WEEEE!!! It's Stream of Consiousness time!

Why yes, I am still alive. Clinicals are eating my life. And yet, I do so little at them. The past few weeks have been full of medic unit clinicals, with less than 20 calls to show for it. And today, I sit at a station far from home, bored to tears. Only one call all day thus far, and it was a BlS run, which netted me ZERO patient contact credits.

I'm not saying I want people to get hurt. Remember, I am a firm believer in the fact that a bored medic is a happy medic. However, in order to fulfill the requirements of the National Registry, not to mention the much higher (as in double, because 'we're better than everyone else) requirements of my program, I NEED patient contact hours. I NEED people to have the worst day of their lives so that I can graduate and be grateful that they aren't having that day.

I actually like the medics I'm with today. They are including me in their activities (which basically include watching movies and sleeping) and generally being very nice to me. Much more than I get from most crews I end up with, who usually are irritated that they have yet another student to babysit. I'm slowly learning shift days, and have found myself carefully arranging shifts as best I can to coincide with the crews I like and actually learn from.

I only wish I was either closer to my clinical sites or had better hours because I am getting ZERO triathlon training in. I have convinced my mother to forgo purchasing things off The Engineer's and my registry and instead buy me an indoor bike trainer so that I can work out early in the morning before clinicals or classes, or when I get home and the gym is either closed or otherwise inaccessible to my schedule.

Though I didn't help my case much by having a dozen buffalo wings for lunch today.

I am heartened by the fact that tomorrow is the election, which means that once tonight is done, the horrid, pervasive and otherwise boring (and boorish) political ads will be gone. I would say they would be gone for another year, but experience and cynicism leads me to dread that we will only have a few months respite before the next round begins anew.

Speaking of politics (and I heartily try not to), I have several friends who made their way to the rally in DC this weekend. I declined their invitations to go because I don't like crowds, particularly large, pressing crowds where you don't know the people around you. In fact, my normal feelings of 'anti-large groups of people' have intensified by several large factors since returning from The Ice several years ago. At any rate, some friends of mine returned from the rally with a story that nearly made me wish I was there so that I could set people straight. It seems that at some point, an ambulance was dispatched for some emergency in the crowd. As often happens with large crowds and large vehicles, at some point the large white box with flashing lights and loud noises reached a choke point, and was unable to go any further. The paramedics got out of their vehicle and, grabbing their bags, made their way through the crowd on foot to the patient. Some in the crowd, evidently irritated that their moderate vantage point was blocked, and they were thus inconvenienced, decided that the ambulance made a far better perch than the spot of ground they were on, and climbed up. To the roof. Per my friends, there were approximately 20-30 people on the roof or hood of the ambulance, and were reaching down hands to help others up. Now, while I can't confirm the actual number of people (20-30 seems an awful lot of people to be crammed on the roof of an ambo), I have several issues with this. I'm not sure of the rating of the roofs of the boxes of ambulances, but I'm fairly sure that even 10-20 will stress the metal and other structural elements of the roof. Even if you assume that there is some sort of structural element to prevent crushing in a roll-over accident, that does not extend to the 'skin' between those structural elements. Not to mention that the roof of an ambulance has several antennae on it for communicating with the world. I've been on the top of an ambo, and they are not the most sturdy of pieces of equipment. The third thing I have issue with is this: WTF is wrong with people? Even my friends, who are in no way, shape or form associated with medicine other than being consumers and patients, would never ever even consider such a thing. I can say that if I were there, I would likely have said something that would have been seen as at the minimum, moderately provoking. I am not the most tactful of creatures on the best of days, and seeing such a flagrant disregard and disrespect for a public safety vehicle would likely have put me over the edge.

In other news, I am already becoming frustrated with wedding planning. So much to do, and so little time, or motivation. We have the site, we have the hotel for people. We have colors picked out and the registry done (though there is a present we need to return, since we don't know the people that sent it). We still have to pick officiant, photog (though there is a woman in my dog's obedience class who is a photog, so we are thinking of choosing them), DJ, cake, meal, etc. In addition, I am not looking forward to dress shopping, as I am a strange shape, and, if I can get training to better mesh with my schedule, likely to drastically change shape quite a bit over the next few months. Still, the wedding date itself is now 341 days away, and as much as I am much more concerned over finishing school and getting a job, I should get my butt in gear. Oh, and I am sick and tired of people asking "Are you excited about the wedding?" If I had time to think about it, yes I would be, but I am much more concerned with finishing assignments, getting enough patient contacts, and getting a job than I am about my impending (in a year) nuptials. And I'm tired of everyone telling me that I'm weird or strange or wrong to think this way.

By the way, who the hell calls 9-1-1 for swollen and sore gums post-tooth pulling x 2 years ago? Really? Come on....