Giacomo needs your help!!

Giacomo is a two year old male domestic shorthair cat who needs a good home.

Unfortunately, Jeremiah's crazy b*tch of an ex-roommate moved out of their shared house while we were at Burning Man... and left Giacomo in the house, all by himself, with a window propped open, essentially to die. We got home from our 16-day trip and found him without food. She absolves herself of all responsibility for this poor kitty, and refuses to either take him or find a home for him.

We have been taking care of him at the house while moving Jeremiah out, but truly cannot adopt him and give him a permanent home at our new place (we already have one cat, a skunk, and four chickens on our lease, and really cannot bring another animal into our home right now).

Giacomo is grey and white, long and lean. He is a very sweet animal, but at the moment he is a little skittish around people (understandably so, since his trusted caretaker abandoned him). He is warming up to us more each day as he begins to understand that we are indeed going to feed him on a daily basis. He gets along well with other animals (he has lived with four other cats, two dogs, and a skunk!). He's a good little mouser and loves to play! We have his documents from when he was purchased that show his immunizations.

If you or someone you know can find room in your heart and your home for Giacomo, please contact me as soon as possible. He really needs a stable, loving person to care for him and give him a forever home.

Quick update!

Burning Man was amazing and wonderful and horrible. Got the flu. Misery.
Healed in Tahoe, journeyed on to CA, gorgeousness in Big Sur like I have never seen.
No nursing job. Scraping by with phlebotomy and Apothecary work.
Still waiting my authorization to test from the State so I can take the NCLEX-RN.
New apartment is effing amazing. So thrilled. Totally nesting.
More when there is time!

That's "Nurse Marlenah" to you!

I am officially done nursing school.
I completed the semester this morning with a grade of "A". My ATI Predictor test tells me I have a 99% chance of passing the NCLEX on the first try. Jeremiah and I signed the lease on our new apartment last night. I'm leaving for Burning Man on Saturday, followed by a week of hiking and exploring in California.
Now I am just waiting to hear back from HR about the nursing position I interviewed for which, if I am offered it, would start the day after we return from California. If I land this job, then just about everything will finally have fallen into place.

Wow.

Eggs!

My girls have started laying!
Or, more specifically, Popcorn has. It was a mystery who was doing it for the first two eggs, but this morning I saw her leaving a nesting box, and within it was a brown egg with butt-feathers still stuck to it, warm to the touch!
They grow up so fast...

FOCUS.

I have a serious case of senioritis.
I never got to experience this in my senior year of high school, because I spent that year completing my freshman year of college.
Now I have 16 days of nursing school left, and I can hardly motivate myself to pick up a book.
I am currently in a Community Health rotation, which is proving to be a peice of cake. I have two major projects to wrap up by Friday, and three exams in the last week. But can I make myself complete the research? Can I will myself to crack open my notes to study? Nope. All I can think about is preparing for Burning Man and California... and moving into the new place with Jeremiah when we get back... and how I have an interview for a nursing job on the 21st... It is very difficult to put myself into the present when the future is so much more exciting...

almost done nursing school, holy crap...

I haven't updated in ages, so much has happened...
Teaching and playing at Drum and Splash, the beach, Ewan's, the surprise of Jeremiah buying us silks and hanging em from a tree in my driveway, teaching hoop at the Circus School, the completion of my high-risk OB rotation...
The summer is flying by so quickly that I feel like I can't even catch my breath. Before I know it, it's going to be finals week and I'm going to be scrambling to get everything done before Burning Man. There is so much that I have yet to do, especially costumes... but it will all get done eventually!!

I have 5 weeks left of nursing school, including this one... and then I'm done. It's unbelievable. I've been doing well in clinical and on my tests, though I still feel very unprepared for the NCLEX-RN. I've been applying to every hospital that I can think of within a 30 mile radius, and just praying that someone hires me... if anyone has any leads on nursing jobs, especially in women's health/maternity, please let me know!!!

So much to do, so little time...

I am feeling a bit overwhelmed by my life right now.

First things first, school is crazy. Several large projects in the works all at once, plus the day to day struggles of learning the material, applying it on the telemetry unit two days each week, then recalling it well enough to discuss it in regards to our case studies in seminar and pass the tests. Preparing for NCLEX is daunting, I'm so afraid that I'm going to botch it up and be denied my liscense. My confidence waxes and wanes when it comes to my skills and competence as a nurse... graduation is so close, and then what? Where the hell am I going to work? The jobs simply aren't out there, and I fear that I am not the most competitive applicant for the ones that do exist. What happens if I graduate and can't get a job? Or I do get a job, and find out that I don't have what it takes to cut it as a "real" nurse? I really don't think that I'll be able to handle getting sent back to square one. I've invested so much time and energy and love into this path... failure is not an option!!! Ahh, the stress of it is sickening, and all I can do is try not to think about it too much and take this semester a day at a time.

Secondly, living at home is driving me fucking nuts. I love my family, but it's just too much. We finally found a nice young lady to rent the spare room out to... which is great, because that rent money is essential to our being able to continue living in this house. But it also means the loss of a significant amount of storage space, as well as the loss of my private bathroom (which is now her private bathroom). Petty and stupid as it may seem... it was just really nice to not have to share a bathroom with my sweet, but deaf and flatulant handicapped uncle. I'm 22 years old, I have a full life... and I now have to find a way to fit that entire adult life into my small, childhood bedroom. I've packed away all my homebrew supplies, and in the attic they'll remain until I move out... my schoolbooks tower over me on top of my cluttered computer desk which is crammed in next to my bed under which is stored a box of candles that I don't have the flat surfaces on which to burn and the few pairs of shoes I'm hanging on to after having to weed out my closet for items to donate in order to fit my scrubs, camping supplies and ongoing art projects. And really, I don't have very much stuff! I'm not a "stuff" kinda person, I don't hoard and I wear my clothes until they are literally worn through because I hate shopping THAT MUCH. It's just too small a space. I'm going out of my mind.

Keeping up with the hoop stuff has been tricky. I don't have much time for my own personal hoop practice, and sometimes I really hesitate to sacrifice my weekend mornings to teaching. But I do have some really exciting opportunities coming up, and I'm excited to have the chance to bring the hoop into the lives of new people.

My social life is essentially dead. I made it out to PDF, and had a fabulous time. It felt wonderful to spend a weekend dancing and drinking wine and hooping all night long. We went to Patrick and Mel's wedding celebration in the Pines, and though I spent quite a bit of it asleep in the car (it had been a long day!), we had fun and drove to LBI to watch the sun rise. It was beautiful. But, on a weekly basis, I am a homebody. I have to get up early all the time for school, or work... and by the time the stuff that I have to do is done, and dinner has been cooked... it's too late to go out. I'm okay with this for now... I'm not terribly upset that I spend my evenings at home with tea and books and cats and my boyfriend. It's comfortable, I'm content, and rest is more important to my health and success now than it has ever been. But there are friends of mine who I haven't seen in months, who I hope understand what's going on with me!!

The chickens are growing up too fast! There is quite a bit of pressure to get their permanent fenced run and second chicken house built... the photo is of that work in progress... it's starting to get crowded with the four of them in the one house! They have eaten almost ALL 50 LBS of their chick feed that I bought what, 6 weeks ago?

Jeremiah has been wonderful. He is so supportive and understanding. I couldn't ask for a better partner, and I don't know how I'd be keeping it together if it weren't for him. Sometimes he just knows exactly what I need... whether it's a cup of tea or a backrub or someone to help me study for NCLEX or just an early bedtime.

That's pretty much the sum of it right now!

PDF

...approaches.
Getting antsy.
My chickens are becoming giants.
Nursing school is effing hard.
That is all!

Springtime...

It is a warm and pleasant May afternoon. I spend an hour sitting on the bench next to my pond and watching the wealth of life that surrounds me.
A pair of mating toads create a long strand of black pearls behind them, lying in coils and strands amongst the watercress and lilypads. Occasionally one of the single, singing males attempts to interrupt their union, and the pond erupts into a show of splashes and kicks. Brand new, tiny little tadpoles cling to the algae-covered walls. Our dear frog, who has been with us for three years now (and has gotten absurdly large in size) relaxes on the stones surrounding the water, awaiting his next meal. Even as I watch, a brown and black chipmink peeks his head over the the rock barrier, its hands pressed together beneath its chin, watching me. His family finds safe roads beneath the wooden pation that we built, which is elevated a few inches off the ground. Honeybees and bumblebees are hard at work pollinating the holly bushes and they create a buzz that can be heard even over the sound of the traffic. Their labors are evident in the apple trees, who have losts their blossoms and are already swelling with young fruit. A yellow finch flits from branch to branch, chirping quietly as though talking to itself. The breeze brings me scents of fresh mown grass, lily of the valley, and rain-washed earth. In this moment, I am part of this beautiful world. I am complete. I am happy.

Ahhhhh!!!

Lots of things are happening quickly, and I'm scrambling to adjust. Tons of happy hoop stuff and opportunities are flying at me, from every direction, and I'm kind of spinning from it all (pun intended).

But on a happy, carefree note... I have baby chickens!!! I've finally taken an important second step towards my dream of independence... the first step being my tiny little vegetable and herb gardens :)

The Chickiechickiepeeperpants Clan includes Popcorn and Daffodil (Golden Sex-Link females who will lay light brown eggs when they're grown up) and Cerberus and Bambi (Ameraucana females who will lay turquoise eggs when they're grown up). They are so ridiculous cute! They're currently living in my bathroom brooder under a heatlamp until they are fully feathered out and can move into the ultra deluxe renovated bunny hutches that Jeremiah and I have turned into chicken coops. I loveses them!!!