It's Fall Break!

...but that doesn't really mean much when you've got Test 2 in Med-Surg coming up this week. Neuro is the topic of choice this time.

But Fall Break always signals that we've made it half way through fall semester, which does bring a little joy. My clinical mates and I have been counting down clinical prep days for weeks now. The semester doesn't end until mid-December when we have exams, but clinicals end before Thanksgiving!  So we are definitely past the half-way mark in terms of clinicals. Let's see... 5 Psych clinical days left and four Med-Surg clinical days and prep days left. This week, due to Fall Break, we won't have a clinical day at the hospital on Wednesday. Instead we'll be heading to campus for a Simulation Day. The instructors have designed "stations" for us to rotate through with scenarios. Sounds fun, but a little nerve wracking too (and certainly opportunities for embarrassment). From my understanding, each clinical group (nine nursing students) will work through each station/scenario with our clinical instructor. Sounds like a bad episode of Grey's Anatomy. Thank goodness we aren't surgeons! :D

Well, it looks like I will be working for the same business over Christmas that I did last year. And because there are some changes to the family gathering and when Christmas actually falls this year, it looks like I will be able to work more hours. More hours means more money earned, which will certainly come in handy next semester. It's a very tiring job where I'm walking and bending/climbing ladders for 8 hours straight in a warehouse (okay, not during lunch), but at least it pays double digits per hour. So now I just need to work out what days and shift I want to work. Last year I worked 7 to 3, Monday through Wednesday. This year I think I'm going to switch to working 9 to 5 and try to get to the gym before work. That way, I can spend my evenings Christmas shopping or hanging out with friends--neither of which I can do at 6am.  But the other question is how many days will I work? I'm not sure yet if the artist will need me over the holidays. It's so iffy with her sometimes. I can carve out one morning a week for her, but she might email me the day before and cancel...which is annoying when I COULD've been scheduled to work at the warehouse. However, if I do work for her, I'd earn $5 more/hour than I would at the warehouse. So.... decisions, decisions. I've emailed the artist so she could think about whether she'd want/need me over Christmas (when her kids are off school), so guess I'll wait and see what she's thinking. But it's just really nice to know that I've got a job for a few weeks over break. Not much time for myself, but it's probably a good thing that I'll be keeping busy with no time to get used to being lazy. It would be nice to possibly get some reading done for next semester, but I think that's highly unlikely!

For weeks I've known that over Fall Break I would need to resupply my stock of soup in the freezer. So far, I've made up two batches of soup - Butternut Squash and a Harvest Soup (lentils, rice, veggies and chicken). I still need to make up several batches of my favorite White Turkey Chili - which is my preferred soup to carry to clinicals. It's also a "comfort" food for me too...great for exam week! But I'm kinda running out of time...I'm hoping to get through bulk of my test-studying today and that will leave me time to make soup tomorrow. I might have some time this coming weekend too, but really don't want to count on that.

Okay, back to studying...