My cats and their idiosyncrasies

So I have noticed that most people use their blogs to show off pictures of their children and what not. I don't have any kiddos yet, but I will show off my "babies" (even though they are full grown). I have some pics of their idiosyncrasies here.

Bartok

Bartok has always had a slight obsession with the water faucet in the bath tub. When we lived in California he always came running when we would get out of the shower. He would jump in the tub (sometimes before we were able to get out and sometimes almost knocking us over) and play with the drips coming from the faucet. In our bathroom at our house, now, we don't have a bathtub with our shower so he can't play with the water after we get out, but we do have a separate tub in the master bath. Now, he will jump in the tub and stare at the faucet until we turn the water on for him to play with. Here he is staring at the faucet.

It is a strange obsession. Here he is grabbing the water with his paw so he can drink it:

Another bit of trivia about Bartok is his favorite sleeping position. He likes to sleep on his back with his feet in the air. When he gets into a deep sleep his foot starts to drop, bringing him into a side lying position. When this happens it startles him awake and he makes a cooing sound almost like a pigeon, adjusts himself back on his back and the whole cycle starts over again. He also likes to sleep on our shoes in the closet, but I don't have a picture of that. A new favorite of his (that I also don't have a picture of) is sleeping in the dryer in the clean clothes if we don't get them out fast enough or close the door.

Some idiosyncrasies cannot be pictured. One is that he likes to play peek-a-boo. He likes to try to catch the peek-a-booee's face with his paw. This game is not for the faint of heart as there are claws on the end of that paw!

Bartok doesn't meow at the door when he wants to go out. He pigeon coos loudly while racing up and down the stairs and ricocheting off furniture and walls. He only goes out at night, though, because he is afraid of the neighbors and outside daytime noises.

He has also learned how to open cupboard doors. His favorite is the cupboard above the refrigerator. Who knew we would have to baby proof our house before we had babies.

Bartok also likes to attack Milhaud (mee-oh, please). He sits on the edge of the couch and waits for her to come by and then leaps. When she growls at him he cowers, but he still likes the game.

Milhaud (Pronounced mee-oh)

Milhaud has her own little idiosyncrasies. Her favorite sleeping position is with her back against a pillow. It can be any pillow. She likes to be in the same room with me so if I happen to be in the kitchen or living room she sleeps on the couch:

If I am sleeping during the day for work (or if I am not around) she sleeps in the bed. When I am not there she goes directly for the pillow:

If I am there she either snuggles up to me and "chases" me around the bed until sometimes I end up lying crosswise by the time I wake up or I wake up to find myself on the very edge of the pilow or completely off the pillow so that she can sleep next to it. She never does this with Matt's pillow. Just mine. Also, if I lay on my back she has to sit in the middle of my chest. For Matt, she likes to sit in the middle of his back, where he can't see her.

Something I can't take a picture of is her meowing. She is a very loud meower. If she wants out she will not take "no" for an answer. She will meow at the door, literally, until someone lets her out (or in). When we first had her we could not let her inside because we could not afford pet rent at the time. It was a couple of days before we asked our land lady if we could let her inside. Night and day, day and night she meowed at the door. If we woke up in the middle of the night we heard her. When we came home at the end of the day she was still meowing. I hope she took a break to get something to eat and go potty, but we will never know. Finally, the land lady took pity and gave us permission to let her in. When we did finally open the door for her, she came in, sniffed at some furniture, jumped on the couch and went to sleep. Keep in mind that she used to belong to the lady that lived there before and she pretty much came with the house so that was the first time she met us in the house. I think she decided that we were okay. Now, when Milhaud comes inside she meows a couple times (depending on how long it takes us to let her in the meow can be friendly or loud and grumpy) walks in and literally flops onto her side on the floor.

Milhaud does not like to use the cat box. She will in a pinch, but she prefers to go outside. Before we got Bartok the cat box was pretty much just for decoration.

There is so much more I could say about my cats, like Bartok having to have all doors in the house open, and Milhaud demanding to be petted whether you want to or not, but I think I am becoming a bit boring and obsessive so I will stop now.

Meet Nurse Elley

As promised, Matto took me to Build-a-Bear last Wednesday! There I found this wonderful Elephant and dressed her up in scrubs and got her some medical equipment. Notice the stethescope around her neck, the syringe in her hand and the thermometer "grasped" in her trunk. It is very handy for Nurse Elley (that is her name by the way) to have that extra appendage because nurses are always in need of some extra hands. Note her booties. She is all ready for a leaky patient!

In other news on the nursing front: Please be in prayer for me. Apparently I am not allowed to work as a Professional Student Nurse (PSN) after I am declared a Graduate Nurse (GN) by the Texas Board of Nursing (TBON). Unfortunately, as I have not been hired as a GN, but as an RN (Registered Nurse) I cannot work as a nurse in my unit until after I have passed the licensure exam. I cannot take the licensure exam until I am declared GN. All this to say, there will be a big gap between working as a PSN and working as an RN. At least one paycheck will be lost if not more. Please pray that the transition will go smoothly and that God will provide money for us to live and that we will use the money for His glory.

My husband makes me happy!!

After my pinning on Friday my husband soundlessly came up to me and gave me a big bear hug. Later he told me about what he had been thinking during the evening class representative's speech. The speaker told about how the evening students would work school in between work and vice versa without getting much sleep in between. Matt was reminded of how hard I had worked over the last two years and he told me that he was so proud of me. It makes me happy to know that my husband is proud of me.

Also, I woke up this afternoon to find white roses on my dresser. That made me happy too. He thought I might like them so he put them on my dresser. I think that is great.

Also, Matto is taking me to build-a-bear where I can build a nurse bear!! And he is going to get me a new Littman stethescope which is so great.

I am a happy wife!!

In other news....

Thursday, my mom and I went to her house so she could change before going to my niece's band concert. When we got there I heard a yowling sound. While she changed I went around the side of the house to investigate. Her cat, Charley, had fallen off the fence and somehow gotten his hind leg wedged between the slats in the fence. I reached in and held his body up and yelled for mom. She finally came out and came to help. When she touched his foot he screamed (no kidding, he really screamed) and went to town on my left hand. Ah, what a gesture of thanks. I grabbed his scruff as soon as I could, but not soon enough. I will have some cool scars for sure! As soon as we got him free from the fence he wrapped himself around my right arm so I have some fun marks there as well. We put him down (after prying his claws out of my flesh) and hurried to the bathroom to assess my wounds. Pretty. Puncture wounds and bruises. On mom's insistence we went to the nearest urgent care, but they were closed so we had to drive all the way down to Sugarland. The fang did not break off and no bones were broken and my bones are very healthy (at least in my left hand). When I told Matt about my healthy bones he said, "They better be after all that milk you drink!" I am now on doxycyclene and am supposed to keep it clean and dry. There has been some swelling, but only over the wounds so that is good. No infection. When people ask me about the scars I will tell them that I was in Vietnam!

Charley is fine. He has no limp and other than being a little skittish about going outside shows not signs of the event.

FREEEEEDOOOOOOOMM

So Wednesday I was taking practice tests for my exit exam and freaking out pretty bad because I kept scoring 60's on them. Finally, about ten minutes before the exam I finished my last practice test and scored yet another 63. At this point I had reached panic mode. I looked up from my computer and two of the Christian students from my class came up and asked if I would pray with them. Hmm...let me think...YES!!!!!!! We prayed for clear minds and calm spirits and most of all for God's glory. The next few minutes before the test I spent texting as many people as I could to ask them to pray. Let me just say to all those who prayed - thanks sooo much. All through the test I felt calm and every time I would begin to freak out I would stop and remember that God was with me and I just needed to take one question at a time. It worked and God was definitely glorified. I got a 992 which equals in normal people terms out to a 91.79%. I scored in the 88.22 percentile in the nation. Whew! When the score came up on the screen I thought it must be upside down. I did not feel that confident with my test. I guess I did okay though! So. It is done. I am finished with nursing school.

Let's try that again.

I AM FINISHED WITH NURSING SCHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


My pinning was Friday. There I found out that I was one out of only 34 people who passed out of both day and evening classes. 70% of my class failed the exit exam! Woah. I guess it makes sense though because when we had our review class very few people paid attention. I sat up front for the last two classes because I had a hard time hearing the teacher through all the chatter despite the fact that she was using a microphone. Anyway.

As I said, my pinning was Friday. Later that evening we had a party at my sister's house and I burned my clinical uniforms. Holy cow! I am so glad I never caught fire while wearing those. I would have gone up in flames faster than you can say "I love my lips!" Ah, polyester, such a quality material! The burning was glorious and all I could every hope for! Now I can say for sure that I shall never wear those horrid outfits again! My mom got a pic of me burning them. Perhaps I might be able to get a copy of it when we figure out how her camera works.

Now what? you might be asking. Well now I have to wait until after the 17th to be proclaimed GN (graduate nurse) and be allowed to take my licensure exam (NCLEX-RN). I have to get that done before June 23 because that is my first day of orientation in my unit where I have been hired as a staff nurse.

And between all that I will be cleaning my house. Apparently I have been in a fog the last few weeks because I walked out of my bedroom Thursday morning and saw that apparently there had been a Tornado in my living room. My mom came over later that morning and I asked her if it seemed messier to her than last week. She said that everything was in the exact same place it had been the week before. Wow. Talk about living in a fog. Well the fog has lifted and I am going straight to work on my nasty house on Tuesday (gotta work Sat, Sun, and Mon).

Did I mention...

NURSING SCHOOL IS OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOVEEEEEEEEEEEEERRRRRRRRRRR!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!