GEORGOUS DAY

Good Afternoon or Evening form Missouri, Blue Springs. It has been a lovely day here and one full of action. Today Richard and Eric left at 8.30am to go to a managers meeting and a day full of interactions with various staff at Blue Springs City Council. I spent the morning with Sonja and their little four year old Haley. Haley is a gorgeous wee girl and full of personality. This morning we visited the Target store for some supplies and I was overwhelmed by the choice that there is here for products - where we have one or two choices here there would be a dozen or more. The roads and streets are all wide and very clean. The city is spread out as there is so much space.

This afternoon I had the pleasure of visiting a hospital -St Marys, which is similar to Mercy Hospital in Dunedin - only on a bigger scale with a ICU, Emergency Department and a Birthing unit with its own NICU. It was impressive and very well maintained. It has 170 beds. It also had a Cath lab and patients have no waiting time - even if they have been seen as an outpatient, they will have the procedure the next day. The NICU was very spacious where there were one incubator there would be four in our NICU at DPH. The staff to patient ratio is only 4 to one and is not allowed to go above that. There was even a full rehab ward where patients do not go home until they are functioning as best they can with three hours a day of Speech, Physio and Occupational therapy. There was even a gym for cardiac patients where they are encouraged to completed a rehab exercise programme, whilst being monitored. I wasn't brave enough to ask Nurse Pay rates but would love to know. Interestingly they have a current focus on family violence as there has been an increase of this in Blue Springs. It is symbolised by a purple ribbon here, and every patient is given a pamphlet about this on their meal tray.

This Evening we spent relaxing outside in the sun as it was 23 degrees and a warm breeze. We had a BBQ of grilled chicken, couscous and broccoli YUMMY. Tonight as we were about to eat tea or supper as they call it here we saw Deer come through the bottom of the section. Apparently you are not allowed to shoot them here. It was soooo close to us. I have yet to see a squirrel but the kids tell me that there is a nest in the trees in the back yard, so I will see one eventually. The video shows the deer wandering through the yard, and the pictures are of the youngest two kids Colin and Haley with their mum Sonja. We are having a great time and are starting to feel less jet lagged.

oops cant upload the video sorry:(