Ramble on....

11th June 2008, 0635B

After 2 frustrating hours I’ve eventually decided to give up on rolling around pointlessly in bed & just get up, perhaps even do something constructive. Not much chance of that though, we’re talking about the Procrastination King here after all.
This insomnia I’ve had lately has got to bloody well stop, and soon. It’s been better the last few days, but I still didn’t get more than 5 hours sleep last night, or the night before, & it’s doing neither the happy thoughts, nor sense of goodwill towards my fellow man any good.
When school breaks up next weekend I’ll head into the office to sort out my leave / prac shifts so that they know where I am, & while I’m there I’ll see the doc for some sleepy pills. I had hoped to avoid this though, I spent too damn long relying on drugs to sleep while I was in Burundi.

Anyway, enough of bitching about not sleeping. The last few days have been pretty quiet, with just tech going on really, and even there there’s not been much happening to speak of. We had a brief 20 minute anatomy & physiology lecture on Monday, and an hour or so of library orientation yesterday, and that’s been pretty much it so far. It’ll be the same again today, just another short library session, a pretty useful one this time though as we’ll be learning how to reference the way the school wants us to, which is important for the assignments we have coming up.
Tomorrow looks like it could be a lot of fun though, as we’ll be taking part in a large disaster management exercise at the airport, a simulated air crash. I was involved in one of those a few years ago from the military side, and while the actual management side of things turned into a huge circle jerk – these things usually do by all accounts – the practical “on the ground” part was quite fun. It’s also good to get to meet the people in the industry you’ll be working with in future, and network a little. You can make some very handy and beneficial contacts at little events like this, contacts which may prove very handy in a few years when I graduate.
Other than this event, the schedule at school looks pretty quiet for the rest of the term, and it looks like we’re done with OSCE’s (practical evaluations) and tests for now at least, with just some neurological emergency, assignment rubric lectures and a post-traumatic stress presentation left before we break for the vac. I’m kind of looking forward to the PTSD presentation truth be told, though not so much for myself – a reasonable number of the class I’m in isn’t new to the industry, but we do have a fair few “youngsters” with us who haven’t had the exposure, or learned the coping mechanisms the more experienced among us have along the way. I can’t help but think I might have found a few presentations like that useful back when I was 18 or so – chances are I would have laughed them off for the most part, young macho soldiers being what they are, but perhaps something would have stuck along the way, and maybe I’d have known how to cope with the fun and games in the townships a little better. Those were not always such fun & happy times, take my word for it......

So far as plans for the vac are concerned.... technically I’m supposed to either go back to work at the office, or take leave for the duration of the school vacation. I [b]really[/b] don’t want to do the first, and I’d prefer not to do the second, so I’ll be trying for Option C – having the school roster me for practical shifts in either hospitals or at ambo stations. Evidently my old Officer Commanding here at the unit on the Bluff was bitching about my having taken leave for the last vac, and had wanted to know why I’d not been at work, but my section head from the School for Military Health Training in Pretoria has confirmed he’s happy for us to do prac shifts instead of sitting around the office during vacations – his requirements are that we do something constructive, and that it be controlled – we have to be able to show we weren’t just loafing around at home instead of being at work / on shift in other words. Other than that I have a fair sized anatomy and physiology assignment on neurotransmitters to do, and also a fair bit of studying, both for the upcoming A&P test, and also because I’m not happy with how my last emergency care test went. Like I said in the last post, I know I could have done better, and I have to accept that at least some of that was because I was over confident about it – I can’t blame everything on insomnia – so I really need to work on being a bit more conscientious about studying.
And during the vac I also want to work on being a little more diligent about getting some exercise, which is one of the other reasons I decided to resurrect this thing – to keep track of my progress in losing at least some of my fat ass. It’ll be awhile before I can really start with that plan given I’m so broke I can’t pay attention, never mind afford a gym contract and assistance from a biokineticist that’ll entail, but for now I can at least start with doing a few sit-ups & push-ups, and on the days I’m really feeling enthusiastic I can go for a jog too I’m sure. It was gratifying how quickly my fitness improved at the beginning of the year when I had that fitness test motivating me to do something about how out of shape I was, but since our recue lecturer resigned & we’re not doing pt any more..... things have dropped off again, & I’m not much fitter now than I was at the beginning of the year :/

Anyway, on that note I think it’s time for me to finish off here, grab another cup of coffee, and then start getting ready for the day. Till next time.

08th June 2008, 0525B

Well, we're up to post number 2 at least, and it's only around a week since the last post, so maybe I'll get back into this after all.

It might be pertinent at this point to go into the "why" of this blog again, because as I said in the last post, the reasons have changed.

Previously I maintained this blog as a way of keeping in touch with friends while I was away on an 8 month deployment to Burundi, & evidently it was fairly well received. These days though? I'm quite firmly established in Durbs, where I can and do see my friends fairly frequently overall - some far more than others - and I won't be heading anywhere soon, so I really shouldn't need to use this to keep in touch. Then again, given how infrequently I do see some of my friends, maybe this purpose does still apply....

Anyway, to get back to why I’m resurrecting this. The same as before, this is going to be a journal of sorts where I can ramble away, but it’s also going to be way for me to keep track of how the studying is going (or not as the case may be), how my desire to narrow down my fat ass at least a little in the near future works out, and also to record how this little spiritual rediscovery that I’ve been having the last little while.... ok, 2 years or so... progresses. Assuming I ever get off said fat ass & actually do something about it that is.

Hopefully this won’t include quite so much whining & sulking as I did in this blog previously – looking back over it, it seems I was a seriously whiny bitch while I was in Burundi lol – but I make no promises :p

So far as general background for this goes concerned, I’m still in the military, still an Operational Medic, and still kind of based in Durban. I say “kind of” in that since I last updated this I’ve been transferred to the School for Military Health Training in Pretoria, though it’s effectively a paper transfer and I’ll likely never see the place – oh G_d how I hope I never see the place at least. The reason for the transfer is that I was lucky enough to land full time studies at state expense, and I’m currently busy with the National Diploma in Emergency Care & Rescue here at the Durban University of Technology, which is a really sweet deal I must say – the army pays for my studies in full, and they continue to pay me my full salary while I’m studying. After I graduate I’m bound to work back the years that I’ve studied, which is only to be expected I guess, but the real question there is where I’ll be working back that commitment. There’s a very good chance that I’ll be physically transferred at that point, probably to the Pretoria area somewhere, which is something I’m really not looking forward to, but who knows? Maybe by then they’ll have created regional Advanced Life Support practitioner posts and I’ll be able to stay in Durban after all. What would be really sweet is if I could swing some kind of liaison post at DUT itself, as an associate lecturer or something. The military is on a drive to put a lot of students through the N-Dip / B-Tech, and there are currently 17 students at the Durban faculty alone, including myself, & there’s a chance that’ll go up to perhaps 25-30 next year with a new group of 1^st year students. Given those numbers, having a permanent representative at the regional schools to act as a mentor to, and to exercise command & control over, the military students might not be too bad an idea. Now if only I can sell that idea to the various people who make the decisions.....

So far the diploma has gone pretty well for me, though it’s not been too much of a challenge thus far. The reason for that is that I’ve started from scratch as a fresh 1^st year student, instead of challenging the diploma and entering it under a Recognition of Prior learning (RPL) program, whereby I’d effectively do bridging training to upgrade my current qualification. Given that the diploma is structured to take you from “zero to hero”, all we’ve been doing so far has been work I’ve done numerous times before, so my biggest problem has been paying attention & taking things seriously so far. And I must confess, my focus has not been what it should be..... With a little luck I’ll wizen up very quickly & start putting in the work, & paying the attention I should be, but things have been a little shaky in that sense the last 2-3 weeks or so. The work is starting to get a little challenging though, so hopefully the last Adult Emergency Care test we did will shake me up & be an incentive to start studying properly again. I’m not happy with how that last test went at all, but it’s not entirely because I didn’t study enough for it – I’ve been having some real trouble with insomnia the last 6 months, and this last month or so in particular, and the headaches, mood swings & inability to concentrate that’s been causing really haven’t helped when it’s come to getting any studying done.

I’ve not received my results from that test yet, so I don’t know for sure how I did – the last I spoke to the lecturer nobody had failed at least – but I know I could have done better.

Overall though, I’m happy with how the diploma is going for me, & I have no doubt whatsoever about my ability to successfully complete the diploma. Which is a good thing, because I really don’t fancy having to refund the army my study fees :p

I think I’m going to end off here for now though, and perhaps do some of that studying I was just speaking of – I have a fair chunk of anatomy & physiology homework that’s due for tomorrow, and a pretty big assignment on neurotransmitters I need to get started on sometime soon. With a little luck I’ll have something to add to this soon, & I’ll get back into the swing of updating this regularly.

Till then.