Gggrrrrrrr 2

OK, I am now 38 hours into the smoke free section, with mixed emotions.
Physically, I feel great (except for the congestion from the cold I mentioned last post.)
I can breath, my lungs don't hurt, and I don't smell like a chimney.
Yet mentally, I feel like someone is dragging my teeth down a chalkboard. I have that sensation, plus that annoying, irritating feeling like there are 4 people running close circles around me poking me with their fingers and laughing (you know how little kids like to do that to torment you? yeah, thats the vibe i've got right now.).
Weird descriptions, aren't they?
I know there are probably some ex-smokers out there laughing at me, calling me a wuss, but I don't care.
Everyone quits differently. For some people, they just put the smokes down, walk away, and never have another craving. Then some people lose their minds, go postal, and start killing people (ok, maybe not literally). All I have to say is this: 1. I am glad i work for peaceful little QVA, and not some huge high-stress place. 2. If i keep up at this rate, i'll be doing pretty good by mid-week.
The real test will come tomorrow night at class. That's gonna be a tough part to kick.
I have always been a firm believer that addiction to smoking as 5% physical, 95% mental. The hardest part of quitting smoking is breaking the routine of it.
Class goes on break, go outside and smoke. Hang out before and after class and smoke.
The real fun part will be Feb 10th, which is my next shift at VO. All we do there when we aren't running calls is watch TV, or hang out in the garage, smoke, and chat.
Then again, maybe it won't be that bad, because by then I should be over this. The hard part is going to be avoiding that "occasional" smoke. You know, you've been quit for a week or so, then you bum one off of someone to "ease the craving", but instead it just makes it worse.
But yeah, to make a long story short; so far, so good.
I just saw an interesting ad in the paper. Check this out.

Caretaker/Handyman needed for security and general upkeep of 125 acre wooded private recreation property with 18 acre lake, ideal for hunter, fisherman, or trapper. Modern cabin, garages, and workshop provided. Should be employed and have good credentials. Call blah blah blah for more info.

So i called on it today and got some interesting info.
For starters, it's in my fire district. once they told me where it was, i realized that it's the place that anm acquaintance of mine was caretaking for a while back. i will not be mentioning his name when i talk to the homeowners, because the reason he quit was a falling out with the owners that was mostly his fault, from the sounds of it.
Anyway.
It's a live-in position. They have a small cabin, they told me about the things that come with it, It's wood heated and the caretaker has to collect his own wood from the property.
They provide you with a 4-wheeler and some other stuff for recreation and work...
All they ask is that the caretaker keeps an eye on the place, keeps other people out, and keeps the property looking good (aka keeping the trails clear, lawn mowed, roof shoveled, driveway plowed, etc etc etc.)
Now here is the interesting part.
There's no pay. I'm assuming they have the attitude that the place is so nice, and staying there is such a privelage, that they'll let you stay there if you keep the place lookin good.
Being as how i'm familiar with the place, i know this is true. This is like my dream house. The actual house is huge, there's bass, catfish, etc. in the lake, there's freakin deer EVERYWHERE, and it's a heluva lot close to the firehouse.
So anyway, they expect 30 hours of labor a week in exchange for living there. I can deal with that.
They're going to be making phone calls in the middle of next month to do interviews in person.
The lady i spoke to is the owners next door neighbor, and she is also their P.O.A. I guess this place is their vacation home, because they live out of state, and they'll be back in Feb. so their doing the interviews then.
I think i impressed the lady, because she asked what i do for work and stuff, and i told her that i live in QV and i'm a bus driver and i also work for several area ambulances as an EMT, and i'm a paramedic student. That's when i heard her ears perk up. She said "Oh wow, that's very good. see, this couple is in their 70's, so they would really appreciate having an EMT around when they are home."
So we will see how this turns out. it'd be nice, having that place all to myself. She said that the owners can get kind of annoying though. In her words, "The old guy will call you over to 'give him a quick hand' or something and the next thing you know you'll be painting the deck and have 2 days of work ahead of you"

If i do get this position, I'll be getting myself a dog once i move in (as long as they don't toss in the no
pets card, which would really piss me off.)

Well as long as i'm on a roll, i think i'll start with my call history that i've been putting off.


My mom and I joined an extremely rural fire dept. back when i was 16. She was an EMT and always hearing this FD calling for mutual aid for medical personnel, and it was only about 8 miles from our house at the time, so we joined up.
My first actual call came in on a sunny Saturday morning. I had just about finished a shower when the tones dropped for an MVA, unknown injuries. I still pick on my mom about how fast I was ready. All she had to do was go upstairs, get out of her nightgown and into her clothes and come back downstairs.
I got myself rinsed, dried, dressed, downstairs, and out the door before she even came downstairs.
Anyway, we got moving and after a few seconds of deliberation, decided to head for the scene. The scene was about 4 miles away, versus the 8 miles to the station then 4 miles back to the scene.

We pulled up on the scene and our chief was already there. We got out of the car, mom grabbed her kit, and we started walking up. From the angle we were at, we could see a pick-up and a Caddy, both off the side of the road. As soon as the chief saw us, he jumped out of his truck and started doing the Steal Second sign. We got up there and he said to my mom, "Check on him, I think he's fatal."
I'm thinking "Oh, WTF. My first call is gonna be a fatal?" Sure enough, we walked around the corner of the chiefs truck and there was a body between the 2 vehicles (Which were about 10' apart) and it was covered in a blanket with one leg sticking out. That's when I realized that body blankets look a lot different when they are real. Talk about goosebumps.

We went over to him, saw the occupant of the other car (he was sitting there staring straight ahead, with his car door open and obviously not trapped) Mom asked if he was ok and he said "Yes, check on the other guy, don't worry about me".
We uncovered the guy on the ground, log rolled him onto his back, and saw that he had the works. J.V.D., (jugular vein distension for the non-medical readers out there... basically looks like 2 garden hoses under the skin in your neck) Blue Hood (this really shitty looking bluish-greyish-purplish color that runs from your collarbones up), bulging eyes staring straight ahead, and a very swollen tongue.
Mom was doing a quick check on him when she thought she heard him gasp or grunt or something, so we started working him.
This was turning into a pretty crazy first call for a 16 year old kid with basic first aid and CPR.
Mom took his airway, I took compressions and also a nice case of tunnel vision.
After a few minutes, I heard sirens coming from both directions (one direction was our FD, the other direction was the next FD north who our FD called for mutual aid alot.)
I swear that those sirens sounded like angels singing. Once the trucks all pulled up, things got weird.
I still had the tunnel vision, yet at the same time, I had this viewpoint that seemed as if i was leaning up against the big maple tree about 15' away, watching everything. As I was doing CPR, my field of vision pretty much ran from the guys neck to his belt. Yet at the same time, I saw 3 guys from our neighbors up north come running by with a backboard and EMS bags and start working on the guy behind us in the Caddy. It was strange.
Then 2 EMT's from our M.A. dept. came up with an AED and bags and I got out of the way.
After that, the whole thing was kind of blurry. I remember just kinda wandering aimlessly around, seeing what everyone was going and whatever. Mom wound up riding the ambulance to the hospital while they worked the guy. As i was walking around, one of the medics from one of the ambulances there came up to me, put an arm around my shoulders and asked "How's Adam doing?" I told him I was alright, and he said that if mom or I needed to talk, he'd be at the other ambulance he worked at (where mom and I also volunteered) that night, so come on up.

Once we were done at the scene, I drove our car back to the station. I hung out there for a while while i waited for mom to get back. After a while, I decided I needed the restroom. In the process of taking care of business, i looked down and saw blood on my knee. I started looking at it, trying to see where i was bleeding from, when i looked at my pants and saw that the right knee of my pants was soaked in blood, about half of the circumfrence and about 6" above and below my knee.
Turns out that gun racks and MVA's don't mix well. This guy had a gun rack in his trucks back window and when he collided with the other vehicle, his head snapped back and got impaled deeply on the gun rack right thru his upper occipital region. If he did have a heart attack right nefore the wreck, that would explain why that wound didn't bleed. Mom did a pretty thourogh inspection of the guy and she said she felt something on the back of his head, but he was not bleeding before we started CPR.
By the time i swapped off with the EMTs, we'd perfused him enough to get blood from his head to my knee.

What we were told eventually was that the now-dead guy (who was driving the pick-up) was pulling out of his driveway when he apparently had a heart attack (which would explain the lack of bleeding from the head injury) He crossed lanes and popped the Caddy just about head on, then they went into the ditch on the opposite side of the road from his house. He then proceeded to get out of his truck, walk around the back of it, and then collapse between his truck and the other car. Throw in the trans-occipital implantation of the gun rack and you have one shitty Saturday morning.


This call was a little extra stressful due to it's location. The dead guy and his wife lived on one side of the road, and their son and his family lived right across the street from them. So there was a wife on one side of the road and a son and his family on the other side, all watching in horror. Looking back , we would have done CPR anyway. I'm a firm believer that a chunk of the CPR we do is more for the families closure than it is to try to revive the pt. Anyone agree with me?

So that was my introduction into fire/resuce. I'm normally a white cloud, but every now and then i catch some serious 'oh shit' calls. I'll cover more later.