Late-night phone convo:

Me: “Did I already tell you about what happened yesterday?”
P: “Don’t think so…”
Me: “There was a girl next to the station who got hit by a bus.”
P: “Ooohhh… Was the bus okay?”

I talked to Dad on AIM last night and he says he bought me something for Christmas and that he thinks I’ll, quote, LOVE it, unquote. I asked for a hint and he said “If you ever need it, you’ll be glad I gave it to you. …And you’ll be REALLY glad I gave it to you instead of you having to buy it yourself.” But he wouldn’t say any more. So. Yeah. Twelve days till they get here.

I figured out how I can do the paramedic thing – did some research last night. It takes three semesters to become a paramedic, but to take the class you first have to be an EMT (Emergency Medical Technician), which takes one semester. And to be an EMT, you first have to be certified in CPR for the Professional Rescuer (different from normal CPR) and take First Response, a 40-hour class. I should be able to do both of those things in J-ville over the summer, then take the EMT class during fall semester. (And then, if I decide to, spend the next three semesters – the rest of my time at UF – on the paramedic class.) But I think I have to do that at Santa Fe, the community college in G-ville – I’m pretty sure UF doesn’t offer it. Which sucks, because I’ve already got a really full schedule for the next two years. The EMT class is 40 hours a week, within clinical rotations on weekends, and I’ve got a 17-credit class schedule planned out for myself already. Can we say busy?? That means I most likely won’t have time for a job. Oh well, I’ll make it work.

But CPR again… geez. I’ve been re-certified almost every single stinking year since I was ten years old! And yes, I had the ‘special’ CPR that I need for this – that came as part of my lifeguard training. But it’s expired now – expires after one year – so I have to do it again.

But you know what’s weird? That they teach different techniques in the classes. Not just more information in the Professional Rescuer class (although that too), but different information. When I got re-certified this summer at camp, that was of course just regular Adult & Child CPR, and I took an immediate dislike to the woman teaching it – don’t know why, I just felt an immediate ‘bristling’. Anyway, we were working on the mannequins in small groups and something she told us to do didn’t ‘kloppen’ with the way I’d been taught – I think it was the Heimlich maneuver on an unconscious victim. I’d always been taught to give abdominal thrusts with the heel of your hand, simulating the normal maneuver as closely as possible while the victim is lying on his or her back. But she was telling us to simply give chest compressions the same way you would for normal CPR. That didn’t (and still doesn’t) make any sense to me; the reason the Heimlich works is that is forces your diaphragm to push air upwards and expel the object. So how are chest compressions – used to artificially beat your heart - going to have any effect on the diaphragm whatsoever? Seems to me that all that’s going to do is mess with the rhythm of your heart. So I called her on it, and she was impressed that I knew that and admitted that that was the ‘better’ method, but said that it was only taught in CPR for the Professional Rescuer and that we couldn’t use it since we were only being certified for ‘normal’ CPR. When I told her I’d had the other certification the previous year, she said then that *I* could use the method I’d learned, but no one else in the room could because doing things you aren’t trained for can get you in legal trouble if the family sues or something. I thought and still think that that was a crock. If they know one way is ‘better’, why don’t they just teach us that method? I mean, this is ultimately about saving lives, yes??? Idiots. Hope I never choke around someone who’s been trained at Ton-A-Wandah.

Just got my phone bill… EUR 96,22. That’s lower than the last two months, but it’s still ticking me off because there’s 19% tax on it. My *actual* costs were only 80 euro. Sigh.

Okay… well… guess that’s all. It’s 12.23 and I’m still sitting here in my pajamas. I have class at 15.00 and then I need to go grocery shopping, AGAIN. And I need to figure out my money situation. I have enough in my account to pay off the phone bill, but not to ALSO pay the NT2 people. And I still want that coat. And I need to reload my Chipknip. So I’ll withdraw like 150 from my American account, buy the coat, then go deposit the rest at ABN-AMRO. Today.

Which means I’d better get moving. Goodbye…