First week at work.

Well, at last, I got my starting date, which was last Monday (the 1st). While I was waiting for the date I also had another interview, at which I did well.  Apparently it was between myself and 1 other, so we had to have a second interview on Tuesday, with one of the directors.  That also went well and I should have heard on Friday, but nothing came through, which is strange as this recruitment company have been brilliant in their follow-ups. Totally different from the last firm I whinged about! I have a feeling something happened to the girl who runs it (one person company) as she has been on the phone, or text, every time.

Anyway, the Community Nurse job is certainly different. I have been working with the District Nurse (team leader) for most of the week and it’s been a combination of visiting patients and juggling stuff, responding to phone messages and organising work for the next day.  The patients we saw were mostly elderly, mostly wound care, some with dementia, some in residential homes, others in their own home. One we visited in a residential home, I said to the DN that she didn’t look like she would last another 2 weeks.  She had Non-Hodgkins Lymphoma and seemed very frail.  She passed away in her sleep at 6 am next morning!

Am I enjoying it? Sort of.  Learning different things, which is always good. It’s good being out and about and being pretty much your own boss (when I am up and doing it on my own), but I am not a great fan of geriatric nursing and that’s what it seems to be mostly.  Please don’t think I have anything against the elderly. I know we all get there sooner or later!  But all nurses have their particular favourite type of nursing, and elderly is not mine!  The fact remains that it is a job and while I am here I will do the best that I can, while still looking for something I would be more suited to.

This weekend has not really been a happy one. Vicki (2nd daughter) finally moved to Cornwall on Saturday.  We knew it was coming, none of us were looking forward to it, and it has been really heart-wrenching.  She has had to leave her little Pug dog, Hiro, with us as she cannot keep it at the place she is staying at the moment.  Hopefully she will have her own place in November and will take him with her then. In the meantime she is really missing him.  He is her “baby”! We will be keeping in touch with Skype, but it’s not the same as having her here. I guess we’ll get used to it.  This is one of the drawbacks of being such a close family.

It was Jayden’s 4th birthday on Friday (second grandson).  He had a party yesterday, so Dawn and I showed our faces for a little while…..until the other “guests” started to arrive , then we beat a hasty retreat!  It was already getting too noisy! LOL

Still using the bike most of the time at the moment, until I start going out on my own, when I’ll have to carry some supplies with me, so I’ll have to use the car.  Wednesday saw the day start with lovely sunshine and the forecast of light showers.  What we actually got around 3pm was a bloody monsoon!  We got 6 inches of rain in half hour, with hailstones thrown in for good measure!  This resulted in flash floods and closed some main roads around Peterborough (British drains aren’t built to deal with that amount of water!)  There was a photo in the evening paper of one guy going down the road in a canoe!  On the way home I was forced to ride through one of these floods. I was following cars going through it and their wake was making my front wheel waver quite a bit.  The water was up to my front axle and even got my boots wet.  I was expecting to go for a swim at any second, but managed to actually get through it ok in the end.

Well, I guess that’s about all for now.  Take care, all.

Hugz

RNBiker