It’s Official

Was psyched to get this in the mail today:

National Registry EMT Certification

Also, check out my new hair color & cut! A little windswept as I just walked in from eating lunch outside on this glorious but EXTREMELY WINDY day with Linus at boulange de cole (our favorite neighborhood place to sit outside and chow):

new hair color & cut

I wanted to go with something a little more professional looking than the “bleach bottle blond” which I’ve had of late, so I asked him to tone it down a bit to more of a dirty blond/brunette. Hopefully this will look a little nicer when my roots come in as well, to eliminate the skunk stripe I’ve been sporting!

So I can’t start working just yet, I’m still up to my ears in certifications and paperwork, but hopefully I will get everything else done in the next two weeks. I still have to do:

• livescan federal background check/fingerprinting, TWICE- once for ambulance drivers license and once for state of CA EMS (and, unsurprisingly, I’ve learned they make you pay the $70 fee twice to do this, even though it’s basically them filling out the same exact form twice).
• get a California driver’s license
• take and pass the Ambulance Driver License Test
• sit for the county of San Francisco EMS board (not a test, but a meeting)
• get certified in the state of CA for their EMS (paperwork)
• process my DM-51 form which is a medical check and make sure my Dr. filled it out correctly (it’s an 8 page, very confusing government form and he wasn’t sure if he did everything correctly).
• DMV driver history printout (which, btw, is flawless…are you suprised?)
• double check all my vaccinations and make sure I am up to date on everything I need (different ambulance companies require different vaccines, so there could be a slight margin for error here, trying to be very thorough).
• on that note, get part 2 of my Hep-B vaccine
• get my letter of recommendation from my EMT school instructor (I am shamelessly bribing him with these maple glazed bacon-chocolate chip cookies for this )

I think that’s everything, although who knows I might be missing something.  All of this stuff requires a very thorough double-check.  For example today when I was making my livescan appointment next week, they couldn’t make my appointment until I had the ORI Request which I needed to get from the DMV.  Complete pain!  So I spent almost four hours on the phone with various people trying to get everything rushed through.  I think I’m set for next week.  The aggravating thing is all of these things are sequential (ie- you can’t do the ambulance test until you have the livescan form, etc) and oftentimes each of the steps has a 3 business day or more lag time, so it’s all FAR from instantaneous.  Also, almost every single step has a $70-$100 fee, so it’s quite a bit to shell out!

Phew.

Other than that, what else have I got going on?  Oh some exciting news!  I’m starting Crossfit next week!  I’m taking an introduction class on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays.  I realized that I needed to gain a bunch of functional strength so I can pass the CPAT, which is the California Physical Fitness Test for firefighters.  From everything I’ve heard, Crossfit is *the* program for functional strength.  So basically I’ll be crossfitting to suppliment my standard running schedule as strength training days.  I’m looking foward, although a bit aprehensive as I’ve heard it’s BRUTAL.  You should have heard me on the phone with the very patient and helpful program director as I was signing up for the class with SF Crossfit.  “Are you SURE someone out of shape can do it?”  ….. “yeah, but… are you SURE???????”  lol.  Next Tuesday should be amusing, at the very least.