Tag: first aid

This and That

Preparing for the Norfolk Coast Path and lots of other things.

Three more getups and then I’m off to Norfolk for half term. I’m looking forward to walking the Norfolk Coast Path and I’m intrigued to find out what sort of weather I’ll get. Every weekend has been so different recently and now I keep hearing talk of snow. Bring it on! – I’ll enjoy the walk whatever the weather.

I’ve been googling and searching Amazon looking for books set in Norfolk that I can read whilst I’m there, but haven’t had any luck finding anything. Then this evening my eyes alighted on my copy of Bill Bryson’s ‘At Home’. A bell started to ring in the deep recesses of my mind – didn’t he settle in Norfolk when he moved back to the UK? A quick check, and yes, the book is about his house in Norfolk. So that’s the one I’ll be taking with me. It’s very chunky and so I doubt I’ll get much of it read, but at least I can start it. My habit of reading books set in, or about, the places I visit isn’t helping me get through the BBC Big Read challenge, but I’ll get round to that at some point.

To prepare for the walk I’ve been very good about going to the gym. I hadn’t been for ages as life just kind of took over and ate up all my time. But this past few weeks I’ve been going regularly and feeling good for it. I’m surprised that my fitness level is still pretty good, but maybe all the walking I did in the summer has paid off there.

I had been hoping to go back to the local college this week for a bit more waxing, but decided I’d rather spend my available evenings in the gym instead. So stage two of that challenge will have to wait until after half term.

By the time half term is over it will be almost November and time for me to start NaNoWriMo. I still haven’t thought about what I’m going to write, but that’s ok. I’m just going to use the month to let my thoughts flow free and see what happens. I’m going to concentrate on quantity not quality. If I’m able to write 50,000 words in a month then at least I’ll know that I do have the stamina and patience to think seriously about writing in the future. Then I’ll think about quality.

I finished my first aid course last week. This is only a basic course, but has given me confidence to tackle the more full-on course that I’ll need to do for walking group leader’s qualification. I’ll think about doing this in the spring. That’ll give me plenty of time to read up on first aid and consolidate what I’ve learnt.

So all in all, things are ticking along quite nicely.

First Aid

A basic first aid course with the Red Cross.

I’ve spent the last two evenings at the Red Cross training centre with a couple of colleagues doing a basic first aid course. School has paid for it (bonus!) as it means I can teach first aid skills to my Health and Social Care students in the new year. The course included bits of everything and was quite a lot to take in. I’ll have to do a bit of reading up as well, before I feel confident to either practise first aid or teach it.

This level of course is not meant to make me an expert so there was no formal assessment. At some point I’ll need to do the specialist outdoors first aid course for my walking group leader’s qualification. This is a full weekend course with assessments and is quite expensive. I’d hate to fail it and now feel more confident that I won’t because I now have basic knowledge and skills and won’t be starting it cold.

Doing the course meant I had two very long days and feel completely knackered, but it seems well worth it.

First Aid

I’m doing a basic first aid course with the Red Cross.

If I’m to do the training to become a walking group leader, I first need to have a relevant first aid qualification. The one I need is a bit different and a bit more involved than the bog standard one, as a first aid necessitating incident in the middle of nowhere, well out of mobile phone reception range, is a whole lot different to being in an a situation where you can expect an ambulance within 10 minutes.

There are weekend courses I can do for this in the Peak District and at some point I’ll get round to doing one. However, in the meantime I’m about to do a first aid course for school. This is a basic course over two evenings and will qualify me not only as a basic first aider, but will also allow me to teach first aid to some of my students. All good practice for when I come to do the big one.

The course I’m doing next month is offered by the Red Cross and is only about £37. But as an added bonus, school are paying, so it’s not costing me anything!