year one down.

Where has the time gone. I feel like I just moved back to California, and yet it here I am having completed my first year of veterinary school. It feels a little surreal. This past year has been a wonderful adventure that has put me through the emotional gamut and left me swimming in the wake of its many storms. I have do some of the most amazing things in this first year, things I never thought I would get to do. I have worked harder, studied longer, and slept less than I ever thought possible. But I have survived and did not fail miserably, which is always a sort of small victory.

Despite having finished my first year a week ago, I feel even more exhausted and over worked than I did before thanks to my work schedule this week. Apparently, when people know that you're the one not planning on any major summer vacations, all the shifts fall to you. The money making is always nice, but man am I tired and need to sleep for about 24 hours straight. But, I did get to assist on a pig c-section, which from what my resident's were discussing is not a common procedure, so again one of those small victories! I also just started in a research lab again, for the summer, and while it is nice to get back to bench work and hands on science, holy crap balls did I forget that it is a completely different set of brain skills that I need to utilize. It's been information overload for the past couple days, reading papers and trying to keep up with a bunch of board certified pathologists and virology PhD students, but I'm hanging in there.

So much has happened in the many months since I have had a moment to sit down and write out my thoughts. The most difficult to talk about is the passing of my favorite furry friend. I was forced to say goodbye to Heimlich almost 2 months ago. It still hurts. It's still hard. I still look for him everyday when I come home, miss him snuggling with me while I sleep, and even sometimes miss his ridiculously early morning wake up calls for his breakfast. A lot of people don't understand and look at me like I'm crazy when I talk about how much I miss my cat, that I had him cremated privately and have his ashes in a small cat figurine urn, and that I'm just not ready for another pet and won't be any time soon as far as I can tell. But, he was my little, constant, furry friend. After almost 15 years of him being a part of my everyday, let alone the past couple years as his health declined and my daily schedule revolved around feedings and medications and not leaving him home for too long unchecked because he would decide to lose his ever-loving-mind medically, to have that just gone so suddenly is impossible to describe. As a pet owner and veterinary student I'm plagued by the guilt of did I wait to long to say goodbye, was he happy at the end, did I do the right thing all this time? The morning of his passing he was in such good spirits, snugging and kneading and hanging out with me at 4 am when I got home from work. And looking back that past week, he was far more affectionate than normal for him. I think he knew something I didn't. And then he crashed, so quickly, so fast. After sitting in the emergency room at the teaching hospital for several hours and talking with the clinician and student all seemed like a potential bought of normal GI upset for him, he appeared stable enough to take home. I wish I had never made the decision to take him out of the hospital. Even though I'm planning on going into large animal medicine, watching a pet go into hypovolemic shock is not something I would ever wish on any pet owner, large or small. It was terrifying, heartbreaking and one of the worst experiences I have ever been through. I rushed him back, sad my all too quick good byes and he was gone. I still can't talk about it (or write about it) or think about it without tears streaming down my face. My little orange dude, I will miss him forever.

Apart from that, life has been full of the normal ups and downs. Relationship and friendship struggles and triumphs. Failures and successes in school. Finally reaching my stride to some extent in all my jobs. Being back in California means I got to be home to celebrate my nephew's birthday for the first time in a couple years. I get to spend time with my family over the summer or for short weekend trips when I don't have to work. I think that has been one of the greatest blessings of this whole veterinary school adventure.

So what will this summer entail? Work, lots of work, and some fun times sprinkled in between. I have to remind myself that as much as the experience is good and I want to do a great job (especially in the lab, to not look like an idiot!), I also need to give myself a little bit of time off, because year two will be here before I know it. I'm moving to a new apartment in August with a new roommate, and I'm so excited for that chapter of this journey to begin. As much as I hate moving, it'll be a fresh change, a way to move on from losing Heimy and hopefully build a place that feels like home for the remainder of my time here.

I'm sure there's a lot I'm missing, all the little details and fun things I've done. (Short recap of some school/club adventures: got a behind the scenes tour of Monterey Bay Aquarium = amazing, learned how to dart (for tranquilizers) wild animals using various darting guns = so. much. fun., did my first abdominal ultrasound on a dog, successfully assisted on a couple surgeries for work, participated in a couple necropsies, and had the privilege of doing a ruminant palpation on a fistulated cow... plus other stuff I can't remember because it's almost 7 am and I've been up since 3:15 am, don't judge me.)



That's all for now, ttfn and as Bob Barker always said, don't forget to spay and neuter your pets! ;)

i think i'd make a pretty hot alien.

I think I moved to the surface of the sun. And because of the non-stop triple digit heats plus humidity, my life outside of work has been decidedly dull as the thought of going outside induces my sweat glands to enlarge in preparation, it's just not worth it.

For example, I had to run a shite-ton of errands yesterday, so I get into my boiling hot car, crank the A/C, which takes until I get several miles down the road to blow even  modestly cool air thanks to how hot it is, park a mile away at the mall on a Saturday (kill. me. now) and then zip through as fast as I can through all the teeny boppers and families to get what I need and get the hell out. But that ALSO makes you hot and sweaty. It's like a bloody catch-22. At least I was able to do a sweet photo bomb with this group of adults, but I blame them for taking a candid photo...in the mall.

I've also been working just about 7 days a week, but it's not so bad. It's nice and cool in the lab :) The project I'm working on basically requires constant monitoring, so I have to go in almost everyday to at least check on my cell cultures so they don't die. Dead cells = one pissed off grad student.

Despite the heat I have been getting mighty crafty lately. I think I'm trying to get it all out of my system before it gets crazy busy in a few weeks. I made this sweet little wall decor/craft supply holder deal a couple weeks ago.

It's not 100% done, but I like it!

And that's all folks. I'm hot. I've been working. And having some fun here and there. Heimy is still a lazy crabby cat. So basically life is normal. Of course, my co-workers and I? Not so much.

if you're short, have a beard and carry an axe, maybe you can pull it off, but even then i doubt it.

Life without music would be sad. I love music. I listen to it constantly at home, at work, in my car, at the gym, you name it. However, music and whistling? These are two distinctly different things. While I love to hear most any kind of music throughout the day, I do not, I repeat, do NOT wish to hear you whistling some shittacular little tune. You might think you sound like the next Andrea Bocelli of the whistling world, really, in all honesty, you sound like a giant wanktard. If it's 7:30 in the morning, no one wants to hear you belt out your own little tune. They don't want to hear it at 8:00, or 10:00 or even 2:00.

Keep it inside.

You have a running tune inside your head? Grrrreeeaaaaat. Keep it there. Tap it out with the toe of your shoe, even hum a bar or two (but don't get crazy).

And please, for the love of all that is holy and kind, leave the whistling to these guys.

i think they're using a quite liberal interpretation of cuisine.

What is the deal with frozen meals? I get that they're quick and easy but damn they just do not look delicious at all. Why would I want to eat a crusty, shriveled up, freeze dried carrot when I could just pack a little snack-pack of fresh carrots in the morning? Or, I get if you want to have one every now and then for ease because hey, maybe you found one that IS just that delicious. But it kills me when I see people eat these little guys every. single. day. Every day. Now I'm a creature of habit, I tend to order the same thing at restaurants because I know I like it, often I pack the same thing for lunch everyday during a week because I'll make a huge vat of egg-salad. But I can't imagine choking down re-hydrated anything day after day after day after day.

Not to mention the smell these suckers emit when being heated up. It's like a stink bomb mixed with mustard gas and that shit lingers. It's enough to make my stomach clench and burn my nose hairs.

So please, consider those around you, in the same building or even the same zip code when you zap one of these babies back to life every fucking day, because you're making it hard for me to enjoy my sandwich and apple. And are they really all that lean? Or enough to feed a Hungry Man? I mean, they're tiny. Perhaps this is just another one the universe's mysteries that I will never understand.....and maybe don't want to.

just like dr. phil except with more hair and bigger boobs.

One extremely vital part of life is being a good listener I think. I try and be open and willing to listen to people who seek out my ear drums to discuss their problems or what have you, which in my opinion, I think I'm pretty successful.  Whether your issues are with your job, your spouse, your friend, your mom, your pet, that asshole who blocks your driveway with his garbage can or with that co-worker that you want to stab, I'm completely willing to listen, nod sympathetically and try to help you come to a solution for the situation, even if that solution is just to sit down with a bottle of rum and bad mouth the mother fucker until dawn.

However, there are lines people. LINES. Boundaries one might say. Whereas I might call up my best gal pal to discuss the in's and out's of bodily functions or weird medical issues, I would NOT delve into these topics with perfect strangers.

Perfect example. You walk into an office and the young(ish) receptionist proclaims that your twin toddler girls are extremely adorable and my, what a handful that must be! It is ok for you to say thank you and perhaps mention that they're nothing compared to their four older brothers. It is not ok that upon reply from the young(ish) receptionist, for you to then dive into how you and your husband had only wanted one more child, but had twins, so that when you had to go in for a minor procedures they tied your tubes but even THAT didn't work because you were then plagued with a tubular pregnancy at which point you had to have your ovary and such removed.
.
.
.
Do you hear that? THAT is the sound of an over share. Over. Share. This is information, that while I feel for you because that must have be mildly unpleasant, I do not ever need to know. I will never see you again (hopefully). You have also just greatly reduced my already slim desire to have children, logarithmically. So while my face might appear sincere and understanding, inside I'm screaming at you to shut your damn pie hole because I don't give a damn, just fill out your paper and sit down.

I'm not sure what it is about me that encourages people to share these things with me, but if you aren't willing to discuss the results of your morning bathroom visit with me, by all means prevent my inevitable psychotic breakdown by limiting the over shares.

it's an epidemic that needs to stop before i slam my head in the copy machine.

Sometimes age and technology just do not mix. I mean, my grandma is super hip and emails and can use a computer with the best of them. However, there are many people, some not so old as you might think, that go beyond technophobia and simply enter the realm of just being a complete wanker with a lack of common sense. In an age where most machines DO everything for you, it can be frustrating at times when you have to take 20 minutes out of your day to explain how to attach a file to an email...even after you've explained this process several times over and the person has taken notes that include the quite specific instruction of "click on the paper clip that says Attach File underneath". These, my friends, are what I like to call CompuTARDS.

I am beginning to discover that the risk of being a CompuTARD runs deep in the veins of many people born prior to 1980. Granted, those of us born after that date have a bit of a head start since computers stopped taking up the space of an entire room during our childhood but I digress. That fact still remains that if you, or someone you love, suffers from CompuTARDation, the following chart might be of service to you. I find that it answer 99.9% of the "How did you do that?!" questions that I have ever been asked when called upon for assistance.

Image via http://sunandsmiles.com/

Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go have this enlarged and framed. Do you think Staples does 'Bulletin Board' size?

The Phantom of the Drawer

No, I do not have a case of invisible underwear, that would be weird....yet kind of awesome. Imagine how much LESS laundry you'd have! Or maybe incredibly gross, since you wouldn't be able to see it to clean it, and that could produce potential health and smell issues. But I digress..... I have this set of drawers that likes to open on their own in my desk. It's kind of, well, creepy. I'll be piddling along, doing my work and turn to grab something or get up and there one of them is, wide open and gaping at me like some sort of great abyss, demanding I either A. trip over it, B. Get something out of it or C. attempt to close it and be mocked as it opens of its own accord again. Don't believe me, well I took a picture, but then I realized that it's just a picture with a drawer on it that's open, I mean, anyone could have opened it. But I swear on all that is crazy, this baby opened by itself. The picture even says it, see, in the pink. It's like, science, because it's photo documented.

There's a new parking lot near where I work and said parking lot has lots of planters in it with cement curbs, idly waiting for trees to be planted in them (I assume) and today, some lady managed to get her car tire stuck in one. Yes, you read that right, stuck. in. a. planter. How you may ask? I have no fucking idea. She was in a smaller car, low to the ground, so it's not as if the tire would have easily hopped into the waiting dirt. The only thing I can guess is that she was hauling ass and BAM, popped her tire up on in that bitch. Crazy sauce.

And update on the hip: it still hurts like a bitch. Every time I stand or walk and sometimes even when I think about standing or walking. Houston, I fear we may have a problem here. Dag.

I need to find me some pain killers and booze.

Sharing the love via post-it notes :)

This is why I love my friends. Love notes when you get to work are
instant day brighteners.

It's true, you can have it all. No wait, they lied.

Oh life, how funny you can be. One weekend I'll have nothing to do but enjoy being lazy around the house, catching up on my DVR and Netflix. And the next..... everyone and their mother will want to make plans for those exact days.

I always want to do it ALL! I want to play and hang out and do everything that people invite me to do, but this weekend, that was just not going to happen. I thoroughly enjoyed the things I did, I merely wish instead of getting 3 invites for Saturday night and 2 for Sunday, that I could have spread them across 3 weekends. My weekend started great though, with this little surprise on my desk when I got to work on Friday!


Who doesn't like to get surprise love notes while they're gone! Thanks Meg :) We had a bit of a weird day on Friday as well, concerning a mystery shipment. A delivery guy arrives with some paperwork for something he wants to deliver, so I check it out. It's for our office, no specific name but there is a PO number. AHA! I tell the gentleman to bring it on in and run over to our Accounts Payable department to look up the PO. We find a name and I feel smug and satisfied that another delivery crises has been diverted.

And then he brings in the delivery.

As you can see by this photo, this does NOT look like something someone in my office would order.

YIKES! So I rip open the packing slip attached to the thing and I'm reading over the contents of the package and oh holy shit there is tear gas and flash grenades in these suckers!! One thing about being next to the Sheriff's department, and having a similar address, you sometimes get the wrong package. We debated on having our own war game, but opted to call them to pick up their supplies instead.

Needless to say, the weekend passed by far too quickly as it often does when it's full of excitement, but despite all the coming and going, I have little to tell. Except that last night at dinner at PF Changs (yum and YUM and can I say that I have some of the best friends ever who totally embraced getting a bunch of vegetarian dishes, complete with being excited about it! Love you ladies!) and our waiter starts asking questions about who's the vegetarian and asking me why (which is just kind of an awkward question for me to begin with, I don't know why) so I attempt to explain and in doing so reveal my major in school, to which he says he's an animal science major as well and that's probably where he recognized me from and then I was all "Oh wow, hold the phone bucko, you didn't say anything about recognizing me and now this conversation just got a whole lot more awkward considering I can't say I've ever seen you before in my life", which of course was in my head, out loud I just stammered an "Oh really....Uh...." and then when we left he gave a hearty "See you on campus!" and I just kind of nodded and ran.

Totally. Awkward.

Not that it's his fault, I'm generally the awkward kid in the bunch, but then I suppose some one's got to do it!

I am ridiculously cute and love playing with my feathers. Why am I halfway under the bed? Who knows, I'm just that kind of crazy cool.

Whooooooooo are yoooooooouu?

Another Manic Monday is upon me and I'm feeling slightly maniacal. I might have spent the better part of about 25 minutes of my last class today reading My Life Is Average on my phone. I know, it's a fantastic way to put my higher education experience to good use. But, I did find this gem:

"Today, I was in my car about to leave a parking lot. I got scared because my car started rolling forward unexpectedly, but then I realized it was just the car next to me backing up. MLIA"

That happens to me ALL the time! I'm so glad I'm not the only one.

I was antsy and pacing all afternoon at work waiting for the FedEx guy to arrive so that I could mug him and grab my photoshop software that was being delivered. He finally got here, I tore open the box and reveled at the beauty of the new software...until I read the fine print on the side....for systems requirements... requiring Microsoft Windows XP or higher and wait, what? Microsoft. Son of a bitch. I totally ordered the wrong platform. So I'll be spending the next year and a half of my life on hold waiting for a customer service person so I can arrange an exchange and wait for me to mail this sucker back and them to send a new one. Utter. Disappointment. and I am dumb. What the deuce.

Yesterday was sissy-pant's first softball tourney of the season and while they may not have done awesome, they still did good and we had a great day. Beautiful weather, sun, sunblock, snacks. Good times. Then I went and saw Alice in Wonderland and I must say Tim Burton, you do not disappoint. I wasn't really sure what to expect going in and was totally satisfied with my movie experience. Especially since AinW is my favorite Disney movie, my standards were exceptionally high that they not ruin it for me, and alas, they did not. Bravo.

After I got home from the movie I took a shower and went to blowdry my hair and ...nothing. Push the little buttons. Nothing. Try the top plug. Nothing. Push the buttons some more. Nothing. Try a different outlet in a different bathroom. Nothing. Throw the damn thing on the ground and try it again. Nothing. Needless to say, I was at Target on Saturday and then on Sunday my stupid blowdryer kicked the circuit breaker. So scary hair was my friend and I'll be hitting Target at some point in the very VERY near future considering my hair is not long enough to comfortably wear in ponytails for any extended amount of days. Blowdryer: 1 Anna: 0

In other news, I was on the phone with Megan this afternoon who gets excited and says she's off work in 3 minutes! While I still had an hour to go. She texts me with "FREEDOM!" shortly after 4. My response?

"Bitch. I'm going to sharpen my pen into a shive and come find you when I get on the outside."

Needless to say, I earned a snort which makes anyday, a good day.