Accents

There are several opinions, if not many, when it comes to accents. The way foreigners view it is totally different from the way natives view it. I think instead of natives trying to sound nice and tell foreigners accents are cool and so on, they need to listen to those on the other side of the fence and try to see it from their point of view. Here's one person view on this issue and i've found many views that do make sense. Of course, natives don't see it cuz the discrimination is shown towards a foreigner based on their accent is mostly unconscious and subtle at times they don't even know they are doing it. Some do but other don't.
So, here's the post by 'ihavenoname'.

Why people would want to eliminate accents:

-- Social stigma

There is much stigma associated with accents, depending on where you are or what accents we're talking about. The problem is accent draws too much attention to itself. Rather than listening to what you have to say, people focus on how you say it. It's
also very easy to earn labels with an outlandish accent. Titles like 'redneck', 'foreigner', 'FOB', 'that guy with a Spanish accent' are not very pleasant, especially when you only want to fit in. It's true that discrimination is all too common, but speech, second in importance only to appearance, is something that can be changed. And that's all that matters.

Accent is sort of like criminal background; nice people try not to be mean about it,
but everyone has their own prejudices and you can't change that.

HP (hewlett packard)

I was looking at laptops at amazon and i specifically chose to look at Toshiba models only. A reviewer commented on having a not so positive experience with HP and it reminded me i need to sell this piece of mine. Of course i'm not gonna buy a hp laptop. If their desktops can't survive the 1 year warranty, why should i expect their laptops to do better. In fact i've heard terrible reviews about hp laptops. That wasn't the main reason why i decided not to go for a hp. Mine was the fact that i had to call hp support about a month before my warranty was through cuz i was having issues with my computer and they quoted me the number of days i have left on my warranty. They decided to start "a case" and look into the problem and after calling a little while thereafter, i gave up.
The thing that surprises me is how they keep sending me their catalogues and emails about their sale events. I always thought i was gonna get a hp digital camera but after reading some stuff about that, i got a canon and i'm soo glad i did. Thing is if hp knows their computers break down before the 1year warranty, which i'm sure they do, i wonder why they keep sending catalogues to customers who should be pissed at them for the poor ROI. Well, for now at least, i think it's because they know customers would need to replace those broken pc's so its best to send them the catalouges. Smart idea but the thing is: everyone ain't stupid! I am done with them. I really don't need a desktop anymore since my contract with the Big Dubya is ending this month. That means we switch to a laptop. hahaha.

Things i need to do

• Tone my abs
• Find a way to gain some extra weight, i've gained about 15 to 18 pounds since i've been in philly, but i could uses some extra flesh since africans are crazy about weight...was thinking ensure but i never gained an ounce when i drank 4 -6packs of those. 24 ensure plus and i didn't gain an ounce. So i need to find a different way.
• Get stuff i need to buy

Hopfully i can find my way to the gym...hahaha. Did i say i filled the form to change my major today? i'll letcha know how that goes.

Philly as I know it

Today, i was walking down 13th street trying to get to drexel. Then it occured to me i was going home to visit for a little while. As i looked down the street this cloudy morning, starred at the cars waiting at the red light adn the the people around, i realized i'm gonna miss philly, even if i'm leaving for 2 weeks.
I love philly, it's a great city. I take a lot of things for granted such as the art museum, city hall, which i walk past at least once a week, reading terminal market which i walk by at least 4-5 times a week among other things.
Thinking about how i was gonna miss philly when i leave for my vacation made me realize i wouldn't have felt the same way if i was leaving for kansas. I wouldn't have felt the same way if i lived in kansas and was leaving for Ghana. It occured to me that this is prolly cuz philly is a city i know very well. I've been in many cities in the US, been to more than 30 states or is it 40+ states. I've never really lived somewhere where i knew the city, had friends in different parts of the city and did stuff. One thing about the midwest is that you have to drive everywhere, walking seems to be a sin in most parts of the midwest. Plus diversity is absolutely nonexistent so you don't see much and the little you see isn't engaging or fun. Philly is different, it's a vibrant city with young and old around, rich culture and diversity, lots of history and great people.

Over 2 years ago, when i was choosing which state to move to, i thought of maryland, then i chose philly cuz it looked like it had a lot going on and the truth is it does. I just never new how attached i was attached to philly when it occured to me i was gonna go away for a little while. i used to travel a lot before i came here and it occured to me i haven't gone out of state since i came. I tried to think of how ghana will look like, i can't imagine because i've known philly these last few years and it's vibrant, busy and soo much like accra that i really didn't miss it that much.
It just occured to me 2days ago at work that i was going to travel, prior to that time, it had been something that didn't seem real, now it is an the time left is little. I don't even have my suitcase, it's still in kansas. i guess i'll need to get one from walmart or kmart...kmart has a sale so it might be the best place to go, plus it's downtown so i can just walk down the street and get the thing.
For the two weeks, i know i'll miss living downtown, center city is awesome and i'll miss philly, the sweet city of brotherly love, i'll miss those days when i see 2 girls fighting over a cell phone, or when someone sits on top of a building threatening to jump down and seeing the cops and everyone standing and trying to do what they have to do, i'll miss chestnut street, where i've spent a lot of money this spring and summer shopping my heart out. Gosh, downtown philly can turn a tightwad into a shopaholic, lol. I'll miss a lotta things and i hope that when i get back, philly will be the same great philly it is. I don't expect much to change in two weeks but you can't be too careful about, can you?
I was so excited in may when i bought my ticket then sam scared me and i realized he was talking bout the holland embassy for transit visa. Now, i got excited early this week and thinking about philly brings me mixed feelings. But i've been dying to see Ghana for the last 2 or so years so i'm happy to go HOME and see what my country has come to.

A moment of silence

For a dear patient of mine. Not really my patient all the time but he is someone i got to know as i worked with other nurses and had a good relationship with. Just walked into the breakroom and saw the announcement for his funeral. First of all, i wasn't expecting him to die cuz i saw him the weekedn before the last when i worked and i know he was here during the week when i was here cuz i'd heard them talking about dialysis for him cuz he had developed renal failure. For a moment there, i thought chemo makes him get that but that was all i thought at that moment and i never thought about anything again.

I'm just sad. Soo sad. Actually, i was so shocked in the break room i expressed my shock in such loud outburst of disbelief. It made me loose my appetite for the other half of my chicken sandwich (Thank God i finished the first half of it when it came in an 10 ). As i sat and ate dinner, i couldn't help but picture him from the last time when i saw him, boy he was soooo huge then, i remember trying to say something to him but i couldn't say "you look like you've gained a lot of weight" so i said "you're not your usual self". And i said that because he was quiet, withdrawn, wasn't talking much, had this flat affect and he just wasn't who he used to be. I thought back to the last time when i came in and he made me go get a delivery for him downstairs while i was getting report. He asked me to take $5 of the money and i told him, i can't do that because i'm a christian. Then i thought back to the last time katie worked, i did cultures on him that night and thinking about that made me realize that the first time i did cultures during april was on this patient and the last time i did cultures was on him. Then i thought about the very first time he came in, the first day i saw him, i'd heard during report that his name was being pronounced wrong. When i went in, there were two male friends of his, and his girlfriend. I'm wondering if his daughter was there but i don't think he was. They were cracking jokes left and right and his blood pressure was elevated so i made a comment and he blamed the people there for getting him too excited. That was the best i'd ever seen him, thinking aobut it now.

Over these past few months, i've watched him through the spikes and how sometimes he would say the S word when he spikes or the F word when he spikes or something happens. I've watch him on the phone deal with family issues with his gf as i took a blood pressure and pretended i wasn't listening.

Today, i think off all the times i've known this person, of how i would go say hi even when i don't have him as a patient and chat with him for a while. I only go to few patients room to say hi when i don't have them and those are patients i've good relationship with. I can only think of 4 of them for the time that i've been here. I'm sad to hear that he died. i think of that 2-year old daughter of his. She was really beautiful and i remember telling him the first time i saw him to "do it for her." If by saying that i meant do the chemo, then God forgive me. I have a strong sense of feeling that some people can live longer without chemo than they can with it. I overheard a patient today tellign whomever was on the other end of the phone that when this treatment is over, she is not going to come in again. I don't blame here. This is a patient who came in perfectly healthy with a baseline temperature of 97. whatever. Now she's grateful to God to get a temp of 98.8. I remember a case in my bioethics class last quarter when a christian scientist family came under severe critism because they would not let their child undergo chemotherapy after they'd been told the child could get all the side effects including sterility. Plus the child could also die. I wouldn't have gone with the therapy but of course we live in a society where anti-christian sentiments are mundane.

Anyway, back to the topic. Thinking about this patient of mine, part of me wonders if his lifespan woulda been longer without chemo. I guess we'll never find out. Life is soo unpredictable and something like this tells me to draw nearer to God cuz death has no respect for age. We try to think we are in control of our lives but the truth is, we aren't. I'm not a funeral person. The last time i went to a funeral was in high school and that was cuz i was trying to show that i wasn't that selfish person who wants to stay on campus and study. That was silly anyway cuz i never went into the house when i went to the funeral. I might go. i thought i had some hours lined up with WCD for me but i guess i may be trading them. If i do go, i'll post my thoughts on funeral. ):

Guess when a code is called....

Now, 6:54, when the shift ends at 7. That is what i call perfect timing...you have both day and night shift available to help. Well, not soo perfect timing.

Speech, but not as i know it.

Today was my last day with julie. We spent an hour and half together cuz after waking up at 8am and having to walk around downtown and do lundry as well, i didn't think i would be able to get up at 3pm tmrw especially since i had to do some hours for WCD. Well, i'm gonna get up at 3 anyways tmrw except i saw some stray trades and figured i need them. Last week, we got kicked out of one of those viewing rooms so we went to the student academic resource or whatever-it's-called place so we could use the anatomy room. Today, i took her there since i didn't want a repeat of last weeks episode. I think St*ph thought i was tutoring julie when i came over last week and j*ff asked me this week just to verify. Of course she did come later to interrupt my session, not sure if she wanted to find out specifically what was going on but she came at that time cuz julie and i were doing a couple of dialogues like we were reheasing for a play.

Enougha that. Bottom line, i do an improvement and this became pretty obvious today with the dialogues and 3 news articles i had to read. The articles are torture...too much concentration required. However, i was suprised to see how i would have previously said something a particular way and how i say it currently. The interesting part is when i get confused about which one is the ole way and which is the new way, hahaha. But then it's just not a matter of speech, i see a big change in terms of comprehension of the cultural indoctrination underlying every single word or phrase or sentence. I actually think comprehension is 80% when it comes to this but of course, everyone pays no attention to it. The focus is put on the mechanical and technical aspects such as producing the speech itself. I've realized if a person can understand how mood and situations can affect stress and intonation, it would make a LOT of difference. That is because once the comprehension is taken care off everything flows or, the sounds may have to be mastered for everything to flow.
I'll say for a grad student, i think julie did a pretty good job. Of course, looking at AAT approach and ravin's approach as well, i think she does have some things she might need to work on but otherwise, she was good and evidently better than these actors who become trainers. And at her level, i think she did do a good job and i'm glad. I wish we coulda accomplish more but i'll keep working on stuff myself for the time being.
Time for my lunch break or 'izit' midnite break.

baby got book... and a sad night.

http://www.godtube.com/view_video.php?viewkey=97759aa27a0c99bff671
i think i started this post last friday and i was gonna finish it up but friday was soo hectic i couldn't sit down to write. i was gonna say everyone should check that video out. But i'll move on to more important stuff.
So, a death, a fall and just running around like crazy...that's all in a night's work. I sweet patient i know died. That was something i wasn't expecting. i heard he was up to visit our floor on monday but he couldn't get a bed. He was fine the morning but it was something of some aneurysm, you know those ones, when they burst, your done. It was sad. His primary on my floor got called to go downstairs and he came back with red eyes. Guy had been crying downstairs, i guess.
Then i had a sweet patient fall. It's like i saw it coming. I'd taken the trouble to mention to my preceptor the lady looks unsteady on her feet when i know very well she doesn't listen to anything i say. She doensn't even listen when tell her vital signs and she has to ask me during report to repeat it, like my brain is some walking computer. And when i open my mind to remind her of something during report, she shuts me down soo rudely it's even a shame. Anyway, she brushed me off thursday morning and thursday night the lady fell. Oops!!

I really don't get my preceptor and sometimes i find it hard to understand what she means when she says something. It doesn't have to do with any language barrier, it has to do with previous actions such as reminding me i'm just a "nursing assistant" and need to do this or that. Sometimes when she's angry, she just goes "don't touch the pump" so i stopped touching them and it's just sad to go to a patient's room, see a pump beeping to the point of blowing up a eardrum and just coming out to say "the pump is beeping." I really don't mind doing that. When she's teaching you something and u just don't get what she said, she takes it from you and does it herself, with some air of anger and an unspoken message of "lemme do my thing myself." I just feel she sees me as some dumb idiot who has nothing in the head and honestly, i don't feel like i have to prove otherwise, i really don't care what she thinks cuz it looks like my mind is already made up. The other day she got angry cuz i didn't tell her i was doing things like drawing labs and stuff when working with a different nurse. Perhaps, the other nurse saw me as nurse extern rather than an assistant whose only job was to take patients vitals and check on them q2h. I just think people only see what you want them to see cuz i've worked with different nurses and i've done a lot more than i do with my preceptor but i really don't mind doing what i do with my preceptor because each nurse has to make us do what they're comfortable with it.
So, i'm glad my co-op days are almost over, i'm thinking of working as a nursing assistant after co-op but part of me would like an externship at one these hospitals where they train externs to do phleb and stuff. Of course each place has it's own perk but i'll think and pray about it.

There are tons of stuff going on in my life now but i'll save that for later.

Day shift

It is as different from night shift as light is from day. Different pace, different atmosphere and even the nurses are different. Trust me, you work with a nurse on night shift and have her on days, expect a whole new animal right from day One.

So i did my first day shift this past weekend and boy oh boy, that was enough for me to see the perils of why i should do everything i can to avoid it. Well, maybe i may have to give it another chance cuz i had a very sick patient and i had a pest who had nothing going on but was just being a pest.

Anyhoo, i'm glad to be back on nights. Two days on day shift and the people who work night look like strangers to me. Of course, those on dayshift kept asking me "why are you here" when they saw me after 8am. Of course, y'all know yours truly is the first to get out of the door at 7:30am. I even leave my preceptor, which for the record, i feel guilty/bad when i do that but i can't sit here till 8am everyday i work.

One thing i realized during dayshift was that it felt like it was a sin to sit down even for a minute. i mean, i did my vitals and i was lost because i had nothing to do but i just couldn't sit down cuz it looked like it was a sin. Made me miss night shift on days like this when i'm done with my vitals and sitting her blogging. I can't count how many times i check my email, all the nurses check their mail at night a million times, surf websites, watch a show on abc.com.

Of course i just got interupted to see if a patient was gone. The kid i wrote about in my last post and it's just sad to see the empty room and that gown. Do miss the poor lad and feel pretty bad bout the whole thing.

But anyway, I just think the perks that come with night shift clearly outweigh those that come with dayshift. Not sure if there any perks that come with dayshift cuz waking up at 5:45 is not a sin or even a bad thing though i enjoy sleeping in but having to shove down 2 waffles, a 2-egg omelette and a glass of milk between 6:15 and 6:23 while trying to make lunch at the same time IS A SIN!

Plus i never got home before 9pm any of those two days i worked dayshift. And when i got home, i was soo dead tired you don't even feel like making dinner. Heck, i had to buy dinner both nights. Unlike night shift, you can stay up when you get home or even if you sleep right away, you can wake up at 2pm and do something like watch tv or go to the store or whatever. You can't wake up at 4am and do that? Actually, your body wouldn't let you get up till it's time to get ready for work.

Personal life, i've been super lazy with this AAT thingamajig. Either i cancel on julie or she cancels on me. Funny thing is i do hear a difference between now and the time before i started this whole thing. I did see a liguistics class i wanted to take but i can't because the Dean has "granted the permission" to substitute patho for A&P2. I thought i wanted that but thinking bout it now, patho is critical thinking, a&P2...lol...i don't even know what the textbook is and all i did was chat on messenger via my pda in class and i still breezed through a&p3. The fact that drexel is being super anal about this is absolutely atrocious. I mean you don't tell a med student who has taken all the year 1 and 2 classes and excelled the step I and 2 to go back and take general chemistry 2 in order to get an MD. i mean chemistry is a pre-req but i guess drexel doesn't reason that way. For them, if you need the chemistry, you will need to have it before you get the MD. Talk about stuff that drives me crazy when it comes to drexe.

I'm just thinking that if i decide to ditch the patho for the language class, i'll either have to take it during last quarter or i can actually ditch the statistics and take it then. not sure what i'm gonna do but time will tell.

Life is short. We make mistakes and sometimes the same mistakes over and over again. But the truth is, we can't let those mistakes hold us back in one place in life. We need to learn and make every effort possible and impossible to make sure we stop that vicious cycle.

I got my keyheartedcross ring today, finally after almost 5 weeks. It was supposed to take no later than 2weeks. Oh well, at least it's here and i'm thankful to God for that.

Chemo...

it either kills you or cures you. That really isn't too bad except you cannot predict which of the two the end result is gonna be until the end when the harm has been done. I'm not sure if it's the type of chemo chosen by the docs that doesn't match with the patient or if it's the patient body system that reacts to the chemo or maybe it a combination factor. I don't know.
I heard on thursday that a patient, really young, closer to my age passed on and the first thing i thought to myself is that the chemo killed him. I only said that because i saw him when he came and he was fine. Part of me wondered if he'd have lived longer if he hadn't gotten the chemo and 99% of me believes he would have lived a lot longer than the lifespan of my co-op.
Today, i've had to say something about a different patient and twice, i have been told and reminded by two different nurses that "Gifty, he's dying." I think i heard it being said last week but i really didn't accept it and the first time i was told today it was just a reminder. But the second time, it reminded me of how i'd not accepted the fact that the person was dying.
This person only started chemo in may. So his was also short. I just remembered the first day he came in, he was a kid, excited, full of energy, i mean he looked perfectly healthy. Over the next few months, i've watched the chemo sucked the life out of him through all the mucositis, neutropenic fevers, weakness, infections and everything else. I smiled when i remembered how he did not know a single word of english on admission and how i had to use google to translate words to how i saw him one day with a book that would help him learn english and enable him communicate with us. It brings joy to my heart when i remember pointing to a brush in the broom and having to describe there's a hairbrush and a toothbrush or having to describe a towel or anything else.
I think it's pretty sad considering a teenager whose mom is out of the country and only has brothers here. I thought of what it would be to lose a younger brother or what it would be for the mom who looses his son. I really can't say "i know how it feels" because i don't know how it feels because i've not experienced it and even if i did, it'll never feel the same way as they experience this. My heart and prayers and go to his family.

The Aftermath

So i did speak to my good ole friend today cuz last night we decided we werent thingking straight and that we'll talk today to figure out what's gonna go on. I think i'm better off with somone not pushing me to do something i don't want to do and i told him i don't want to force him into a life of celibacy by putting my values on him which is why i decided it's best if we go our separate ways.
So, i'm not exactly sure how i feel today but i do know he's a great friend and i did want us not to really get involed i a serious relationship cuz someone's gonna get hurt in the end and the earlier the better.
So life still goes on, i don't even have my purity ring on cuz i took it to the store for a smaller size and i still haven't recieved the call back to come get it. I guess u don't need a purity ring to stay pure. But yeah, we're havin lunch on saturday, i just hope we stay friends cuz i'm trying to figure out where my life is heading now. So, point blank, i'm not sure how i feel, i'm more or less feeling like what i'm i gonna do now that i've thrown off somethig that hinders my growth in Christ.
I guess i'll figure it out. Of course, one thing i've been thinking about is the rebuttal of why do i hold one sin above others. i stil don't think i do. i mean no christian should consciously and purposely try to sin. All i can say to God is Scott's Krippayne song "Deeper still".

Freakin out the patient

Silly comment. was singing the song "great are you lord" not sure what the title is but i decided to listen to ktis and it starts to play at the same point i'm at in my head.

Anywho, i took a pt's BP and it was low. The person asked what will the next step be and i said, have you been drinking? and he says "NO. i have really drank anything today". He went on to ask what can be done to bring the BP up so i said, "they might put you on fluids to bring it up, i'm not sure." Looks like that freaked him out because right there at that moment, he asks me to pass him his bottle of 7-up he was had been sipping at since afternoon, it's 11pm and the thing is more than half full. I go do my other signs and when came down the hallway and peek into this person room, he's done drinking the 7-up, he's gotten some juice from the fridge and he has a pitcher of water with cups right in front of him.
Thing i'm wondering now is, is he just trying to drink to raise his BP up or is he afraid of being attached to an IV again? i kinda feel bad cuz i prolly shouldn't have said what i said but on the other hand, let's mind the language. What i said was "they might", i didn't say "they will"

oh, just found out the song title is "Great are you" time and again, i've heard the artiste is Downhere and it seems that hasn't registered in my head cuz whenever i hear it's downhere i'm surprised.

songmania

i loved KTIS when i lived in minnesota cuz they seem to have every christian music in their collection. Songs that have really touched me this week or the once that have gotten into my mind like crazy include

• Psalm 40 by newsong
• Promise of a lifetime by kutless
• Bless the broken road by Selah
• Every time i breathe by big daddy weave ( i love big daddy weave)

There are 2 or so songs whose titles i don't know so that sux. maybe i forgot some others but these are the once i can think of now. I like to sing psalm 40 and every time i breathe. i like the latter cuz it applies to me. that's it for now

The choice of life and death.

Yesterday was a moody day for me. I started out with a headache at 3am, being a little impatient if not a little disrespectful to my mom. I cried between 2 and 3pm and spent the rest of the day worried. Not like i'm still worried, cuz my mom is not well, among other things.
I'm not sure if that is the cause of me shopping for bibles like crazy but i've bought 2 pocket bibles between yesterday and today. i don't really need any of them, i just bought them for the design. Maybe i need one of them but now i feel like i have to return one n since i used a 30% coupon for both of them, i'm not sure if it's a really good idea. i'm thinking of giving on to someone else. I'm thinking to give to a guy but the niv is soo classy it almost looks like a woman's bible. it isn't but i'm just saying it looks like it.

Oh, so i'm gonna try reading my bible each day. it's been mountains and valleys for me. I mean my walk with Christ. Honestly, i wish it's just mountains but that isn't how life works. I start to read my bible and live according to it and there comes the devil. Anyway, i know i'm never giving up on following Christ so i guess it's gonna be a battle and i've realized i'm willing to fight it. I think after doing this uphill and downhill thing with Christianity, searching for God and falling when you've reached somepoint, there comes a time when you really know what Christianity is and what being in the world is and you get to choose.

There thing is when you've tasted and seen how walking with God is, it is almost impossible to chose to live in this world even though you see how you've fallen and gotten far from God. I say almost because it will take a great fool to choose the world. I mean a fool who sees God's goodness and the wonderful life offered by Christ and yet, chooses the world know very well that he is not only damned forever but life from now on will be wretched. For me, my choice wasn't really soo much about weighing the consequences but i realized my life is much better with Christ and if you look at what this world has to offer, you are looking at nothing good, yet, i wonder why keep living according to the world?! Beats me. I think the more you keep falling and picking yourself back up to walk with God, the more you get to see what christianity is about and you understand it better. It's not about church going. There's a HUGE difference between a church-goer and a Christian. The only thing they have in common is tat they go to church but otherwise, they are completely two different things. It's one thing the world does not know and hence, if half of the girls a non-christian sleeps with are "church-goers" who call themselves christians and he meets you and you tell'im you don't do pre-marital sex, the person will tell you, well half of the girls i've slept with are christians. That is when i point out there's a huge a difference between a person who goes to church and calls themself a christian and person who actually lives as christian.

So, enough of that. Life is a mystery itself. Listening to KTIS two days ago, i heard about the I-35 bridge in Minneapolis. I did think about those who went down with it but a silly part of me thought about how sorta nice it is that i've been over that bridge and seen the river. I think i had a picture of bridge except i don't know where it is. Anywho, my heart and prayers go to the family of those who lost their loved ones. I'm glad the toll was way less though it would have been better if there were just a few injured people instead of dead ones. I wonder if anyone thought that morning when they drove to work that they'll die with that bridge collapse. i also wonder what those who had driven over that bridge an hour or 30minutes earlier before the collapse say about how they'd missed that tragic incident. The last time that bridge was inpected was 3 years ago. Maybe, this is will teach us to inpect bridges at least every year if not every 6months. you never know what can happen!