I'm official!!!!

To all who care: it's official!!! I'm an ARNP!!! Advanced Registered Nurse Practitioner, for those of you who are non-medical. I just checked Florida's Department of Health website and they posted my new license number!! Big step for me, people! I'm a dork and very excited and thought I'd share. :-)

Layne out!

Bummed and tired

Okay, so all my posts are depressing. And, really, life's just not that bad but it has been pretty frustrating lately. Anyway, I found out Thursday that I was NOT going to get my car back on Friday. So I could NOT go to work this week either. And, you guessed it, I was NOT happy about this!! I hate missing work. It makes me feel so guilty and lazy, even though I really couldn't help it. . . we only have one frickin' car!! I really hope that it's done this week but, at this point, I'm not holding my breath.

We moved the rest of our stuff out of the condo yesterday. It's completely empty now and that is officially our last trip to Gainesville. It was kinda sad to leave it. It was our first place, we got married there, I got Raina while I lived there. Lots of memories. So we took a moment to say good bye. Yes, we really did . . . don't laugh! And of course we had a bunch of crap to do while we were there (turn in our cable box, pick up my framed diplomas, etc) and we forgot a bunch of stuff that we needed and it rained off and on the whole day . . . In other words, what we expected to be about 2 hours in Gainesville turned into almost 5 hours. It was a mess and we were a mess and it was a very long, exhausting day. But I'm glad it's done. Just two more weeks of traveling to Gainesville to work and then I'm done!! :-)

Alright, I'm done whining. I promise. We have a bunch of stuff that we brought back this trip so I have projects now to keep me busy. Believe it or not, I'm very grateful for that. And it was Easter today and it was very nice! We had lunch with my mom and grandma and ran some errands and set up the house a little. We even went to dinner to this (great) sushi place that just opened across the street from us!!

Overall, it was a good week and a very productive weekend. Anyone who knows me, knows that being productive makes me very happy!! :-)

~Layne
Anal-retentive and proud!

Zzzzzz. . . . bored . . .

Alright, so I've been in Orlando almost 3 weeks and I've done very little of what I really wanted to do after moving here!! Meeting Brad and my mom and friends for lunch, exploring the area, shopping for stuff for the new place. Instead, I'm sitting on my bum staring at walls. Egh! You know, I really underestimated how much I love having my car. I knew that not having a car would be a pain in the butt . . . I guess I just wasn't thinking about how bored and lonely I would be!! ::sniff sniff:: :-(

Anyway, I've tried to get out a little by driving Brad to work and then I get his car for the day. But that's kind of a pain in the butt. I'd love to hang out with friends and go shopping and go out to lunch. Unfortunately, most of them have stupid jobs that they do during the day and they can't come play with me. I've been able to convince a few people to play hookie with me, though, even if it's just for a couple of hours. ;-)

I think I'm done whining now. . . I don't really have much to report because, honestly, I haven't really been doing anything. I'm still waiting to get my ARNP license number. I sent everything off last week but my license number still hasn't been generated. Until that happens, my NP job is on hold. Other than that I've really just been unpacking but I've done about as much as I can do without the rest of the furniture. What did I tell you?? Really, really bored!! I get my car back this Friday, though, which is awesome!! And my mom is taking a half day to come play with me and then we do Easter dinner with Brad's family. YAY for PLANS!!!!

Alright chickies, nothing left to talk about . . .
~Layne

Welcome to Orlando . .

Well, to start off, let me say I absolutely love our new place. It's HUGE and pretty and I love it. We are a little far from some things but can walk to others, like the grocery store, bank, pizza, etc. And they are putting a bunch more stuff in the plaza in front of our apartment complex so it will just keep getting better!

Here's the bad part . . . On Monday (3/3/08), my mom and I went shopping for a couple of things for the new place and we were on our way back to my apartment when we got into a horrible accident on the 528. I was in the middle lane and a semi who was in the fast lane merged over into my lane, right on top of me. All of a sudden I felt a huge thud on my driver's side back quarter panel and since he hit the back corner of my car so hard, he spun my car around and before I knew it we were going backwards in the fast lane. We slammed into the concrete divider between the east and westbound sides and slid along it for several feet before the car finally stopped.

Once we stopped, we were sitting facing the wrong direction, half on the left-hand shoulder and half poking into the fast lane. So I looked behind me to see if the semi pulled over and he hadn't. The guy completely took off and no one who saw the accident stopped to see if we were okay. My mom called 911 and it took 45 minutes for the cop to get there. The ambulance got there right away but they couldn't do anything to help us get out of the middle of the road. They were just there to make sure we were okay, which we were. But that whole time we were sitting backwards in the road praying that nobody hit us.

Once the cop got there, he stopped traffic so that we could move off to the right side of the road out of the way of traffic. About 5 minutes later, some guy rode past us rubber-necking and caused 3-car fender-bender right next to me. At that point, the cop walked over to those cars and started helping them. Now, I'm sorry if this sounds completely horrible but I had been waiting for an hour totally shaken up and really wanted to go home. Couldn't he have radioed some more cops to come and finished my paperwork and let me go first?

I have never been in an accident before and I was completely scared out of my mind. My mom and I are okay, except that we are a little sore from tensing up during the accident. Honestly, it's an absolute miracle that no one hit us while we were spinning out of control. My car has
over $5,000 worth of damage. And I'm more than a little peeved that I'm stuck paying my deductible to have it fixed while that a**hole semi-truck driver gets off with nothing!! We could have been really hurt and he didn't even slow down!! Thank God we have good insurance and my deductible is only $500, which really isn't bad.

Anyway, that all happened 2 days after we moved into town. Welcome back, right? :-) Oh well, it's just a car and I am so grateful that my mom and I were able to walk away without a scratch. Again, I know Someone up there is looking out for us.

~Layne