24-I’m thinking of a certain word that starts with “C”

Fridays will be the new political day here at Dispatches from the Evening Shift. I may not make or keep friends. The direction will be from a feminist lens. Most of the time I will write about topics that are health care related.

But not today.

I have been thinking about the general election that was 19 days ago and the surprising/not surprising results.

A singular word keeps flashing in my mind.

It begins with a C but it is not the word you are thinking of.

The word is coward. Too many of the voters were cowards. They were too wrapped up in their misogyny and their disordered thinking to even conceive of voting for a woman. Much less a blank woman.

Too often they were caught up in the pretend world where a nearly 60-year-old woman is held hostage by her hormones.

Too often they were caught up in the pretend world of strong men world leaders who would make the poor little old woman cry. Insert eye roll here. As if Harris didn’t make the mortgage lenders and others that she prosecuted cry herself.

That or they were bamboozled by propaganda from foreign agents.

Oh, look an F word.

The F words of the day are feminist, friend, and foreign.

The S word of the day is sigh.

I require a tee shirt with the word coward on it.

Hell yes, I am still mad as hell.

Just wait until I write about what I consider a good holiday gift for those who voted with their wallets and their misogyny and their online “friends”.

No, it is not just that I am mad, it is that I am disappointed in us.

I have decided my tee shirt should read “Cowards! All of you.”

Cookie Thursday 11/21/24- sweet potato cookies

Yeah, this is the same recipe that I used two weeks ago for the pumpkin cookies.

Cookie Thursday is a Thing is nothing but exploratory. That means I experiment on my coworkers. They get cookies, I get to experiment in the kitchen. It’s all good fun.

I’m not a huge fan of pumpkin, I like the milder sweet potato.

The pumpkin cookies that I made two weeks ago were very popular. And since this month’s theme is Fall (so original, I know) I wanted to make two of the popular Fall “vegetables” into cookies.

The pumpkin ones went great, although the recipe was a snickerdoodle in disguise.

I just used the same technique on sweet potato, without the fiddly sugar dip in cinnamon sugar step. I was going to use ginger and sugar but I had a meeting that was starting in 15 minutes and the sugar dipping took so long and was so messy last time I just skipped that step. I think ginger sugar dipping would be delightful and I will stow that idea away for use in an upcoming Cookie Thursday is a Thing.

Without the sugar dip these cookies still turned out. They were soft and cakey (in a good way) and delicious.

This is one experiment that I wil have no problem replicating. Unless I change another variable.

Experiments for life.

Edit to add that I added the chocolate chips that I felt were lacking in the pumpkin cookies to half of the batch. Yep, the pumpkin cookies definitely needed chocolate chips.

Best Kept Secrets of the OR #15- What you ignore or suggest is treated as normal

This isn’t a positive best-kept secret. In fact, it makes me mad and is probably making some of your charge nurses mad too. But not the one who is trying to be your friend and suggested that you call in sick, in front of another charge nurse, because you couldn’t get that day off.

However, this is directed at the other charge nurses who permit this behavior.

Apparently, in today’s working operating room, all you have to do to get the day off that was denied is call in sick. No thought was given to the rest of the OR team that now has to work short. No thought is given to the patients who are going to be worked on that day when the rest of the OR is working short. No thought was given to the person who makes the schedule that you just took a giant dump on.

This is because you didn’t get your way and you are making it everyone else’s problem.

Number one- there are rules for a reason. Only one person per staffing level (scrub tech, registered nurse, orderly) can be off at the same time, on the same day. Writing as a previous staff scheduler whose OR was run a lot leaner than the one you enjoy, there are reasons for that rule. You are damning someone else to work extra. The rules are different in each unit. In this unit, one person per staffing level is allowed off for a specific day.

Number two- this is for the charge nurse who suggested that a team member call in sick to accommodate their desire to have a certain day off. To that charge nurse I say don’t do this. Don’t make the rest of your team work extra so that you can be buddy-buddy with another team member. It reflects badly on you.

Number three- what you permit becomes the new standard. And will most likely come around to bite you in the ass.

Just no.

Don’t do this.

You are UNDERMINING your authority.

Consider that.

Or you might want to be friends with all of your subordinates and wonder why they don’t respect you.

You choose.

Tuesday Top of Mind 11/19/24-time to raise a little hell

This was not what I was going to write about today. Which I understand is a theme I’ve got going on the last several weeks.

Oopsie.

I decided not to write about the original idea because I wanted something a little lighter. Well, a lot lighter. Also something that might make the reader laugh. Because I laughed so hard.

My phone and I have a love-hate relationship. Yes, it is a technological marvel and holds vast amount of data and lets us engage with the world that before 2007 and the widespread advent of the smartphone. Perhaps my very favorite thing that the phone can do is give me a read-out of who is calling.

I know I am amongst friends when I write that I don’t answer every phone call I receive. Because the spam filter we were promised is crap.

There is no comparison between the calls I doanswer, which are mostly friends and family or the hospital, and the calls that I don’t answer, which are scam alerts, or numbers I don’t know.

Because that is a fabulous thing that the phone can also do; identify known numbers.

I rationalize it by remarking to my phone nearly every time, well, they’ll leave a message or call back. But they don’t. Leave a message, that is. And if they call back at least twice, I am more liable to answer a repeat phone call.

But tonight, tonight I was driving to the hospital to run a call BootCamp with a new nurse when the phone rang.

It surprised me when I answered it. No name, just a phone number. Totally goes against everything I believe in. Wild hair made me do it?

I don’t say hello if it is someone I don’t know. I answer with “This is Kate.” No more, no less. I have read the news reports about what not to say and give up to people you don’t know on the phone. I avoid yes, I avoid hello, and I avoid apologizing.

When the caller stuttered, I said again, “This is Kate.” I am unsure if they were expecting someone to answer the phone or not.

It was a cold call from somewhere in TN. The caller launched into a spiel about an energy-saving program.

I assured them that I had no need for an energy-saving program.

They tried again, asking if our electrical bill was consistently over $100.

I assured them that it was not.

Silence on the other end.

And then a click.

That just tickled me and I laughed at the absurdity.

It was a definite dopamine hit.

I don’t know if readers are aware of the 2024 general election and the general malaise that has come over some of us.

It’s been a rough 10 days.

And if I can get a little joy out of confounding a scam caller, I will absolutely do it.

I kind of can’t wait for someone else to call tomorrow. Just to make them hang up on me.

This might be fun.

____________________________________________________________________

I wrote the bulk of this post last night and here is a little post-script.

It was fun. An AI called my phone looking for my husband.

Same set up-

this is Kate
their question
no
their second question
no
click

Post-it Sunday 11/17/24-all the hats nurses wear

The gown card reads “In the day’s culture it is not enough just to practice nursing, you must also wear different hats.”

This is a bit of a tricky one. I wrote this gown card at a nursing symposium on November 6, 2015. I know because it is listed on the card. I also know because I remember that symposium. It was one of my first in shared governance. I wasn’t involved in the planning of this one, but I was expected, as the hospital chair, to be present and participate. The theme for this one was “Batter up.”

No, not really. But it was baseball-themed, coming less than a week after the end of the 2015 World Series.

There I was, in a very new environment, soaking up all the excitement of the speakers and my fellow shared governance chairs. I took copious notes. Three gown cards full. And I have bitty handwriting.

Something the keynote speaker must have said struck me. It was probably about having to do all the things and be all the departments after hours, as a nurse on the floor.

While I was probably not the only operating room nurse in the room, I was definitely the only OR nurse on the team.

This was when I started to advocate the OR nurse’s inclusion in all aspects of hospital life. I was the first OR nurse they had ever had on the hospital chair level of shared governance. I volunteered for other committees, so many committees, so that the OR could have a voice in all of these committees, and shared governance meetings.

Nurses have to wear many hats. This is true. We have to be our own unit secretary at times, we definitely have to function as a CNA at others, and we have to pinch hit for plant engineering when things go wrong and no one is available to sort out the problem. We also have to be able to figure out the computer charting and also how to troubleshoot when things don’t work the way they should. We have to be able to fix or find another route for a piece of equipment that is definitely older than our nursing career.

While we are doing all of that, we also have to take care of patients. We have to make sure that the bedbound is repositioned every two hours, that the diabetic gets a blood sugar taken before they eat, that morning and evening pass medications are given. And for those of us who do not work the floor unit life, we have to make sure that every surgical case goes as expected. That ALL the equipment that is needed is available and ready, and we also have to find a workable solution when there is a failure. Don’t forget about making sure the proper instrumentation is available and sterile for each surgery, and if there is an instrument that is dropped where to find a replacement instrument because you know that what hit the floor is the only one.

No one nurse is better or worse than another.

We all wear the hats.

We all wear all the hats.

But we are nurses first.

School Me Saturday 11/16/24- It’s here, the final push toward the end of the semester. Isn’t it hateful?

Depending on when your university or college marks the start of the semester you may be 13 weeks in or 10 into the semester. Considering a semester is usually 15 weeks, with an extra week for finals, you may be nearly there at the end of the semester.

Regardless of how many weeks, anything after 10 is practically useless.

Your grades are set, for the most part. Only a miracle can bring you up an entire grade. Only a disaster can plunge you into failing, depending on where your grades usually hover.

I think this is the hardest part of the semester. Students are tired. Teachers are tired. Administrators are tired. We are all tired.

This year is especially taxing because someone put a very pivotal election in the middle of the semester. While not all students are up on their politics, they are probably aware enough to pick up on the durm and strang that is at a boil at the moment. Reminder, the literal translation of durm and strang is that there is a storm and stress. The Germans really know their way around a phrase

And it took me 5 times to type durm and retype durm after the autocorrect that I didn’t ask for changed it to drum. FIVE times. No wonder we’re tired.

It is too soon to start planning your winter break and too late to “fix” your grades. But you should have bought your plane ticket home weeks ago. You know, for the best price.

It is too soon to start planning for the Summer semester. Planning for Spring? That started almost as soon as the Fall semester started. Planning for graduation? That started before your first class, dear.

No wonder we are tired.

And stressed.

According to the dictionary being tired and stressed at the same time means we are burned out.

Writing as a long-term healthcare professional of 26 years and a nurse for 23 years, my first response is no shit.

Writing as a long-term student who is on her third degree in ten years, my first response is no shit.

Take a deep breath.

This is where the mantra the only way out is through is useful.

Insert whatever mantra you use here.

Just keep swimming.

FFS Friday 11/15/24-New day in the rotation

Yes, FFS means what you think it means.

It means that we Females are tired of the bullshit.

It means that Feminism is alive and well.

It means that we will Fight the new world order that is trying to stuff us into itty bitty boxes because it makes the boys feel better.

It means that we will not Stop until we regain bodily autonomy.

Care to join me?

There will be swearing.

Oh, so much swearing.

Sorry, mom.

Unlike Tuesday Top of Mind, which is overtly political but not necessarily all female all the time, this will be an entirely specific female space for female voice (me) writing about what fresh hell has been dropped on us.

Buckle up, girls, even the ones that voted for the Orange Menace.

You didn’t think your vote gave you any special privileges did you?

You have much to learn.

Best Kept Secrets of the OR #14- You can be friendly, but not friends

There should always be a bit of mystique with your leaders.

You should not be too buddy-buddy with your leaders. Like, at all. Never, not gonna do it.

I’ve seen OR staff ruined because they misunderstood their boss’ friendliness.

Why?

Because some bosses only cultivate close relationships to gain intelligence from the rest of the staff. After all, you can trust me, I’m the manager. No, sometimes you can’t trust the boss to have your best interests at heart when it comes time to make big decisions for the departments.

All of a sudden there can be a new tech or nurse in the department and you are shunted off into the cold without any benefits from befriending the boss. Because they are now the boss’ friend.

Of course, this can go both ways.

Some people go out of their way to befriend their boss. To get a better assignment, to get a better schedule, to be able to “rat” out those they don’t like.

You know, so they can undermine someone they don’t like.

But, in my experience, this is to get a better assignment or to become a lounge lizard because no one would yell at the boss’ friend. I take that back, it is also be complain about those they don’t like.

What is even worse is when the boss is in the in-crowd and making decisions based on their bestie’s desires.

Remember, friendly but not friends.

Because if you are friends with your manager and they leave the hospital and all of a sudden you have a new manager who has a different policy on friendship, what then? And the old manager, that you thought you were friends with is nowhere to be seen.

Drat, all those hours babysitting down the drain.

Friendly but not friends.

Tuesday Top of mind 11/12/24- My body, my choice

Well, last week happened.

The best I’ve heard/seen is that “I knew a lot of men hated women, but I didn’t realize how many women hated women”.

I mean hated/feared same thing, right?

Women didn’t show up for other women, instead they voted for some nebulous promise to make eggs cheaper?

Yes, inflation sucked, sucks, and will continue to suck.

But the seeds of inflation started in 2017 when the transfer of power began and the kowtowing began to those rich in money, but not in morals, started immediately. Tax cuts for the wealthiest ring a bell?

And the covid pandemic, you remember the covid pandemic don’t you? Well, that just accelerated the inflation that had already begun.

Again, inflation sucks.

Suddenly our buying power is a lot less than it was. And don’t get me started on shrinkflation where what once a 24 oz bag of chips, became a 22 oz bag of chips, and a 20 oz bag of chips, and even a 16 oz bag of chips. I am conjecturing here, I don’t buy chips. But I do notice that money gets you a lot less these days.

But the fed was digging us out of the hole we were in. And it was working, faster and better than it had in just about every other country in the world. It was painful, I’ll admit. More painful for those who have less.

And the 2024 general election happened. Lies, lies, and more lies were told.

And immediately entitled men started showing their ass, chanting your body, my choice as if that was a thing.

No, my dude.

No, it is not.

No, we won’t date you.

No, we won’t sleep with you.

Just, no.

You can’t make women do anything we don’t want to do with threats of violence or of taking away choice. What are they going to try? To get rid of Roe? Too late. They’ve already done that and we are still fighting for all the women who can’t fight and all the babies they want to torture. But that’s another post for another day.

I admit I have blocked people with this “Your Body, my choice” attitude on my personal FB page. And I’d do it again and will probably have to.

The backlash against this limp dicked energy was swift.

I don’t choose to entertain their delusions of grandeur.

MY body, MY choice.

May your god of choice have mercy on your souls.