I'm not dead. I think. I'm pretty sure.

My gosh. Just when I thought I wasn't going to ever write anything here again, I came home today from a training event, ready to jump right back in and start posting.

A lot has changed in the past few years.
A lot hasn't.

For a short while, we had several EMTs, but now are back to... very few. At least the ones we have work well as a team, which beats the heck out of always going to calls alone.

My life has taken some interesting twists and turns in the past few years, one of which is that I'm a CLI now, working with a local training center helping with brand spanking new EMT-lets. It's delightful. For one thing, the first couple of semesters kicked my butt. There's nothing like needing to teach something, to get you to focus on your own skills. If you want to be any good at it, I mean.

I came home from the last few days of training with a brain full of great stuff, and some ideas, to go with some ideas I have already been working on. I'd really like to up my game and work on some positive changes around here. I think it's possible now, and important always to strive to improve the service we provide.

I've been creating powerpoint presentations for several years now, for EMS and for my "real job," and find that (shhh, don't tell!) I enjoy putting them together. (I also enjoy doing my taxes, but I digress.) I have NO interest in making them all text, and just reading it out loud. Who enjoys that? Anyone? Ever? Didn't think so.

I'm working on one over the weekend for company training Monday night, and if it turns out well, I'll see if I can find a way to make it available, if anyone is interested. It will come with notes, (including notes I'll take on responses and contributions people make during the training) because otherwise, just looking at the pictures isn't going to help you very much. It's based on an excellent presentation I saw a couple of weeks ago, adapted to specific circumstances and concerns we've run into, with some additional thoughts and information, and is about dealing with calls where the patient dies. Stuff people don't often talk about.

So...
I've tried kickstarting this thing a couple of times. We'll see if it sticks this time! I know some of you who used to read it are still out there. :-)