Bigger or Better: Life outside of Texas

I have just come up with a hierarchy of best ways to broaden my mind. Or any mind. Firstly, travel. Experience what other people experience. Taste, see, smell, feel, speak. How can you understand someone's view if you don't understand the context, the soil from which the fruit drew nourishment? Interact with people, and both can learn. Secondly, but probably more likely to occur, read. Fiction, non-fiction, self-help, whatever, just read. Learn from history's successes and failures to guide your actions. Learn from fictional characters how to test the limits of your mind, to explore what you would and would not do in ANY circumstance. I think my favorite books are all fiction. See what pearls there are: "The existence of this world is simply a guarantee that there exists a world that is perfect. God created the world so that, through its visible objects, men could understand his spiritual teachings and the marvels of his wisdom." Also, "When we strive t...

Every once in a while, my hospital unit will get a patient that has a LOT of drainage from a particular drain tube (chest tube or Jackson-Pratt drain, usually. and that's JP for short). That happened this week. I had a patient who needed her JP drains emptied at least every 4 hours because they were dumping about 300cc (which is a cubic centimeter, which is the same as a milliliter) each time. So the nurse practitioner ordered heavy whipping cream to stick into the feeding tube. Yes, really. Basically, fats (of which heavy whipping cream definitely counts) are picked up by the lymphatic system from the intestines instead of going straight to the liver. When there is a leak in the lymphatic system, the fatty fluid (called chyle) can show up in places it's not supposed to be. Like in the JP drain. The leak can be fixed, but it's really hard to see, so having a really obvious color (like white from the cream) mark the spot can help the surgeon locate the leak. There's t...

Once upon a time, not that long ago, I took care of the,cutest old lady of my acquaintance. She was small, which automatically meets the requirements for being cute, but she also said the darnedest things. When I first met her, I asked her how she was. She said, "Oh, great! I feel like running a marathon." I thought we'd work on getting up to her chair first. So we stood up, walked 3 feet, and she sat in the chair. I put her feet up, covered her in blankets, handed her a newspaper and the TV remote, and asked how she felt. "Oh, great! I feel like a man!" [which is an interesting reflection on gender stereotypes] She was a bit groggy from pain medicine, so before she dozed off in the chair, I helped her back to the bed, put on her leg compression stockings, and told her to enjoy the massage on her calves. "Oh, good. I feel like a woman!" [again, an interesting insight of gender stereotypes] After an appropriate recovery time, and with fair warning...

I've been reflecting on organs lately--don't know why. and also, I'm not talking about the musical instrument--and I've come to the hypothesis that humans lose themselves a lot. We lose our mind. Not sure where it goes... This trip was on the spontaneous side. What we were thinking, I don't know, but it was AWESOME We also lose our heads We lose our feet (or rather, our footing). Also, we lose our toehold. Slipped so many times hiking this in Edinburgh We lose our stomach. Blegh Actually, this was delicious. But I ordered this because the other option was haggis. We lose sight of what we seek. While in Lacock, we lost interest in Slughorn's house in favor of a slug. Or rather, a snail. We lose our nerve. Melissa and I went to see this. And we weren't committed. Crude stuff. So we left. The nerve of them! We lose face Well, that's assuming people thought we were dignified. We lose our heart. My FAVORITE place ...

Yes, really. Public restrooms are quite interesting in the UK. Actually, I think they are similar to ones in Europe, but since I've not exactly been to Europe, I'm sticking with "UK is different than US" Public restrooms are pay toilets. The one Melissa is posing in front of advertised a sanitizer spray after each use, 50 pence entry. I suppose that's reasonable. But it rather irritated me because on top of paying to drink (VERY few water fountains in the UK. I only saw one.), I had to pay to send that drink into the sewers.  On the plus side, UK toilets have hidden tanks. Most of the toilets are floating toilets. I love that. Because I hate tanks. I think they are disgusting. This is probably not logical, but I guess that goes to show that I have tank-phobia, and phobias are never logical.

I may stretch the definition of "popular", but I'm pretty sure I got the culture right. Jane Austen. in Bath. I think she hated Bath. Liverpool At the Baker Street stop on the Tube, we found lots of Sherlocks Police Call Box. Made me think of Doctor Who Paddington Bear! I love Paddington Bear! Peter Pan statue in Kensington Gardens Something to do with Harry Potter. I wasn't paying attention King's Cross Sation I think Melissa and I both chose Slytherin scarves Stratford-on-Avon, the birth and retirement and burial place of William Shakespeare.