So we all headed back to school and work after our Labor Day weekend. Scott really enjoyed his first day as a Senior. He is now driving himself to and from school(and loving it!). And so are we-no more early morning drop offs!  I also attended Scott's Back to School night on Weds. night during his first week back. I like the opportunity to meet his teachers and get an idea of the course curriculum for the year. The only thing I was a bit surprised to hear about is that next year the school is combining the Physics and Chemistry class as one in order to have the kids prepared for a standardized exam that they will be taking their Junior year. That is the craziest thing I have ever heard of and I am so glad Scott is graduating this year!

After his first day at school, Scott dropped in on the After Care program at Resurrection to turn in his Fingerprinting Criminal report. And they asked him to stay and work! Guess he got the job!  Since he was just getting started with classes, he decided to go in after school to work every day during his first week. And it was a short week. Supposedly he was receiving training during his first week, which took about 15 mins and then they left him on his own with the kids. I think he can handle it. He attended the program himself, and he pretty much knows how to babysit. Which is what the program really is, along with homework help. So far, Scott has been watching kids from Kindergarten age up to 8th grade. Although there are a lot more of the younger kids. He prefers working with the middle school aged kids-he reports they are actually able to have conversations(and pretty self reliant) as opposed to the younger kids that are a lot more needy! For instance, he has to tell the Kindergarteners to stop eating the Legos, get off the train table and do not put the Legos back in the bucket after you licked it. And he has played more soccer with the kids in one week than he has his entire life. But it is good for him. He just works about 3 hrs after school, and we decided he should only sign up for 3 nights/wk for now. He can use a break for homework and other after school activities of his own. The nice thing with this job is that he has an extremely flexible work schedule. If he wants to show up and work they are happy to have him. Even if he is not scheduled. Or if he has something else come up and cannot work, no problem. Unlike his previous job. And this is so much more convenient for transportation since it is just down the street from our house. Not to mention that he has weekends, snow days and holidays off. Which he did not at his old job. Sweet!  And that came in handy on Saturday when he went off to take the ACT. He said the math sections made a whole lot more sense this time around since he was better prepared with the class prep and tutoring. We are really hoping he was able to push his math test scores up high enough to avoid taking extra college math classes.

I on the other hand was quite upset when I found out that I was not going to receive my Holiday pay on Labor Day when I called out sick. I did not realize that our facility has a No Pay for Missed Holiday Work policy. Even though I volunteered to work. HR says since I was scheduled and did not show up, I don't get paid. So I do not plan on volunteering to work anymore Holidays. The rest of the staff was thinking that is also a good idea. Sadly, when they make policies for the entire building, they lump the Rehab Dept in with all of the other employees including nursing, housekeeping, maintenance and Dietary. They don't have to schedule therapy on the Holidays or weekends(but we make more money if they do schedule us since we can bill for our treatment time and we are usually happy to sign up since we get paid for Holiday and working). However, no one bills for the other services like nursing, housekeeping or laundry.  You just need to have those employees since we are a 24 hr/7day/wk service for patient care. I guess we will see how the rest of the year goes, but I no longer plan on volunteering unless they can guarantee I will get paid. And on top of that, our new supervisor screwed up my time sheet by taking away 8hrs of sick time for the day. I actually "worked" the following Saturday since I went to a class. So I completed my regular 4 day work week. Sadly we have had a huge turnover in our Administration this year and we feel our facility has not been doing as well. Our Rehab patient caseload has been extremely low, and we have not had many appropriate rehab patients. Instead, we have had quite a few more hospice patients and we usually do not provide therapy for those admissions along with quite a few substance abusers.  They don't do as well either. But I did manage to get to a class on Saturday that I have been wanting to complete for quite some time. It involved training with  an assessment tool for patients that have Dementia. Unfortunately the assessment tool is sold separately for about $500, so I don't think our department will be purchasing this item for awhile. Instead I am going to try and persuade the new Administration to allow us to put together a semi kitchen area in the Rehab gym. The facility had to disconnect our stove and microwave in the basement last year since it had no ventilation. We could easily ventilate a stove/microwave in our gym to the outside wall. Most rehab facilities have a small kitchenette to practice meal prep and cooking for safety assessments when patients return home. We just don't have a place to hook up water for a sink. But a fridge and stove, some cupboards would come in handy. And Scott drew up a very nice schematic for me. Now I just have to type up a letter of request. I would even volunteer to move the stove up from the basement myself!

And Scott's handicapped planters that he built for his Eagle project have really come in handy for our Activity Dept. at the facility. This summer they grew lettuce, tomatoes and herbs for salads for the residents. And it seems that the project will have a two fold purpose. Scott is supposed to come up with a special project for his Sr Engineering class, and he was talking about the portable garden boxes to his teacher during class planning.  The teacher thought Scott's design was awesome! And he even thinks their class could win the District competition with Scott's design(they like projects that help the handicapped and are used in hospital settings). As a matter of fact, another Eagle scout project was completed last Saturday from our Troop that will be of benefit to my facility. We have been requesting benches for outside the facility for our residents and patients to use during therapy sessions and just to have a place to hang out. And one of the scouts built benches, side tables and a flower box with a trellis to grow veggie vines like beans or cucumbers. I had asked Scott to build the benches, but he thought that was boring. I am glad he went with the planter idea. So there are a few good things happening at work.

After a stressful week, I needed some time for rest and recuperation. On Saturday night, Tom and I met with a couple from Northrop for dinner. We attended their wedding a few years ago and they wanted to spend some time catching up. They both lost their spouses to cancer and met at a support group. The wife has 3 kids and Pete did not have any children, so instant family. They have been busy moving their oldest daughter off to college in Boston. We had planned on dinner and an outdoor movie, but they were only up for dinner at the Wine Bar in Olde Ellicott City. We had never eaten there, mainly since it is expensive and you don't get a whole lot to eat(pappas plates which are basically appetizers). But it was tasty, the wine was good and we enjoyed eating out on the patio up above the street. The restaurant is built on the side of the granite rocks that line the street of Ellicott City. There is actually open granite inside the restaurant in their wine cellar. So Ellicott City is basically built like a canyon, which is another reason why it floods so easy.  Afterwards, we walked up the street to the Wine Bin to watch an outdoor movie "Cool Hand Luke" with Paul Newman. We have seen the movie before, but it was fun to join the crowd outside and eat popcorn and repeat all the famous movie lines like "What we have here is a failure to communicate" in your best southern drawl! Our neighbor Dan also joined us, but his wife Gloria was not feeling well(uh oh). Hope she did not catch our cold!

And just when you thought it was safe to go outside, another Hurricane rolled in through Florida. Hurricane Irma. We all have family members and houses in Florida, so we spent the weekend checking on the Hurricane's track. Fortunately Tom's parents and sister and her husband came through the storm in Venice with limited to no damage, as did Mom B's Nokomis house. Thank goodness! And Dan and Dave Bozyk and their families are drying out in Houston. Glad everyone is safe and intact.

And we celebrated another September Birthday this past weekend!  Happy 50th Birthday Mike Bozyk! You made it!