Webb Family Blog

Well, Kellie and I have been in school for nearly a week.  It is a bit different taking classes online.  We are supposed to log in AT LEAST 4 days a week and make at least 2 responses each time.  The biggest upset is that Kellie and I were put in separate classes.  We are taking the same class, but they spread out the load among different instructor / facilitators.  For the first class, this distribution is ONLY random.  They claim they have no way of putting us together for this first class, although they guarantee that we’ll be together from here on out in our program, starting with the second class.  There are a few interesting things with the University of Phoenix.  For one, instead of having to buy books for over $150 or so, we pay a $50 "rEsource" fee, which provides all reading materials online.  We can download and print all of our books.  For this first week, we have 2 chapters in one book to read and 1 chapter in a different book.  I started to read it on the computer, but I felt it was slowing my reading down.  Kellie also wanted to read it on paper.  We agreed that it would be best to print them out, but doing so on our ink jet printer would be both expensive and extremely slow.  We decided to buy a laser printer. 

I did a little research and found the printer I wanted .  It is made by Brother.  It is the Brother HL-5250DN.  The "D" stands for DUPLEX… it can print both sides of the page.  The "N" stands for network.  In addition to being able to be connected by a USB cable, it can also be plugged into a network and all the computers on that network can access it individually.  It can print a resolution of 2400×2400 dots per inch, or at a lower resolution it can print 30 pages a minute or around 15 pages a minute double sided.  I bought some 3-hole punched paper and put it in there.  I can print out all my reading assignments and put them in a binder.  So far, it has been great.  Unlike my old laser printer, which stopped working around the time of our move, this one truly goes to sleep when it hasn’t been used in a short period of time.

I don’t really have have much time for all the things we’ve done in the past, especially watching TV and just playing on the Internet this first week. Kellie is pretty stressed over it all, I am stressed too, but it appears I’m not AS stressed.

It feels rather surreal, but Kellie and I are returning to school; the University of Phoenix. While we have the option of physically walking into a classroom, we will be taking the majority of our classes online. I THINK Kellie is more anxious than I about it. We will continue to work our regular schedule, and we can “attend” class when ever we get a chance… at least 4 days a week. We will only be taking one class at a time, but they will all be taken without break between classes (we will start the next class the week after finishing the preceding class). There are a total of 13 classes required for our course to get our Bachelor of Science—Nursing (BSN). We can take 8 classes a year, so we’ll be done in approximately a year and a half. There is a possibility we may not need to take a class here or there if they find one of the classes we previously took is equivalent. My CURRENT plan is to continue on without stop for another 13 classes, working on a Family Nurse Practitioner, a Masters program. If all goes as planned, I’m hoping that I’ll be a Nurse Practitioner in 2010. That seems like forever away, a science-fiction futuristic time, but that is only a little over 3 years away.

Incidentally, I just found out that the University of Phoenix has been granted naming rights to the brand new, übercool Arizona Cardinals Stadium in Glendale, AZ. This is the stadium with both a retractable roof and a retractable field. The field only comes inside the stadium for games, but stays outside when games are not being played inside.

I can't ever seem to make a regular habit of making posts to my blog here.  My last post was just after Kellie and her mom came back from the Women's Retreat.  I guess one thing I haven't comment on yet is my favorite football team… The Oakland Raiders… they're not doing well so far.  It has been quite upsetting.  They got shut out on the season opener, at home against the San Diego Chargers.  They next got a few field goals, but again lost the next week against the Baltimore Ravens.  Yesterday was a real heart breaker.  The Raiders had a pretty good lead, but blew it.  They got their first defensive touchdown of the year, the first passing touchdown of the year AND the first rushing touchdown of the year… good for 21 points.  At half-time, the Raiders were on top of the Cleveland Browns 21-10, but ultimately lost the game, 24-21. 

Today, I went to the dermatologist and had the remainder of a mole removed from my back.  Around 6-7 years ago, back when I had Kaiser before, I had a punch biopsy made on a mole on my back that has had my family worried.  For me, I never thought of it much, as I can't feel it or see it.  When the doctor back then did the biopsy, apparently he didn't feel he needed to completely remove the mole, but just take a portion of it to biopsy.  Why he didn't take the whole thing was a mystery to me… I didn't even know he'd taken only a portion of it until my brother told me.  The biopsy turned out to be negative, but I've been urged to pursue having the remainder of it removed.  So today, Kellie and I went to the doctor.  My appointment was scheduled for 11:30AM, but we showed up early… 11:05AM.  Thankfully, we were called in early, so we didn't have to wait long.  Other than an initial prick in the center of my back, when he infiltrated the area with 1% Lidocaine with epinephrine, I couldn't feel ANYTHING WHAT-SO-EVER going on on my back.  He had to do some electrocautery to control the bleeding, but again I couldn't feel a thing.  He put in 3 sutures to close up the hole he created and his assistant put a dressing over it.  We left the office at 11:35AM… 5 minutes after the scheduled appointment.  I didn't feel anything on the back until around 3-4PM this afternoon, when I was driving in my car.  I'm not sure if it was related to sweat getting into the wound or just raw nerves, but it started hurting.  When I got home, I took some Vicodin and took my shirt off.  I've spent pretty much the rest of my day on the computer or watching TV.  It is now nearly 10PM and haven't had any more pain… let's hope it stays that way.Another thing that is kind of interesting in our lives is that Kellie and I have been contemplating continuing our education by getting Bachelor's degrees in nursing.  We contacted the University of Phoenix, which has campuses all over the place and allows for online class taking.  By doing it this way, we'd take one class at a time and graduate in about a year and a half.  It won't be cheap, and it won't give me a raise… nor do I think it would give Kellie a raise, but it opens up other opportunities.  I have been considering going on later for Nurse Practitioner.  Becoming a Nurse Practitioner WOULD give me a significant increase in pay, if I changed to an NP job.  I'd probably want to pursue a job with Kaiser, but who knows… I think I'd like to work in an urgent care center… if any had availabilities.