Thursday, May 19, 2011

Sadness, excitement, anticipation, stress!

The ducks moved outside last week.  We put together a nice secure little house with a heat lamp for them, and placed it inside the chicken run.  They were so happy (and clean)!

Yesterday I came home from work to only three of the four ducklings in the pen.  I searched for Squash for an hour before giving in to sobbing.   Then as I strung fishing line over the run (figuring it was probably a hawk), I found his remains in the yard.  That confirmed my suspicion of hawk activity.  I cried and cried and carried his poor little body to his grave, then cried some more.  I found the idea of the other birds seeing that happen to him so horrible... and a couple hours later I saw the hawk flying around above the trees.  I screamed at it, then cried again.

Today, the run is entirely covered in bird netting.  Hopefully that will keep our little critters safe from aerial attacks.  It's so sad to lose little baby creatures like that... I'm gonna miss his little peeps.  At least he got to live his short life as a real duck, with grass and water underfoot.

I spent the last few days out on the unit in the ED.  It was busy, stressful, and humbling... but by the end of the day today I was feeling better acquianted with the way things work.  I took care of a Tier 3 Trauma Alert head injury patient today, almost independently.  A woman came in with an acute MI into our pod, but wasn't assigned to me... so I watched the MI Alert process happen.  It was incredible to see how everyone (assigned nurse, cath lab nurses, cardiologists, ED docs, medics) converged on that room and took care of business.  She had an EKG done and read by an MD less than ten minutes from her arrival time.  From the time she walked in the door to the time she had a balloon in her coronary arteries opening a blockage was 55 minutes.  Amazing.

I have four days off (woot!), and I intend to enjoy them thoroughly.  I plan to mulch my garden, go for a run, check out the closest farmer's market, and sleep in late.  I just hope that the rain stops at some point this weekend!

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