Christmas 2006 in Pictures

Stanger in a Strange Land

I must have been a very good boy this year. Why, you ask? Here's what Santa gave me for Christmas:



Having used PC's for the last 15 years, I have found the transition to a Mac a bit disconcerting. I feel like a man lost in a foreign country in which I don't know the language. Actually, it's more like I picked up and moved to the foreign country without knowing the language and not being prepared for the many cultural differences. (Ok, I guess I've beat that metaphor to death...)

The differences are pretty remarkable. First, I can say that as far as style goes the Mac beats the PC hands down. Macs are just nicer to look at and the operating system is ever so stylish. The initial boot up on the Mac also trumps that of the PC. While I sit for what seems like 15 minutes waiting for my PC to load, my Mac starts right up without any trouble.

My current problem is getting used to the new software I have to use. I have grown quite comfortable with the many offerings of Microsoft and getting used to new programs is a bit like saying goodbye to that friend who kind of always gets on your nerves but whom you always thought would be around. (I know, I know...enough with the fucking metaphors!) I haven't quite figured out how to get my gmail account working with iMail, I can't seem to import my Outlook contacts, and I haven't even attempted to deal with my calendar. As of this point, my new luxury laptop as been nothing more than a very expensive DVD player. Although I must say that I could get used to the idea of watching movies anywhere I go.

I know that I will one day grow to love my new Mac. I will eventually figure out everything it has to offer me and I will become one of those fanatical Mac users who spits at the mention of Bill Gates. For now I will continue to struggle with my new friend and hope that our relationship grows quickly like so many great romances in history. And I promise that was my last metaphor.

Dead Nurse's Favorite Music: 2006

As pundits from across the web chime in with their choices for the “Best of 2006”, I figured I would join in the fun. Here’s a list of my most listened to tracks on I-tunes. Most of the songs are not from this year, but it certainly does tell you a little about my musical tastes.

1. “Hung Up”, Madonna – This is still in heavy rotation on my I-tunes and in my car. It’s great to dance to and I haven’t found a better house cleaning song. I am convinced that the gays will be dancing to this song for the next 20 years.

2. “Hollywood”, Madonna – What can I say, I just love this woman.

3. “The Grass is Blue”, Dolly Parton – This song got me through a very painful few months early in the year. I just love me some Dolly.

4. “Baby, Now That I’ve Found You”, Alison Kraus – This gal has such a lovely voice that I find myself returning to this tune over and over again.

5. “Dagger Through The Heart”, Dolly Parton – Often played after the previous two songs.

6. “Crash”, Gwen Stefani – Gwen minus any “Sound of Music” samples.

7. “Toxic”, Britney Spears – Please don’t hate me for liking a Britney song.

8. “Sleeps With Butterflies”, Tori Amos – I’ve grown a little weary of Tori Amos’s whiney, breathy singing style and the almost religious fanaticism of her fan base, however this song is really quite lovely.

9. “Bigger Than My Body”, John Mayer – I’m not a big fan of John Mayer, but I really enjoy this tune. I love listening to it while walking the busy streets of Portland. It just makes me feel good.

10. “Since U Been Gone”, Kelly Clarkson – Kelly Clarkson is MY American Idol

Hot Guy Tuesday: A Retrospective

I know it's probably a little strange to do a retrospective on something I've only been doing since September. My problem is that I'm afraid I've run out of hot guys. At least guys that I think are hot. So here's a look back at all the men I've honored on Hot Guy Tuesday. If I should discover a new hot guy then he will be added to the ranks. If not, then we'll always have the memories.

Chris Evans (The original hot guy!)
Kevin Zegers
Ryan Carnes
Ewan McGregor
Jeremy Bloom
Christian Bale
Duck-billed Platypus (I was uninspired that week.)
David Beckham
Tom Welling
Ian Somerhalder
Daniel Craig
Jake Gyllenhaal

To finish up today, I give you another shirtless pic of Chris Evans. My appreciation for this man has no limits...

Nice girls don't wear cha-cha heels

In honor of today, I have decided to post the following clip from the American classic Female Trouble. The site of Divine knocking over a Christmas tree because she didn't get her black cha-cha heels is enough to warm any scrooge's heart.

Merry Christmas!

Celebrity Watch: Portland

What Hollywood director was spotted having lunch at the Break & Ink Café this afternoon? Why it was no other than Good Will Hunting director Gus Van Sant! My lunch companions and I did our best not to stare when Mr. Van Sant walked in, but I don’t think we did a very good job. After doing a little research, it would seem that he is filming his latest movie Paranoid Park right here in Portland.

Well it’s not Janice Dickinson, but it’s still pretty exciting.

Ruminations on Entering My Third Decade

Well, it happened. I turned 30.

It feels weird to no longer be a “20-something”. I was so comfortable being in my 20’s. It was something I looked forward to as a teenager. I wanted to be older. I wanted to be in my 20’s (specifically, 21) so that I could enjoy all that life had to offer (read: alcohol).
Now here I am, a man of 30. No longer the happy go-lucky guy in his 20’s. I am a bill paying, job going, soon to be mortgage having man.

I remember when I was a child and I would think about the year 2000. Of course, I expected that life would be more similar to the Jetsons than it is currently (I’m still waiting for my flying car). It seemed so far away. It was so incomprehensible that one day it would be the year 2000 and I would be 24. I never even fathomed what would happen 6 years after that when I turned 30.

A friend of mine told me a couple of years ago right after her 30th birthday, that she felt so confident and secure to be in her 30’s. She had a job, a husband, a life she adored. She said this while we munched on the birthday cake that she had smeared the “30” off of. She didn’t seem so confident or secure to me. Incidentally, she divorced her husband a year later.

I had somewhat of a “quarter-life crisis” when I turned 25. I was in a job that was rapidly draining all life out of me and living in a town that no longer had any secrets to share. I felt lost and uncertain what to do. So I quit my job, went back to school and became a nurse. It was the best thing I’ve ever done for myself and I never regret my decision. When looking back at my 20’s, I suppose that was sort of the pivotal moment of that decade. If I hadn’t made that one simple choice, I would still be in that boring little town working at that soul sucking job.

I wonder what amazing, life altering decisions I’ll make in my 30’s. If I had to guess, I think that this decade will mark the time that I become a parent. Yes, you heard it here first! A and I are considering having a child. We haven’t made a final decision yet, but if we do decide to go ahead with it than I think it will be the most amazing experience. People talk about marriage as though it is some beautiful, life affirming event. Bull shit. I’ve known far too many people who have gotten divorced to believe that marriage is anything other than a contract between two people. Unlike marriage, having a child is for life and not something you can just back out of. Once you do it, you’re in for the long haul.

As I look at myself, I realize that I’ve changed a lot over that last 10 years. I’ve become more secure in who I am as a person and my hairline has retreated slightly. I also seem to have acquired several traits that I used to associate with “old” people. I drink coffee with every meal and I complain when someone plays their music at a decibel I deem too high.

I can only imagine how much I’m going to change over the next 10 years. Hopefully, my hairline stays fairly steadfast and it doesn’t go gray too quickly. I guess I’ll just have another cup of coffee, turn down my music, and ponder it over for a little while.

Hot Guy Tuesday: Jake Gyllenhaal

In honor of his 26th birthday, I've decided to make Jake Gyllenhaal this week's hot guy. Happy Birthday, Jake! Keep those shirtless pictures and gay cowboy movies coming!

This Day in History

1791: The Bill of Rights becomes law

1864: Battle of Nashville, Tennessee

1914: New York Stock Exchange opens for trading

1939: Gone With the Wind premieres in Atlanta.

1961: Nazi SS Officer Adolf Eichmann sentenced to death

1966: Walt Disney dies

1976: Dead Nurse is born in Schenectady, New York

2006: Dead Nurse turns 30. Mourns the passing of his youth by stuffing several hundreds of dollars down the pants of male strippers at a local watering hole.

(Source: The History Channel)

On Working the Night Shift

It’s just after 6am and I haven’t been to bed. I have to work tonight, so I’ve done my usual routine of staying up the previous night. It helps me get back into my nocturnal life. I stay up and watch movies, read, respond to emails, surf the net…Anything to keep myself occupied.

I’ve worked night shift for the last year and half and I just don’t know how much longer I can do it. I love the people I work with. You have to have a certain personality to work nights. Night shift people are funny, cranky, they tend to curse a lot, and they drink their coffee strong and black. These are the type of people I get along with so well. I am one of those people. When a new hire comes in, I can immediately tell if they’re going to last on nights. If they’re too perky, or too conservative, or too stupid, they’re not going to last. It’s usually only a couple of months before they’re meeting with the manager to discuss a transfer to day shift.

I love the camaraderie on nights. It’s a small staff throughout the entire hospital and you learn everyone’s name. When you have a question about something you’ve never seen before, you know who to call on another floor to get the answer. You don’t have swarms of doctors at night like you do during the day. No fighting for your patients’ charts. No hunting for a free space to do your charting. The hospital is a ghost town and that’s the way I like it.

My biggest complaint with working the night shift has always been the negative impact it has on the rest of my life. When all of my friends are going out to dinner or planning a night of drinks and dancing, I’m putting on my scrubs and going to work. It’s always hard to get people who don’t work nights to understand how truly difficult it is. They never seem to understand how hard it can be to get a good 8 hours of sleep. They always seem to call during the day when I’m trying to rest. Even my mother doesn’t understand. She called on Thanksgiving while I was sleeping and wanted to pass the phone around to all of my family members in attendance at their holiday feast. I try to explain that it’s the equivalent of my calling someone at 3am and asking them to meet me for a cup of coffee. It just doesn’t seem to make a difference.

I suppose I’ll continue doing this for awhile longer. Eventually I will probably be that person meeting with my manager asking for a transfer to day shift. In the mean time I’ve gotten used to walking around in a perpetual state of sleep deprivation. I was told when I first started on nights, that night shift workers have a higher incidence of colon cancer. I guess I’ll just keep eating my fiber, pray for the best, and try to get some sleep in the process.

Santa in a speedo

I haven't had much to write about lately. Or perhaps the real problem is I just don't know what to write about. So until my writers block is cured, here's a picture of three guys in speedos and santa hats.


Ho, ho, ho...

Hot Guy Tuesday: Daniel Craig

Like every other gay man in the world who saw Casino Royale, I have fallen in love with Daniel Craig. He makes a fantastic James Bond and looks great in a tuxedo (not to mention those little blue trunks).

The Angel and the Nut

She was a woman in her 40’s who had been admitted for vague abdominal pain. A number of tests had been completed and no cause of the pain had been found. When I had been assigned to care for her she was no longer complaining of pain in her abdomen. The pain had moved to her neck. Little did I know that she would be giving me a similar pain over the next three nights.

She is what we refer to as a “brittle diabetic”. This basically means that her blood sugars are extremely labile and difficult to manage. On top of this, she was crazy. She was forgetful, paranoid and irrational. The first two nights I cared for her were busy but uneventful. She called frequently for snacks and with questions about when her next dose of pain medicine was due, but we got along just fine. She called me her “angel” and told me that I was the “kindest, most compassionate nurse”.

The third night didn’t go as smoothly. The previous day she had been refusing all of her medications and meals. She had vomited on herself and refused assistance cleaning up, so she was lying in bed covered in dry vomit. When I went in to see her, I offered to get her some clean pajamas and a bedtime snack. To my surprise, she agreed and allowed me to help her get cleaned up.

Slowly the rest of the night began to deteriorate. She questioned me repeatedly about her medications. She became more dependent on me to do things that she could previously do for herself. She couldn’t walk without holding my arm. She wasn’t able to open her sugar free jello. She couldn’t undo her pajama bottoms in order to use the toilet. I encouraged her to be independent, but that didn’t work. She quickly became angry with me.

“I don’t feel good!” she yelled.

“You were able to walk without any help yesterday. You need to be independent,” I rationalized with her.

“You don’t fucking care about me!”

I could feel myself getting irritated and I was afraid that she could also sense my annoyance. I grabbed another nurse and asked her to cover for me so that I could leave the room. I needed to get away from this woman. She was getting to me and I felt like a horrible nurse for allowing it to happen. Why was I permitting this woman to upset me? Why was I letting her take control?

After I had cooled off, I approached her. She was crying, which wasn’t really unusual. She cried easily and I wondered if it was an attention seeking behavior.

“I’m sorry for taking up so much of your time,” she said.

“It’s alright. I’m here to help you but I need you to do things for yourself,” I told her.

She looked at me with tears in her eyes, her upper lip quivering. I couldn’t help but think she looked like a six-year old I once cared for during my pediatric rotation in nursing school. Emotionally, I think the six year old was probably more mature.

“You’re my angel,” she whimpered.

High praise from a nut like her. High praise, indeed.