6 mile hilly San Francisco run.  Watched this for motivation:

UltraRunning from Matt Hart on Vimeo.

Thanks Steve for the video link!

Guess what I get to spend my weekend doing?  FEMA Incident Command System Training. Oh boy!

One of the EMT jobs I’m applying for requires the following three coursework certifications:

ICS 100: Introduction to Incident Command System

ICS 200:  ICS for Single Resources and Initial Action Incidents

ICS 700: National Incident Management System (NIMS), an Introduction

Each of these classes is three hours long; At least I can do them online.

Other than that, I’m getting together with one of my friends from EMT school (she’ll be in town tomorrow to turn in her SF Fire application – I already turned in my application for that during the last round during December, we’ll both be taking the same test, apparently sometime in August) for coffee and we are going to compare job-hunting notes.  Just hearing what she’s done since graduation, I felt instantly behind.  She has already done her CPAT practice and is currently enrolled in a Medical Terminology and an A&P course.  However, I have her beat when it comes to getting the county EMS cert and ambulance drivers license, medical examiner card.  So I guess everyone just plugs along and gets as many certifications as they can, constantly.  I think it’s just the nature of this type of career that the certification process and further coursework is just relentless.  So, I’ve accepted that… and am learning to embrace it.  I mean, those FEMA courses sound like they could be interesting, right?  Right?!??  Haha.  I sure hope they will be.

Do you know what this is?

Pee Paws Cat

This is a disgruntled cat who had her “rear” washed because she pees all over her feet.  And then she tracks her stinky pee-paws all over the apartment.

One of the many benefits of an aging, half-blind cat!

- ps, I actually had a dream today that Lucy called 911 and tried to report us for animal abuse because that is how much she hates getting her feet and rear washed after she pees all over herself every night.

Just went to get tickets to next Tuesday’s Michael Pollan lecture at the World Affair Council, and it’s sold out.

Registration is now closed.  If you would like to be placed on the waiting list, please arrive at Marines’ Memorial Theatre at 5:15 PM on the day of the event.

As my father would say, “you fink!”

Argh, argh, argh.

I emailed his agent to find out the next time Mr. Pollan will be speaking in San Francisco.  He lives in Berekeley, so I’m sure (hopefully) it won’t be too long.  But man, I was looking forward to this.

They nap, I read.  What he doesn’t know is that I am about to steal Woofer to take him for a run.

everybody nap

I can’t believe it, but at EARL’S suggestion (!!!) we might become a foster home for corgis in need (ie- between when they are at a pound and before they find a rescue home).

We just emailed to find out if this cute little guy needs a temporary loving place to stay until he finds his forever home:

Adopt Bunta!

Here’s Bunta’s craigslist ad, he sounds like a real sweetheart in a pretty sad situation:

hi all,

Bunta, our Corgi is neutered and house broken. He knows basic commands such as sit, down, come and loves to play with kids and other dogs. He’s a Corgi so he’s known for as herding dog. He sniffs just about anything and anywhere. He is very hyper but will come down ones all tired up from a long walk and play. He’ll bark and chase most cats since he’s never really been around cats. He’ll even chase birds when he has a chance to. Bunta is an indoor dog. But lately, since we have a newborn baby, he’s been in the garage most of the time and out side our yard. He needs a big yard to play and a lot of walks. He’s had all the shots required. Bunta is been with us for over 3 yrs. since weeks old from the breeder. He’s AKC certified if that matters. Bunta is very loyal and never, ever snapped or bit anybody.
With our growing family and recently moved into a smaller size yard we can’t give the same attention to our loving dog. We want Bunta to go to the right family who will take good care and give respect of him as he will give the same back. He will be missed. We are asking a small rehoming fee of $150 to serious interest.

In the meantime, I’m not sure if there’s an official way you become a foster home- maybe I should email CorgiAid, or ask the super helpful and informative Debbie of Tri State Rescue in West Virginia (where we adopted Linus from), if there is an official process.

This is Lady’s table.

Woof, woof.

This table is reserved.  Lady is getting a latte and coming right back.

Who ever said that we didn’t train ze woofster for Very Important Jobs?

Guard Dog!

What I learned today:

Dropping off applications in person is the way to go.  Today I drove around the Bay Area and handed in my application packets (including 20 odd pages of certifications, fronts and backs of licenses, etc) to each of the firms I am hoping to get hired at.

The in-person application approach (as opposed to the fax it or email it method, which I was debating before) was a success!  I landed facetime with a hiring manager at every single firm, which let me not only give my elevator pitch about why a 28 year old former i-banker hoping to go to med school eventually would make a great EMT on their team, but also snagged three impromptu, on the spot interviews!

Going in person and being (a tiny bit) loud and pushy has its benefits.  For example, at one firm today, I’m talking to the “gatekeeper” who is the random EMT who answered the door.  He tells me the company owners are out at lunch (my mistake getting there at 12:30, but I had a bunch of places to hit today so at least one of them around lunchtime couldn’t be avoided), but he will give them my application.  Not to be turned away that easily, I respond by asking if there was anyone else there at the time that I could at least introduce myself to.   He started to say no and usher me out (politely), but lo and behold the Operations Manager had heard from down the hall, came out of his office and was like, “Pete, I have time, I can talk to her now.”

Score!  That place seemed like a great firm to work for, too.  Unfortunately they had just hired two people and aren’t going to be hiring again until the end of the month.  Agh.  The ops manager told me, “I wish we had gotten your resume two weeks ago.”  Drats.  However, he informed me I was on the top of the pile for the next round of hires in two weeks.

I took two other things away from my job searching today:

-Current Job Market for EMTs- looks like a lot of places are NOT hiring right now, or are having temporary hiring “freezes,” but anticipate hiring within the month or for people to start in July.  So altogether not horrible outlook.  Heck, this career change has taken me 9 months so far, another three weeks won’t kill me (Earl will be less than thrilled, he has been waiting with baited breath for me to start paying my fair share of the bills again!). I did find the expression, “we are not hiring now, but we are hiring in two weeks” to be somewhat amusing.  It is customary for the act of hiring alone to take over a month at a few of my previous places of employment!   So with that perspective, a two week wait is nothing.    Overall, I’d say this speaks to how solid the employment outlook is for EMTs.  If it’s unusual for them to have a temporary hiring freeze, it signifies that they are normally CONTINUOUSLY hiring, implicating strong need, possible growth, and of course high turnover.  Based on the amount of people who leave to become paramedics, go on to nursing, PA or med school, or becoming firefighters, the turnover makes sense.  Which leads me to…

- Candidate Career Path/Future Goals- This might be a bit controversial, but I’ll just state it as what I took away from some of the managers I talked to today and leave it at that.   Two of the hiring managers told me they prefer candidates who hope to go into medicine in the future, NOT fire.  From what I gathered, it sounds like a lot of people become EMTs just to work for 6 months and then get a job as a firefighter.  One manager complained directly about this!  It sounds like someone who’s hoping to build a career in medicine would be a more motivated and eager to learn EMT because they are interested in the pathology and science side of things, whereas a future firefighter might just be there to put his or her time and then move on.  As I mentioned, just my impression, but I certainly picked up on this vibe which seemed to be working in my favor today.

Finally, I have a full-on job interview (which I landed today) scheduled for tomorrow at 11:00!  Woot.  And with that, off to bed a I go.  Here’s to future good news. 

Oh- one other quick anecdote- you know what else I landed today?  I apparently passed my sitdown interview at one of the firms and now get to move on to this bastardized form of an interview known as the “Pre Employment Ride Along.” AKA… A TWELVE HOUR ON THE JOB, SIMULATED WORK ENVIRONMENT INTERVIEW!!  Holy balls!  No pressure there.  It’s in two weeks with an ALS team.  Yeah.  Nooo pressure there, Greene.  Completely nerve-wracking, right?  I almost hope I land another job before then, just so I don’t have to go through with this 12-hour “try out” ride along.  Heh.  (just kidding).  But, it’s with freaking ALS!  Holy cow…. Earl often tells me how when he’s hiring people at his office he has them write code and do algorithms for him on the spot.  And I always thought that sounded so bad-ass and tough.  Well, now I can trump that!  In your face, MathBoy!  TWELVE HOURS LONG INTERVIEW!!  On an ALS rig! Top that!  It’s on the 23rd.  At least I have a little bit to practice my assessments and study my school flashcards beforehand.  ¡ay!

Post Puke Icky Attack!

This morning I took Linus on our little 3-mileish jog around the neighborhood/visit to the two dog parks near us, and guess what he ate this time in Buena Vista Park…

a used peach pit!  (#&!@*!!!!)

I saw him go for it and reached in his mouth to get it out but the little sucker had already swallowed.  I was rewarded with a nice slimy, gunky hand for my effort, but no peach pit.

So get back, call the vet.  Due to his just-on-the-border 30lb size (a bigger dog probably wouldn’t have any problem passing a peach pit, a smaller dog would definitely have a problem, corgis seem to be right in the grey zone), the vet told us it was “our call” as to whether or not we wanted to bring them in to have them remove it.  For a cool $300.  Aggh.  Since our vet wasn’t sure what to tell us, I called another a second opinion, and the second vet I talked to (the Emergency Vet) told us it would be better to have him puke just to be safe.

So, just like last time, when he ate used tampons (gak!), we got to feed Linus yummy yummy hydrogen peroxide and waited around for him to puke.  More accurately, Earl got to wait around for him to puke as I rushed off to the dentist for a cleaning, to which I was already running due to being on the phone with vets for half an hour.  I was a little nervous, leaving this emergency in the hands of Earl, but I reminded myself that he managed to keep Lucy alive for 9 years before we met, so I’m sure he’s capable.

3 teaspoons of hydrogen peroxide and three minutes later, up came peach pit and breakfast in the crate!  Phew.  Earl was the one who had the pleasure of cleaning it up this time, which was nice for me at least   Linus also puked again a few minutes later (mostly just sputum), and then went for a second walk just to make sure he was doing okay and ate a second breakfast with no problem.

I got home from the dentist (and a successful interview outfit shopping trip!) and he seems to be doing well, as you can see above is attacking his Icky with the usual ferocity.  Glad he is okay.  We will be keeping an eye on his bm’s to make sure they’re normal, but I think at this point it’s safe to say, crisis averted!  Again.

For the record, the three-teaspoons of hydrogen peroxide trick has worked really well with us, if you ever need a way to make your dog puke, it seems to be just the trick.  Also, interesting anecdote: “Dog Eating Tampon” and other variations of have been the #1 google search term for this blog as of late.  145 people searched for that and found this site last week alone!  So apparently that is an even more common problem than realized.  I bet it’s one of those things that happens and people are too embarrassed, or grossed out, to bring it up with anyone else, so they turn to the internet.

From my friend Mike, whose advice I was seeking re: the email, fax, or hand deliver the application in person quandary.

Michael: Fake an emergency (or injure yourself–but not too much–if you feel guilty about lying) to get them over to your place, and then hand the EMTs that show up your resume

me: HA HA HA HA

I’m sure that would go over really well and I would certainly get the job. 

me: so when i go in person, wear a suit? or business casual?
sorry so many questions
i feel like I’m an 21 year old fresh out of school pimplefaced dweeb
i don’t know where all my baller ibanker confidence went

Michael: probably down the tube with the rest of wall st….

The man, he has a point.