mja blog

Author: Melissa

  • Thanksgiving fasting

    There was an incident at work the other day during the new intake volunteer course. One of the volunteers displayed symptoms of hypoglycemia (low blood sugar). The volunteer course can get a little boring in parts and by mid afternoon you can easily feel yourself fading. It emerged this lady was a diabetic, and she’d been fasting. It was a potentially dangerous situation.

    A case of religious observance. The lady, Poojah was newly arrived from India, and felt so happy to be starting her new life in Australia that she decided to give thanks the Hindu way, through fasting.

    As luck had it, another of the volunteers was a diabetic specialist and Poojah had mentioned her diabetes condition during a break earlier in the day. It was this volunteer who noticed Poojah becoming hypoglycemic.

    Also fortunate that Poojah happened to be in a facility where there are nurses, and it was a nurse leading the particular segment at the time. Ironically Sharon had been covering workplace health and safety, and found herself having to fill out an incident report for real.

    All’s well that ends well, Poojah was properly taken care of and returned home with her brother. The course finished a little early for the day but they are all returning for day two.

  • Flowers for Nan

    I can’t help but admire the women I work with, each one a “super woman” with her own brand of intelligence and compassion.

    Ros and Jane have been of particular support to me in the past 10 days following Nan’s sudden passing. Ros gave me a very lovely thoughtful card and organised a bouquet of flowers from everyone at work. Jane has been wonderful to talk to, encouraging my thoughts and feelings and helping me make sense of the loss.

    It has been a week tinged with sadness, I have spent a lot of time reflecting on the “enigma” that was Nan. Her funeral service was enlightening, if only because of the insight to how the rest of the family felt about her, and in meeting her oldest friend Aunty Joan, a simply wonderful lady who I would have liked to have spent more time with.

    There has been sadness about Nan’s decline in the later years of her life but as the days pass there is prevailing remembrance of all the wonderful things she meant to us. Holding onto all the little things we gave her over the years like treasures; the huge hugs and face full of kisses in greeting; the wonderful laugh she had. It is hard to believe she is gone.

  • New treasurer

    Looks like management have lined up a new treasurer, and he sounds alright not least because he has commitments until the end of 2009 and will probably leave me to my own devices until next year!

  • Chocolate at bedtime

    One of my favourite comfort foods produces less than comforting results when I consume it just before bedtime! I was curled up in bed reading a book last night, with my cup of tea and some dark rum’n’raisin chocolate. I woke up this morning shortly after 4am with indigestion. Surely not the chocolate, could have been the raisins?

  • Audit time

    It seems impossible to track down our auditor at this time of year, he must get fed up with so many organisations trying to get hold of him at the same time and doesn’t seem to return any phone calls or emails. Apparently my predecessor had this same problem last year. I’ve tried a different approach and have made an appointment via his receptionist to see Tom tomorrow.

    I was planning to take next week off as a holiday, we’ll see. There is still a lot of work on getting last year’s account straightened out, and with AGM brought forward to mid-Sept I’m aiming to have audit completed by the end of August.

    I have another week holiday booked for the week after AGM. At least will be able to relax then.

  • Puppy rescue

    Got to the pound shelter yesterday, first one there and noticed a box at the doorstep. Then a small head popped up, followed by another one. Some x!y%z# had dumped a couple of puppies onto us.

    A lot of dogs are being abandoned at the pound lately, and we’ve had call after call of people wanting us to help rehome their dog, their circumstances no longer allow them to keep an animal. So we had no room for these two, and no carers available either.

    Since I was the one who found them, I felt some extra responsibility towards the two little girls, who at first glance seemed to be 2 or 3 mths old, and some cross between chihuahua and mini foxy. I knew hubby was at home today so I phoned him and he quickly agreed to babysit them that day.

    I had to find foster carers for them though, being so young they couldn’t be left on their own. Since hubby and I both work our place was out of the question. Fortunately for these two my parents agreed to look after them until homes could be found. Since they’re so young and cute, this shouldn’t be too long!

    pups-8-Jul09-2

    First thing hubby did when I brought them home was bath the two of them, they were covered in fleas. They’d gobbled a full can of puppy food at the shelter, when he later gave them some porridge they gobbled that down as well and came back for more!

    When I got home from work hubby had thought of names for the two of them. The puppy on the left (tan coloured) is Reno (he’d at first thought of Rhino because she runs like one); puppy on the right (black and white) is Shonce (as in the french phrase for good luck “bon chance”).

    Took the puppies over to my parents place where Mum had a little corral and crate set up on the front veranda for them. I think there was a little bit of puppy love when I handed them over. They are very cute little creatures and had a big day, all they wanted to do was sleep.

    Taking them to the vet on Saturday for vaccination and worming. They also need to be microchipped at some stage, but might be too young for that yet. Will need to check.