Spoonring

 

Toshing

 Happy Lunar New Year!

Cat or Rabbit, depending.  Megapode on Discworld. 

Working through a project on the job, and it's pulling together a lot of what I've learned over the past year and a half. Boyhowdy have I learned a LOT. This is the puzzle aspect of it, chart review - which I had a whiff of experience with before I started. Now?  Yeah, I've gotten pretty good at digging through and finding a way to unknot. 

Read Dodger by Pratchett.  Yes, that Artful Dodger - although fictionalized as if he was a real character that Dickens met and then fictionalized in Oliver.  I love the twist of it. It's very much Pratchett, but not at all Discworld.  And he makes his living by going down into the sewers and finding lost money and jewels - he's a tosher. 

Which, well, resonates with me.  Dylan and I were out walking, I saw something in the mud next to the sidewalk, picked it up, and it's a ring. One of those made out of the end of a spoon handle. It's rather pretty, and I'm wearing it now. I'm a scrounger through and through. 

This year has also been the year of big stuff needing to be replaced, so it's good my pay is enough to cover it all. The furnace/HVAC, the toilet, fridge, and now the dishwasher. 

Yes, I know the dishwasher is not essential, but for me it is. My most detested childhood task, for a start. My wrists do not tolerate that sort of work, and will fling breakables around to punish me. It's a lot cleaner, too, washing dishes with the machine.  The new one is supposed to be a lot quieter - which, it could hardly be louder than this one. 

The new fridge is also so much quieter. The old fridge - only 10 years, mind, was cheap what we could afford the year we moved in. The handles broke right away and several times more until we gave up and took them off completely. As well as the butter holder. It was loud from the start. Over the past month or so, the volume was far worse and disturbing our sleep. Took a lot of finagling to find anyone to come look at it - and it would be expensive.  Eventually worked out that it was the compressor going out - which would push the repair well into "nearly as much as a new fridge."  So, we got a smaller, but better one, more efficient, better design overall.  

The day we got fridge, the dishwasher started making weird noises. And yesterday, it stopped draining.  So, I washed all the dirty dishes by hand while Dylan researched and ordered a new one. We both hate the wastefulness of this, and feel a bit guilty about it. But he'd also been getting the forms ready for our taxes, and deemed it something we could well afford. 

I've picked up the mending again, even darned one of Dylan's socks that was getting thin. Stabilized the cuffs on my heavy hoodie, nearly done with the red cashmere sweater that the moths got to. And I'm thinking of the pieces I want to make to wear every day I'm not in scrubs at work. At least I can stop wasting resources on clothing that won't last. 

One of my patients with a terrible diagnosis that needed an amputation at the cancer hospital, came by to see me and give me a hug. One of the few patients I wanted to hug back, so I was very glad to see him. Getting the care sorted was a complicated process, when I was still pretty new, and I roped in everyone to help. He recently reached out to me with a billing issue, so I got him those numbers, and sicced a coordinator with those contacts to push. He was so grateful, but that is who he is. 

Compare to the guy I called to rearrange his appointment because we didn't have the test results we needed to properly diagnose him.  He immediately screamed and swore at me, I can't do my job and I'm worse than when he was shot at in Vietnam...  Yes, I ended that call and reported it.  He called his primary care, according to her crying and apologetic.  She got those test results, or some of them, and as soon as we get the rest, we will see him.  Because we can't fire patients at the VA. But we can enforce safe behavior, and require police escorts. 

This stage of my life, drawing in, consolidating insight, living more lightly and deeply at the same time. Finding a ring in the mud.