, my entire left leg was useless. I used to have dreams of being able to walk again, that was it, just walk, without my crutches or a cane, it seemed like it was never going to happen. Now I run, I hike, I do squats, I dragon boat, I dance, I snowshoe, I do whatever I want. And while everyday I take a moment to be grateful for being able to walk I don’t think I ever really took a moment to be consciously grateful for being able to do all the other activities I do. I forgot. I took for granted that I could do all these things.

But not Saturday.

Saturday, when both my knees were barely working because of how badly bruised they got from the boat, when my butt, my back, my shoulders and my arms were all in intense pain and any movement caused me to wince and swear, when stretching made things pop in my back, that is when I had a moment of clarity. That is when I realized I am lucky beyond belief that I was able to be feeling that pain. I am so grateful my body works as well as it does. I am so Thankful I have a loving family and amazing friends who stuck by me while I was injured and who cheer me on now that I am able to be active again.

I will make sure I don’t forget, just like I don’t forget to be grateful I can walk. 🙂

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