So much to talk about and catch up on! I am now living in Los Angeles! I have been here now for almost three weeks! That's crazy. Time just goes so fast. I still don't feel like I have had any time to really settle in. Definitely haven't explored the area much, the traffic kinda keeps me from doing that!
So I guess I need to catch up! After the cruise, we went to Miami beach to walk around. This downtown area is really cool. One street we walked on had tons of restaurants and shops. It was a fun place to window shop. Lots of sushi restaurants. If we hadn't just gotten of a cruise I am sure we would have tried one, but I was definitely not wanting to eat anything! On the way there I got to see the Miami Dolphins stadium. They are my second favorite team, after the Broncos, so it was cool to see the stadium.
Dolphins Stadium
Later that day, my friend from Oklahoma, Tiffany, flew in to Florida to hang out for a few days. It was fun having her there! We really didn't do a whole lot, but we relaxed, walked on the beach one night, played games. We got to catch up and talk a lot.
One evening we were walking on the beach and saw these jellyfish washed up on the shore. They were everywhere! And they were a clear bluish color. It was interesting. We decided that was not the beach we would want to swim in! It was too chilly there anyway though to swim in the ocean.
Don't touch!
The day before we were flying out I must have gotten some food poisoning or something because I was not feeling very good. Lucky me I had to fly home sick, that is never a fun experience having stomach issues and having to fly. It turned out ok though. When I got to Denver I was welcomed by Clint! This was funny because he lives in Oklahoma, but flew to Denver that morning and picked me up at the airport that night. It was cool. He picked me up, we went and saw his family, then drove to BV. He came out to Colorado so I could teach him how to snowboard. First I took him out snowshoeing and then to practice on the board a little. He enjoyed snowshoeing but discovered early how it can be hard work! Then on the way to go snowboarding, I was just driving and bragging about how great my car is when I get stuck in the snow! Bad stuck. We couldn't dig it out, luckily a truck drove by and towed my out. This still wasn't working too well and we had to dig down deep to the gravel in order to finally get out. My first stuck in the snow experience. Guess I had to really welcome Clint to the Colorado snow! It was fun, after my car was unstuck!
After the day, we walked out onto Cottonwood Lake. Clint's first time to walk on a lake!
The next three days Clint and I spent at Monarch. First day was slow of course being his very first day on a board. But I could tell he was picking it up quickly. And he was tough. Didn't complain after all the many normal falls of learning to ride. He was sore of course, but he stuck it out and rode hard all three days. He didn't even have to take many extra breaks. I was proud of him. And I think I might have made a snowboarder out of him! At least that is what he says. He says he really enjoyed it and hopes to get to go more often. Unfortunately that is a little tough to do in Oklahoma, hence the reason I left there as soon as I could and don't plan on going back. Sorry to all my friends there, it just makes for a great place to visit.
After unfortunately having to take Clint back to Denver I had one day to go back to Pueblo to move out of my apartment. It was funny because I left Pueblo like January 12th to go to Florida and then didn't go back until the 3oth just to move out. Didn't even spend another night there! That was ok with me! I was ready to leave. It was nice being there to get to go snowboarding a lot and see friends in BV and Denver, but as my life is right now, it had been three months, time to move on! My amazing mother came with me to Pueblo to help me move out! It was so great to have her help. I love her!
Then I was going to have a few days to snowboard and repack for California, but that was right when the storms hit and the temperatures were in the negative 20s at Monarch. I managed to go up one day for a few hours, but riding alone in that cold of temps, isn't the most fun so I didn't go as much as wanted to. Oh well.
Packing to drive out to California was so much nicer than any other time so far because of my new car! It's great to have a bigger car and not feel totally jam packed inside it! Since I was headed to California, I took advantage of the opportunity to go up to Salt Lake City to visit Brea and Tom. A little out of the way, but totally worth it! Just spent the evening with them, but anytime I get to spend with them is always a good time. Then the next day I left early to meet up with Luke and Jackie on base. Luke works at Edwards AFB now about 2 hours outside of LA. Luke and Jackie came with me to LA to help me move all my stuff in. Man, it's so nice to have help! I didn't even realize at first that I would have them close by to help me, but having them there to help made a huge difference. Usually I arrive somewhere like the day before I have to start and I am rushing around getting everything done that needs to be done that it is at least a week before I feel like I am somewhat organized. With Luke and Jackie helping this time, everything was moved in and organized in less than two hours! Thanks Luke and Jackie! Left us with lots of time to explore the area and have a little fun.
My new apartment kitchen
View from my porch. Yep, that is the Hollywood sign in the background
That afternoon after getting everything moved in we went to play frisbee golf. We found a park that has 27 holes. That's a lot! We only played 18, that's enough for me. Luke was ready to keep playing all night if he could! But Jackie and I were ready to be done. We played Saturday and Sunday afternoon. Sunday afternoon the park we played at was along a side of the hill. Made it more challenging and more of a workout with the risk of your frisbee rolling all the way down the hill.
I tend to enjoy climbing trees when I play frisbee golf. This tree looked fun...it was!
I was driving around the park and noticed this sign. Just cool to see a sign that says Buena Vista on it. Guess this is a Buena Vista rec area, there were a lot of Buena Vista signs
View of the Los Angeles hills
Downtown LA
Saturday night we went to the Santa Monica Pier. This is a famous beach; if anyone has ever seen Private Practice, the lit up ferris wheel you see all the time on that show is the Santa Monica Pier. So we walked around and took a ride on the ferris wheel. Cool place to walk around. Not sure if it is somewhere I would chill on the beach for the day though. It is a very large, busy beach. The houses along it are cool, just very close together and skinny!
The Pier. Can't really see the ferris wheel, but its there!
Sunset on the beach!
Luke and Jackie left Sunday afternoon to catch the end of the Super Bowl. I settled in and explored the area a little bit more, then got ready to start my busy week of orientation at my new hospital, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center. If anyone has never heard of this hospital, it is right in Hollywood. It is where many of the stars go. It is actually a Jewish hospital. They even have a whole Kosher section in the cafeteria! But orientation was the longest orientation days I have had yet. Very boring and a lot of it was a waste of time. I figured out right away that this hospital has a lot of travel nurses. There were 6 new travel nurses just in labor and delivery starting with me, and more to start soon. I guess their labor and delivery unit has had a lot of changes lately and lots of nurses leaving. They were in desperate need of some help. But the whole hospital has somewhere between 250-300 travelers, and most these travelers are all with the same company! It's crazy. That's a lot of travel nurses. So I met some people right away! One girl that I have gone to the beach with once and hung out with a few times lives in the same apartment as me. Another nurse on my floor I figured out lives right next door to me!
It took some getting used to how things work here in the city. Actually, correction, I don't think I will ever get used to it, just took some time to get oriented to how things work. For example, we have to pay $50 a month for parking here, all employees have to pay that, and staff don't get this reimbursed! I get it reimbursed through my company but I think it is ridiculous that if your staff there you have to pay that much just to park to go to work. Not only that, but every day when I get to the parking garage I have to get a parking ticket, then before I leave I have to go to the cashier and get my ticket verified. EVERY DAY!!! It's crazy. I don't want to have to wait in line every day after getting of a 12-13 hour work day. I just want to go home! Such a waste of time. You have to pay to park everywhere you go here. You get a parking ticket everywhere you park. Now I can relate whenever I see on TV or a movie about people getting their parking tickets validated. If you park somewhere for a store or something like that, many places validate the ticket so you don't have to pay to park if you are a customer. You figure out that process quickly living here. Sometimes it is interesting just figuring out where to park when you go somewhere. Kind of frustrating. I got my first LA parking ticket within the first week. I was going to the gym, couldn't find a parking garage, so I parked on a side street. Didn't see a sign anywhere saying I couldn't park there or needed a permit. But apparently it was permit parking only so I got a ticket! Lame.
So far everyone on the floor have been nice and friendly. Its so busy that sometimes it is hard to find anyone to help you out, but my patient assignments havent been too bad. One weird thing here is we do self assignments, so in the morning we walk in and decide what patient we want. That is a little strange, but hasn't been too bad yet. Just sucks when you pick a patient and the baby ends up being a bad baby requiring lots of interventions during labor. In normal language this means that the baby's heart rate during labor is not reassuring so we have to continue to make sure the baby is doing ok by doing different things with the mother. I have had decent patients though. They have in general been nice and appreciative, that is always a nice thing to have! Can make a big different on your work week. And they try harder here to make sure you get your break, that is really nice! So besides feeling completely lost in just how they do all their paperwork and technical stuff here, things have been going fairly well!
Last weekend I went to Luke's house and we went snowboarding at Big Bear on Friday. It was awesome!!!! The snow was decent, but the best part was that this resort is made for snowboarders. It is a very small resort, but they have tons of rails, boxes, and jumps. It's crazy. So fun to ride down the mountain and have so many options of things to do! Plus it was just tons of fun to get to go with Luke and other people he works with. I go so often by myself, it was fun to go with other boarders, especially with Luke. I love snowboarding with him! By two o clock a storm rolled in and the snow started coming down hard. So by the time we left, we were soaked! It was a great day though.
Luke was supposed to be taking a picture of us, apparently he likes himself because he only got a shot of himself! Silly, would have been a great pic!
Luke and I are training for a triathlon (I talked him into doing it with me!) so Saturday we did a little training, but that was after he introduced me to some kiteboarding. As a beginner, you have to get used to kite on land first before you take a board and kite out on water. So we took his kite out to the field behind his house. We spent a few hours getting me used to the kite. It was fun. I enjoyed it, now I am ready to try it with a board, but very nervous. Not looking forward to the many face plants I am sure I am going to have in the water!
Saturday night we headed back to LA so we could go to Magic Mountain on Sunday. It was a chilly weekend but it was great to go to an amusement park and not be dying of heat while waiting in line. It was busy, but the lines were never to terrible that we had to wait extremely long for any ride. We ended up doing lots of rides. Magic Mountain has tons of roller coasters. That is all we did except for the spinning ride that you just lay on the wall and it spins in a big circle really fast. I was nervous to do this at first thinking it would make me really dizzy, but I was ok. Most the coasters we did were big and fast! It was fun! Not sure if I have ever been there before. I don't think so because nothing looked familiar.
This week at work, we had two famous people on the floor. I can't say who, it is against the law. But I can say they were not having the baby, they were visiting the couple having the baby. It wasn't crazy on the floor having them there. Everything was normal except for the two bodyguards they had standing outside of their door. I expected it to be a little different when there was someone famous on the floor, but I guess it was good to know things don't go crazy when this happens! I still kind of hope I don't take care of a famous person though, it is a little nerve wrecking!
I invite anyone to come visit me in Hollywood! We can go experience the LA life!!!
