Nurse Joc, Not Jackie

Alright... I thought I said before that if you are approaching a dog with fear aggression, particularly towards strangers, that you ignore the dog. That means not even sticking your hand out when the dog approaches you. Pretend you are a tree. Do not respond, do not react. The dog is not there. The dog is not there. Don't look at it. Don't talk to it. Don't bend over. Don't stick your hand out... 

That said, the obvious happened while I was at work. The significant other had company over, and one of the rather tall, strange men, put his hand out to our dog when our dog approached him. He got a warning nip and our doggy ended up going into a freak out of barking. 

That said, the dog has been returned to its previous owner (my sister). My sister, also an LPN, has tracked down an amazing trainer in the area (I'll post the trainer's info later if I can get my hands on it), and is looking into anti-anxiety medications for the dog.  Poor pup. He's a really good dog, but since he is half-Bernese and was not socialized properly as a puppy, he has a bad case of stranger fear, hence his behavior. 

Unfortunately, my significant other is not experienced with dogs, so training a behavior such as aggression out of him wasn't an option for him. Understandable. That dog is scary as hell when he's being aggressive. 

No one wags their tail to greet me anymore when I come home from my evening shift. I told my SO he has to thump the wall for me so I can pretend it's the dog greeting me. Thus far, he is no dog. Even if I call him one at times!

Boo-urns. 

Summer is supposed to start on Monday, officially. With the way things are going with the weather, who knows? It's been fall-esque weather here in central Vancouver Island for all of spring with a few days that could be considered summer-like. I hope that we get a nice summer... We have so much work to do in the yard that it would be nice to have some encouragement in the form of sun. 

So I've been a little behind on things lately. I recently picked up a casual position at another retirement home to supplement my near-part time job. On top of that, I've been sick off and on for a while. I'm thinking my whole family might be getting sick more frequently and staying sick longer because of allergies... Now, the only thing that is different this year compared to last year is that we have a dog. Uh oh! 

My dog. Uhg. He is a snuggly, cute shedding machine in the house. As soon as you put a stranger into the mix, he turns into a fear aggressor. I've been trying many methods to help train the behavior out of him. Around the house, he is a submissive member of the pack, but outside, I'm not sure what happens. I've tried getting out house visitors in on the training, but none of them actually listen and follow through with what I've asked of them. 

For example, if a dog is barking at you... Don't bend over to the dog. It's seen as threatening. If he's barking at you, don't say he's a good dog. One, you're reinforcing the behavior, two he's not going to stop barking because you're saying that. If If I ask you not to acknowledge the dog while he's barking, please DON'T ACKNOWLEDGE THE DOG. I don't get mad at people (outside of my family :P) easily, but this one thing does make me very angry. Don't look at a(n aggressively) barking dog. Just don't. Ignore the heck out of him and he will calm down, realizing that he has no power over you. 

So essentially, if you're coming to my house, ignore my dog until he stops barking.  Why is that so hard for people to do? 

May 15th, 2010... We arrived at the airport near San José del Cabo; a historic town. After fighting our way through the time share vultures, we spotted our driver, whom we can not recommend enough! I highly, highly recommend everyone use Arturo's company for private transportation from and to the airport.

He was incredibly friendly and helped whisk us from the airport straight to the very clean, air-conditioned vehicle for transportation. Beverages, of course, were served in transit. Honestly, we were just a paparazzi away from feeling like celebrities, haha. Very friendly service. If you research him and his company, you will find nothing but amazing reviews. (Not a sponsored post) Please don't wing it and take a taxi from the airport in cabo, because you will get ripped off and possibly even taken to a time share gathering instead of your hotel! Careful. :)

So, the first day we checked into our hotel, slathered on the sunscreen and made our way down to the beach: Playa del Medano/Medano beach. We ate at the Mango Deck. Boo. The food was okay, the entertainment was pretty cheesy (spring break-esque), and the price was far too high for Mexico. This is Mexico, there's no reason for food for two to cost $30.00.

We decided to explore a little after our meal. We walked along the beach, allowing the waves to crash up against us and cool us down. We walked up a hidden path and went past a chain link fenced lot with small sheds and huts all over it. After looking more closely, we found out that it was actually a cemetery. We continued on our walk... Mind you, it was incredibly hot out, and there was no sign of the main road anywhere. We found an opening in the chain link fence as the road came to a dead-end, so we walked towards it. Roosters and chickens crossed our paths as we spot a shed with three kids peaking out of it, watching and giggling at us. Then we see the sign "No entering!"/"Ningún entrar!" Eek! We kept walking to the road and alas! We were on familiar ground. Back to the hotel we went and passed out quite early. 

Been so busy this week packing for our trip to Mexico (leaving Friday), working, doing vet and doctor appointments, and working out last-minute family and beauticontrol details that aside from this hour leading up to my last evening shift before I fly away, my schedule is absolutely full!

Tomorrow, I have a bunch of confirmation phone calls to make, re-printing all my itinerary, copying pages of the passports (per Canada's suggestions), re-packing, and packing my daughter's bags, Dan's birthday dinner with his family and us, and dropping off a delivery.

Whew! And I still haven't finished May's BeautiControl news, or June's running races schedules! I'm bad this month! Next month will be smoother, I'm sure :)

So finally, someone made a nurse jackie scarf. Check it out here. She adapted a pattern for a mesh chain scarf and used crocheted flowers to complete the look. If I ever make it through my umpteen projects, I will make myself one of those scarves! I've yet to start on socks for my mom for mother's day... Uh oh! Good thing I have a few days off starting tomorrow! Ha!

I'll likely update the Beauti News tomorrow during my day off. I'll also try to get June's running races up for Vancouver Island.

In other news, my energy has been just drained from me. I have helped a resident through their dying process before. I helped keep them comfortable and stayed with them when their family couldn't. This particular resident is one that I never had the pleasure of working with prior to their palliative order. I still showed a great deal of empathy towards this resident; holding their hand, being as gentle as humanly possible, and just being there. You can tell when a person's body has stopped working, but long before then, you can almost see their presence leaving themselves before that happens.

I'm trying to type this in a way that preserves some privacy, but one of the residents that I just absolutely adore working with is quite suddenly on their death bed. I was their nurse last night and will be the nurse again tonight. This is what has sucked the energy out of me. It's a bit of a blessing to be able to help them through this process and be the person with the power to bring comfort, but at the same time, this is a person I greatly enjoyed working with and will be so very, very sorely missed.

After weeks of being pestered by my sister and my mother, I gave in and went to curves to give it a shot. I had a few misconceptions before going: First, it was for people trying to lose weight only. Second, it wouldn't be that great of a work out. While it certainly wasn't a replacement for tossing around the barbells and dumbbells, it did provide a good upper and lower body work out -- core included.

It consists of a full circuit which alternates between resistance machines and resting areas (forget what they're called). You take 30 seconds on each area before the pre-recorded voice (playing overtime of upbeat music) tells you to change stations. Every few minutes, that same recorded voice will ask you to step aside and count your pulse so you can tell how hard you're pushing yourself.

You make your way around the stations twice and you are all done. This takes about 30 minutes, then you go into the stretching contraption they have to stretch out your muscles. I'm not really a fan of that thing. A lot of the stretches don't feel natural, but I have really strange tendons and ligaments that are flexible in all the wrong ways.

All in all, it is a really fun way to work out. It's a very supportive environment and I didn't feel at all out of place being a slim, semi-fit 25-year-old there. Out with the misconception that it's just for older people trying to lose weight! It's for everyone :)

That said, I'm still on the fence about whether I would like to return to a regular gym or continue with Curves once my 30 days for 30 dollars is over... If you're interested, most Curves locations will offer you the first day free.

A truly awesome lady. Being different isn't always a "handicap" or a disability. This woman is smart, beautiful, hilarious, and well spoken. Oh, and she is missing two legs, but you wouldn't have guessed that about this athlete by just looking at her.

My bookmarks are flooded as it is, so I thought I'd post an entry about this website so I didn't have to add it... Ha!

This website lets you do a sort-of reverse search, using a list of ingredients that you actually have. The search results will be a list of recipes that use those ingredients. This is perfect for at the end of the month when you need to use the remaining ingredients inside of your fridge before they go bad, while sparing you from having to spend more money.

Without further adeou, here is the website: Recipe Puppy.com, featuring a pug... Of which my mother has two and of which I may or may not have an aversion to. Darn jumping, yappy cute blobs on legs.

I have decided to start doing a monthly knitting pattern for us all to do together. For a great cause, too... Kozy Kaps 4 Kids. I wish they had gone with the name "Cozy Caps for Children" or something less similar to a certain elitist group, if you catch my drift... Uh... Anyway...

For the month of April, I will be knitting "Little Cables Hat" from The Knitting Box - a knitting blog website. As much as I'd love to knit many, many hats, I am only able to set aside a small amount of time and have set my own personal goal for one cap per month.

If you are participating, please let me know so that I can link you and acknowledge your amazing selfless donation of time and wool!

Cheers!