Countdown

Have been (blessedly) off call for some three days now, and have been a perpetual motion machine ever since. Have finally accumulated some 20kg (~40lbs) of supplies to take with me thanks in large part to the gracious donations of assorted Seattle midwifery practices, friends and preceptors. Vila Hospital has the following coming their way, assuming I don't slip a disc in the process...

• 200 disposable chux pads (we get to use 1/2 a chux for each birth - I'm used to using between 10 and 20 per birth so I expect I will get to love those rationed items dearly...)
• 12 boxes (1800) non sterile nitrile gloves. Always in short supply I'm told.
• 200 pairs of sterile gloves
• About a gallon of alcohol based hand sanitizer.
• A big pile of hand towels (all now permanently marked with "Property of VGH" on the advice of former pacific midwife-adventurer Emily. I guess they have a tendency to "walk" otherwise)
• About a dozen bars of antibacterial soap (more to be purchased in NZ)
• Several large bottles of lidocaine - students have found at various times that there wasn't enough lido for all the repairs that are reported to go on. I tend to think that you can never have too much, so I've brought a bunch with me.
• A bag of tubes of Erythromycin eye ointment - I've since been informed that they don't use it, but perhaps it'll come in handy anyway to some baby somewhere!
• A handful of (slightly out of date) amnihooks thanks to a lovely nurse at a hospital which shall remain nameless.
• A handful of digital thermometers (which read in celcius - note to self, must brush up on conversions...)
• Oh yeah and a small fortune in suture material, mostly 3.0 and 4.0 synthetic. I'm reliably informed that every lac, no matter how small is routinely sutured with 0.0 (aka what I imagine looks and feels like heavy gauge fishing line). Besides the fact that I'm not sure I could adequately knot that sort of suture, I hope that the 3.0 and 4.0 will make more women a bit more comfortable.

For myself Husband (sweet man) has gifted me an electronic book which will allow me to take 800 books with me without actually carrying them all around. Sometimes this technology is a wonderful thing. :) I also have packed 5 knitting projects (two UFO's -un-finished objects - and three lovely new projects for baby all in yarns which honestly, are too luscious for babies altogether. There will be an "Absolutley no puking allowed" clause cited before each garment is ever worn. How effective this plan actually ends up being, remains to be seen. In any event I plan on much knitting, much reading and oh yeah, much blogging.

I'm frantically preparing for my final practical exam - the dreaded ACE (Advanced Clinical Examination) as well as completing the rough draft of my Senior Paper which, inexplicably is due NOW. Husband and boys leave for NZ tomorrow morning, as I head to school for a couple of days.

I'll be on a 10.30 ish flight to LAX/FIJI/AUK on Wednesday next.

Thanks all for your support and encouragement. Stay tuned!