Hi! Remember me?
I was approved for that extra week of work, have packed and moved and started my new job since we last caught up. I haven’t set up Internet yet though because I don’t know my whole schedule, so, sorry for this giant delay. Here we go!
Jared’s bonfire farewell party never happened because there was a surfer convention or something and all of the beaches were packed. Instead, Jared wanted to hang out at a less crowded one, Seal Beach, at the beach and then at a restaurant overlooking the ocean, so that’s how we sent him off.
Nothing crazy had ever happened where we lived or really at all the entire time Jared lived here. As soon as he took off on his trip home, I was woken up every morning. First it was the rattling of my closet doors from an earthquake, my first! Only a 4.1 but still. The next day, someone tried breaking into my apartment at 3:30 in the afternoon (I was still sleeping from night shift). I heard rattling and jiggling of my door handle. I packed a lot of my clothes at this point so I was sleeping in a t-shirt and underwear, who is looking, right? This event and my situation caused me to scream like a 13 year old boy, “Who’s there!?” It’s okay, Max was snoring away and missed it all. I need to get his ears checked! The next day, the furniture company banged on the door, not knowing that I was staying for an extra week. My nerves at this point… shot.
I finished work in the ICU on my last night, thank goodness. I had nice comments and feedback and hugs. It felt nice to close that chapter anyway. I am excited about getting back into a teaching hospital! I slept and spent the rest of the day cleaning and packing and filling my car again. I totally forget how I did it the first time to get out here and have enough room for a passenger and a dog too! I haven’t even accumulated that much!
In the morning, one of my shiny new friends from out here offered to tow some stuff and help me get into my new apartment. I didn’t want to take advantage of this while packing stuff because next time, I may not be so lucky and eventually I am going to have to tow it all by myself. I left the larger things for his car and it took us over an hour to get from point A to point B. Ugh. GPS tried to avoid traffic but took us though back roads with plenty of stoplights. Thanks for nothing, Garmin.
We arrived midday, got a quick tour and I got my first LA ticket! $63.00 for the nose of my car being in a red zone. No hydrant or anything. I was in a spot, just off centered. Sheesh, welcome to the neighborhood! The apartment is beautiful though with a pool on the roof, a kitchen that reminds me of my favorite one in my last apartment in Edgewood, a gym with virtual spinning, a cyber café and a community room equipped with a pool table, flat screen TV and a kitchen. Hello Oktoberfest!?
Did I mention that it is A LOT hotter inland without that ocean breeze. I am feeling summer more now, 90s instead of 70s every day. Someone said that August and September are the hottest months out here. Just in time…
My next challenge was finding a blade of grass for Max to toilet on. It felt a lot like being on the South Side of Pittsburgh again. Luckily there is a park two blocks away, but it’s a LONG two blocks. I circled the neighborhood and found a few patches nearby for him and he accepted this, thankfully. Not so thankfully, this is also where ever other dog in North Hollywood toilets so if he isn’t sniffing each blade and taking his good old time, he is jammed up because some other dog is nearby. I miss my yard!
The night after I arrived at my new place, I drove back to my old place to drop keys off, check my mail and pick up another friend from the airport, again through the hood. The hood people are so thoughtful. They are trying to throw water bottles at you, protect you from the sun with shields for your car and even wash you windshield. At every stoplight. And I told you there were a lot. They are pretty forceful too! Yikes! Anyway, my friend started at Kaiser Sunset with me and decided to stay with me for the week. It was nice to have company and someone around to explore my new hood with after work.
After our first day of work, we got out early and a few other nurses suggested grabbing a drink up the road at this little French place. It was so cute! It has been almost 10 years since I’ve been there but the feel was spot on.
Danielle and I explored a few restaurants within walking distance from my apartment. We even passed a marijuana clinic. I am so naive and didn’t believe her but the windows are covered, there is a green medical cross on the door and a note that says “Patients only.” Oh and there was an odor to confirm. Whoa! Is this real life?
We apparently had our finger on the pulse of what’s what in North Hollywood though. We walked by a restaurant/bar one of the nights we were out and decided to invite friends up for dinner the next night. It was delicious food and drinks and it had only been open for six weeks. Boom, on it! It was also somewhat of a “sausage party”, if you will, which was nice to look at but I quickly am learning that guys are out here to pursue acting or music or something and that is where their focus stays. Oh well. At least the food, drinks and service were good.
Now, onto the new hospital. Think of Kaiser as UPMC and Sunset/LAMC as Presby. It has several addresses, that is how big it is, but it is primarily on Sunset Boulevard. It was all recently remodeled and everything is fresh and new (It doesn’t even smell like a hospital yet, which is surprising considering what comes through those doors). We had two days of orientation- to the hospital, our units and the equipment we would be using. They also introduced a new tool named Vocera. I heard about this thing, it’s like Siri for the iPhone.
It will be the source of my rage, no doubt. You have to know the first and last name of someone to contact them and there are no phones. It is nice if a patient calls out, you can answer it and talk to them on the speaker near their bed, instead of making two or more trips into the room. It’s a strange and accepted excuse to be rude and unavailable and interrupt everything you are doing but they promote this behavior so, I am just here to help.
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| Hard to see in this picture, closer in real life. Griffith Observatory to the right, Hollywood sign to the left. All from the parking garage. |
My week of orientation is over now. Everything went well, even though (a lot of) the other nurses tried to make us non-existent by refusing to look at us, ha! Some would even shake their heads "no" when assigned to orient us. What!? We are here to HELP! One nurse even said, "Maybe you want to try Kaiser Woodland Hills. That's where a lot of white people are..." Rude! And I've even been laying out!
Anyway, we oriented to our home unit, the intermediate cardiac step-down unit (ICSU), Emergency Department (ED), Short Stay Observation Unit (SSOU), a general medical surgical floor and the Intensive Care Unit (ICU). By far, the ICU was my favorite. I really like being able to focus on just two patients. They are currently converting the hospital to a Neurosurgical Center as well, so maybe I just felt at home with the equipment and disease processes. The doctors are way nicer at Sunset (here) and they even have residents and a nurse practitioner on the unit at all times. Ahhh...teaching hospitals are great! My home unit, the ICSU, isn't that bad though. I think it is going to be a 13-week tolerable assignment. Maybe longer...
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Side story. The other night the greatest thing happened! I saw a pretty decently well-known celebrity, in his natural habitat, trying to be a human. I stopped at Whole Foods on my way home from work (in my scrubs) and went in on a mission because I wanted to get home to let Max out. "I'm going in and getting this, this and this and I'm out of here" is what I thought. I walked in and headed directly into the produce. Immediately, I made eye contact with Omar Epps who was busy picking out avocados or oranges or something very California.
ooooooooooo mm mm ggggggggggg !!!!!
oo oo mm mm gg gg !!!!!
oo oo mmm mmm gg !!!!!
oo oo m m m m gg ggggg !!!!!
oo oo m mmmm m gg gg
ooooooooooo m mm m ggggggggggg !!!!!
I played it cool, avoided the produce and darted into an aisle, rapidly texting everyone who might care. I may have made a few loops to make sure it was him... it still was him. I forgot almost everything I went in there for. I fumbled at the check out at the thought of him seeing my check out. I just hope that when he saw me, he also associated me with his TV girlfriend from House, Olivia Wilde (as I've been told is one of my doppelgangers).
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| I was even wearing navy blue at the time... so, maybe? |
I finally have internet and cable. I am on my own next week at work. I can get to and from work and some parts of the neighborhood without GPS. It is safe to say that I am settled in. Let's catch up (Especially now that I have somewhat of a schedule to work with here)!
XO
