Okie Dokie...one more weekend down

Yeah yeah yeah i know been a while since i posted anything, you'll have to forgive me. It was a busy weekend.

As for class, Thursday was kinda boring, it was an introduction to CVA, TIA, and a guest "lecture" on diabetes. Interesting stuff just a LONG night, early to rise, late to bed make Odie MUSHY in head.

Thursday passed without much fanfare, except realizing that we only have another 5 weeks and 3 practice sessions left (including last sunday) until we challenge the state EMT test. Scary stuff i tell you. Me and my partner are pretty comfortable, we'll get together and study by running through multiple scenarios and writings stuff down. I'm actually really comfortable with this stuff, so much so that i'm starting to get worried that we'll get a tad overconfident and start to overlook small details that will fail us. Like PMS and ABC after every move, its so simple it takes NO time to do and we are starting to forget it on scenarios, BAD TIMES!!!

Ok enough about thursday.

Friday i show up at the station for my usual CPAT workout, and my buddy J strolls in after me, says he's putting up a shift with some friends from another station. Eh, why not, work out then hang out with some friends for a couple hours, chill and watch a movie with the career guys. Doesnt sound like a bad night to me.

One of the career guys has taken an interest in helping me pass the CPAT, so when i'm working out and he's there he'll pop his head in and yell at me to go faster or give me a certain exercise to do, then come back and check in on me. Its helping a lot. I'll DEFINITELY pass with his help. No worries at all.

I get suited up and sign myself onto the unit at about 845. We drive around for a while to familiarize our visiting driver with the response area, and we stop and grab him a frostee at the Wendy's up the street. No sooner than he had payed and we walked out the door than our Medic and Engine get toned out to a difficulty breathing right up the street from our location . We add our unit on because we basically know where it is. Jump up the street and get there exactly as the career guys are rolling up. Nothing much we can do except get the patient on oxygen and load her up in to the Medic unit and get her to the hospital. Nothing much we could do medically to improve her condition so ALS transport was the best thign we could do.

Silent for the rest of the night, i get out of there around 1:30am. Of course i miss all the fun, i stop by the station in the morning to grab my gear to head to practice our at station 21, and the ambulance is out?!?! Wierd, the guys were supposed to take it out of service at 0700, mind you this is around 0930 by the time i'm at the station. Ok, fine, whats going on? I pop into our Altaris terminal to pull up the unit history, they're out on a PSERV (public service) call, helping a gentleman to get from his car to his house (i think). The kicker is the patient has ALS, Lou Gherig's Disease, for those of you that don't know my dad died from ALS in 1997. I just like to help out ALS patients when i can, i couldnt do much to help my dad so i kinda feel i owe it to those that are suffering the same way he was. Now that i can provide that type of assistance. Thats not the really interesting part. The interesting part is why the unit was still in service. Evidently the county was in Condition 3, severely depleted of unit resources, due to a 3 alarm fire. Our county activated our Volunteer Resource System and called for any and all Volunteer Units that could be staffed to be put in service. All in all, including volunteer units that were already in service for drill coverage. Fairfax county volunteers mobilized 11 units. The incident that went to 3 alarms was kind of interesting in and of itself.

Really briefly and in SoCal surfer lingo...

Dude A has suicidal machinations
Dude A severs the gas line in his apartment
Dude A's family shows up and Calls 911
Call goes out as a SUICF, suicide attempt and GASIN inside gasleak
Dude A decides that it is go time, sparks it up and BOOM
call is now a FHOU housefire, in a garden apartment
Fire goes to a second alarm, then a third alarm
Dude A is removed from the scene via Helicopter, one of our own Volunteers is the porter that takes him to the helo. And a Volunteer Engine has control of the Landing Zone.

Lessons learned, DO NOT USE THE OVEN TO KILL YOURSELF, you'll only wind up looking like meatloaf.



That puts us at class on sunday, Good times, not quite sure what our time on trauma was, they threw some unorthodox scenarios at us. But i think we'll be JUST FINE. Really nothing all that eventful other than a masterfully handled Diabetic emergency. SAMPLE and OPQRST and the calls to medical direction just kinda came naturally. Good stuff, very happy with how i handled that.


I decide to ride our medic unit while i'm shmying around up at our weekly BINGO, nothing all night then just as i'm about to sign off and head home out of boredom and a desire to sleep, the tones drop for an ALS emergency, passerby saw a patient slumped over the steering wheel of their car up the road from the station. The location is equidistant between us ansd the station to the North, so they dispatch the North Engine and South Medic. we get there and see the engine headed the opposite direction? NO patient? No car? ok i can see where this is going, keystone cops. Here, there, up, down, far, near, we check everywhere, nothing. The funny part is whenever our medic driver passes the engine he'll stop and stick his head out the window and ask "WHICH WAY DIDDEE GO?" i just imagine something out of the old heckel and jeckel cartoons. It was one of those you had to be there things i guess. but thats really all they got all night.

As i'm packing it in off the medic our canteen coordinator, wonderful lady, sees an incident right up the street from our station in the other direction where some prize winner put his vehicle into the side of an apartment buildling, compromising the structure. Technical Rescue and support are dispatched. We call into the control center and see if the guys on scene could do with a hot cup of coffee and some snacks. Of course a firefighter will never turn down a hot cup of coffee or some gatorade on a busy night. so off we go. Its kinda chest puffing proud to hear how much the career guys appreciate the volunteer canteens and what the volunteers do for the county.

NOW its time to head home, and here we are, present day.

Planning on heading to the statoin after work to get in my run and talk to my "trainer" about what the next step i need to take is.

Oh and chcek out my 101 things in 1001 days list.

I'm doing ok on a couple of them. So we'll see how this keeps up.