Spanish for dummies...

was on a SWAT raid recently, i'm a medic on two separate SWAT teams locally, and they were joking around when we were in the truck on the way to the scene. they were talking about another guy, who wasn't with us that day. i'm paraphrasing but here's the jist of the story. they hit a house and there was a spanish dude in the house and the SWAT officer came at him, gun up and fully kitted up, and wanted the spanish dude to put his hands up. so he started yelling "Como te llamas!!" and the dude said "Juan". so he kept moving forward and yelling "Como te llamas!!" and the dude yelled back "Juan!" with his hands still by his side. "I'll shot you motherfucker!! Como te llamas!!!" and the dude screamed back "JUAN!!". hahahahahaha. finally someone corrected him before he shot the dude. i'm not sure what exactly they are taught in SWAT school, i finnaly get to go this summer, but "Manos arriba" will probably work just fine. reminds me of when we were in Iraq. we were in the invasion so our cultural knowledge was very primitive and the universal American sign for stop (hand palm forward and arm up) is actually a greeting and sign of "come over here" for the Iraqis....oops. within a day or two my platoon noticed it was different (both hands over your head and arms crossed). luckily we hadn't killed any civilians by then. ah, but understanding cultural diversity is such a dirty fucking hippie (DFH) way to approach the world, isn't it. too bad most people who get into the infantry and police work are, for the most part, not the sharpest tools in the shed.

Solar flares and the shuttle...

go to spaceweather and search for today in the archive in the top right (02/08/2010) and check out some wonderful pics of the space shuttle Endeavour lifting off. it is bringing a new section of the space station so the astronauts can see in a 360 degree space. how f-in cool would that be?!? and then right below that part you can listen, by links, to massive solar flares screaming by the Earth. it sounds like being in a tent during a strong rain storm... i guess that is a pretty good analogy of us and our planet. such a great website on a daily basis.

I must be dreaming...

this was a couple years back. i was working a shift with SA and we were in line to get breakfast at Bojangles and a 10D, chest pain, came out and we both got out of line and set off to it. usually when interrupted from breakfast a crew may make snarky remarks about the pt we are going to (of course, once on scene that all goes away) but this time i remember we didn't say anything we just took off. we got on scene and the first responders were already there with the pt. this was in a bad area of town on one of our worst streets for drugs and violence. we walked into the house and the pt was a black male about 42 years old, he looked younger. he was wild eyed and clutching frequently at his chest. right away we could tell there was something going on and we placed him on the stretcher. as we were pulling the stretcher out of his house, he was only 2-3 minutes from the hospital and we decided to do everything in the truck, he said something about "spiders". his house was dirty and i started to look at my shoulders and arms and get that feeling like stuff was crawling all over me. as we loaded him into the ambulance he said it again "is it the spider?" and i crawled into the truck looking at my clothes for spiders. SA placed him on the monitor and right away, i think without even a 12-Lead she just said "let's go, i'll do everything en route". the pt was very anxious and had that text book "impending sense of doom" going on, looking back in hindsight. i took off for the hospital and i could hear him asking SA "is it the spider" and finally she asked him what he was meaning. he started to say he was watching a hospital-type show the other night and heard about a spider. SA asked him "you mean a widow maker?" and he goes "yeah, that. is it that?" and i just mashed the pedal a little further into the floor. as i pulled up on the ramp of the old ED i could see SA in the rear view mirror start yelling at the guy and she pulled the head of the stretcher down, moving him from sitting to supine. i ran around to the back and pulled open the doors and jumped up and the pt looked to be having a seizure. SA was at the monitor and she had placed the pads on him earlier and the monitor was showing V-tach. but the pt was shaking so violently i told her to hold on and i checked for a pulse quickly and after 5-10 seconds of not finding one she gave him a nice shock at 200J. as i was pulling him out someone came out and i yelled to them to tell the ED our pt coded on the ramp. we ran him in and i was doing CPR and SA was pushing the stretcher and we got him into the old orange zone and the nurses and MD were there and i moved around to lower the head of the stretcher and the doc yelled out shock him again. the monitor was in between the pt's legs and the doc could see the V-tach plain as day once i stopped doing compressions. BAM! we hit him again and began to move him to the bed. within a minute of his first shock on the ramp the pt was shocked a second time and he was on the hospital bed, biting a female ED tech in the hand and screaming "i'm dreaming!!! i'm dreaming!!!". hell yeah he was dreaming. and sure enough he WAS having a widow maker. we later found out he had an extensive cardiac history from abusing cocaine and had had a mild MI in the past. "i'm dreaming!!! i'm dreaming!!!" crazy town.

Words to the wise...

As I Develop The Awakening Mind I Praise The Buddha As They Shine
I Bow Before You As I Travel My Path To Join Your Ranks,
I Make My Full Time Task
For The Sake Of All Beings I Seek
The Enlighted Mind That I Know I'll Reap
Respect To Shantideva And All The Others
Who Brought Down The Darma For Sisters And Brothers
I Give Thanks For This World As A Place To Learn
And For This Human Body That I'm Glad To Have Earned
And My Deepest Thanks To All Sentient Beings
For Without Them There Would Be No Place To Learn What I'm Seeing
There's Nothing Here That's Not Been Said Before
But I Put It Down Now So I'll Be Sure
To Solidify My Own Views And I'll Be Glad If It Helps
Anyone Else Out Too
If Others Disrespect Me Or Give Me Flack
I'll Stop And Think Before I React =
Knowing That They're Going Through Insecure Stages
I'll Take The Opportunity To Exercise Patience
I'll See It As A Chance To Help The Other Person
Nip It In The Bud Before It Can Worsen
A Change For Me To Be Strong And Sure
As I Think On The Buddhas Who Have Come Before
As I Praise And Respect The Good They've Done
Knowing Only Love Can Conquer In Every Situation
We Need Other People In Order To Create
The Circumstances For The Learning That We're Here To Generate
Situations That Bring Up Our Deepest Fears
So We Can Work To Release Them Until They're Cleared
Therefore, It Only Makes Sense
To Thank Our Enemies Despite Their Intent
The Bodhisattva Path Is One Of Power And Strength
A Strength From Within To Go The Length
Seeing Others Are As Important As Myself
I Strive For A Happiness Of Mental Wealth
With The Interconnectedness That We Share As One
Every Action That We Take Affects Everyone
So In Deciding For What A Situation Calls
There Is A Path For The Good For All
I Try To Make My Every Action For That Highest Good
With The Altruistic Wish To Achive Buddhahood
So I Pledge Here Before Everyone Who's Listening
To Try To Make My Every Action For The Good Of All Beings
For The Rest Of My Lifetimes And Even Beyond
I Vow To Do My Best To Do No Harm
And In Times Of Doubt I Can Think On The Dharma
And The Enlightened Ones Who've Graduated Samsara