I must have been more out of my mind than I gave myself credit for this morning.
I went to bed at 4 AM, fell asleep by six, and woke up in a daze around 8 AM. I had 4 bites of strawberry yogurt with granola, a cup of water, and cup of coffee. That was before I felt nauseous, probably from waking up too abruptly. Considering the circumstances, though, I was feeling fine. I kept my small bit of breakfast down, gathered my paperwork, and headed out the door on time.
9:30 -- 10:30, COMMUTE
Crosstown blues (upper west side to the upper [far, far] east side) - missed the crosstown bus by a matter of a few meters and had to wait 10 minutes in the increasingly frigid NYC air for the next one.
11:00 -- 12:00, OUCH!
OSHA pre-placement clearance appointment for my clinical rotation at the NY-Presbyterian (Cornell Weill site), including color-blind test, Hepatitis B shot 1 of 3, flu vaccine, and 2 vials of my blood to test for Hep A-B-C, measles, mumps, rubella, varicella (chicken pox), and maybe some others I don't even know about. The minimal water, the coffee, and my habitual low blood pressure made finding a vein a painful experience. My arms have been aching all day. Oh yeah, nearly forgot, I also had to provide a urine sample in a cup with a heat-sensitive sticker on it to make sure the pee came from meeeee, which was then tranferred to a smaller tube to be tested for alcohol, poppy seed muffins, and other narcotics.
12:00 -- 12:45, COMMUTE
12:50 -- 1:00, GRAPEVINE
Back on campus (teachers college, columbia university) to have a quickie meeting with our faculty editor to get her comments on our latest issue (final steps before publication, woohoo!)
1:00 -- 5:00, HARLEM RBI
In another office on campus I met with the new teacher who will be taking over for me at the Harlem RBI REAL Kids after-school program. We went over the lessons, then headed back to the east side so she could have her first day and I could help with the transition.
5:00 -- 6:00, OOPS!
Another crosstown bus later, I realize I don't have my mp3 player. But I've had things coming in and out of my bag and pockets all day. Could it have fallen out on any of a number of public transit modes from the day? Panicked, I call home. It was there! phew. This comforts me most of the way home. Until I look for my house keys. Now, those I specifically looked at in the morning, but I thought the same thing about the lil' music maker. No dice. They were no where in my bag or on my body and it was cold outside.
I got really lucky. I had forgotten a set of keys in California and my sister brought them back. She passed them off to her friend whose daughter is my little dance student. She lives 4 blocks away. Saved!
7:00, FINALLY
Home, sweet, home. I played a few scrabble games to decompress, and should be ready to work soon. Classes start tomorrow, and I have about eight million things to do.
PS. The bahamas were nice. Back to work now.
