Down in the Louisianna bayou

I'm trying to see if I can make it through my whole iPod music library. There are 611 songs on my little nano and so far I've gotten through about 250 of them. I'll admit, I've skipped some, but those are the ones I'm not really sure why I put them on in the first place.

I made it across the Mississippi River and almost across the entire width of Louisianna. Not much to see on the road, just come cornfields and cows. I was surprised at how much more fertile Louisianna appeared to be compared to Mississippi. But still, not too much to see.

You may have noticed by now my little DIfferential Diagnosis book in most of my pictures. I'm using it to represent me since I'm traveling by myself and it's hard to find people to take my picture sometimes. PLuse, I don't like being in too many pictures. I don't think I'm very photogenic. It's a quirk of mine, I know. THis little book will be accompanying me to each externship. It's the only one that will be going to all 4 locations since it's the only one that I will be able to take on the place with me to LA (Fossum's is just too heavy).

So I made it to Shreveport and I'm only about 3 hours from Dallas. This city has a really cool boardwalk area on the Red River which I walked around for a couple of hours today. I also bought some presents for myself and my host in Dallas (I had to get her fancy pancake mix to go with the syrup). I would feel worse about it if I hadn't gotten everything on sale. The whole boardwalk is basically a giant outlet mall, which makes it super awesome.

I have to say, I was a little nervous before embarking on this trip. I don't know why. Something profoundly deep having to do with neomg pm ,u pwm amd wprlomg O'm sure. But once I got started everything felt better. This trip feels like the one I took when I graduated college. I spent 2 and 1/2 weeks tromping around Europe, staying in hostels and riding overnight trains by myself. I like traveling alone. You can basically do whatever you want. I don't feel like I have to keep anyone entertained. I can eat where and when I want and, most importantly, I can sing as loud as I want in the car. The only thing I really miss are my cats. It's weird, I know, I'm a cat lady. They're just so damn cute and cuddly.

Tomorrow I'm leaving early to try and get into Dallas before noon, which shouldn't be a problem. I can't wait to start my externship. I know it's going to be great.

Drive, drive, drive and then drive some more

I took that picture at 11:00am, May 27th before I left for my parent's place. I packed up the car with everything I could think of and threw in the kitty cats for a nice little 6 1/2 hour jaunt to the Atlanta area. I saw this sign as I got into Gwinnett county (where my parents are):




My dad will be happy to know that by living in Gwinnett he lives with success.

Trip miles: 355
Total miles: 355

I spent the next couple of days with my mom shopping, eating, hanging out, and, oh yeah, looking at houses. My parents still haven't found a house and after going out and looking with them I can see why. The houses are ridiculously overpriced and the newer ones are pretty but built like shit. Not to mention all the kitchens are impractical. I told my mom that it's because most builders are men and don't understand that you actually have to use a kitchen, not just look at it. Overall it was actually a really nice trip. I don't get to see my parents all that often. So now Lexy and Murry are settled in (and causing trouble) with my mom and dad for the summer.

This morning I left Atlanta and headed west to Meridian, Mississippi. The drive was okay. Truthfully, there's not much between Atlanta and Meridian. I stopped in Birmingham, Alabama to have lunch. I wasn't overly impressed, although there was a really nice park, Linn Park, and a yummy eatery called Zoe's Kitchen. The city seemed like it was inhabited mostly by young, business-type people, although, that may just be the downtown area where I was.



Then there was the drive between Birmingham and Meridian. I am basically traveling west on I-20 for the entire trip to Dallas. I've discovered that there is absolutely nothing in northern Alabama and Mississippi. Seriously, nothing. There was an exit every ten miles or so with a gas station, that was about it. I think the road is mainly just for trucks and people like me on road trips.

Meridian also leaves something to be desired. I drove to the downtown area and drove immediately back out. It's charming but definitely still being rejuvinated. So instead I decided to go check out a little historic landmark, Causeyville General Store. After getting ridiculously lost I found the little store. They grind their own corn meal there and make their own ribbon cane table syrup. The woman who owns it was pretty interesting. She's an elderly woman and does all the mill work pretty much on her own. She used to have several employees but when Katrina hit she had to have the roof re-done on the store and she was forced to let everyone go. She's still paying off the roof. I bought a jar of the syrup that they make to give to my host in Dallas.

Now I'm just chillin' out in my hotel room. I'm exhausted and can't wait to get to sleep!

Trip miles: 364
Total miles: 719

My next adventure

Senior banquet, graduation, the end of classes . . . its all come and gone. I still can't believe I am officially a senior in vet school. Just the thought of it seems ridiculous. In one year I will be graduating. Weird.

Since the end of classes I've been alternating between being incredibly lazy and incredibly productive. I finally got all of the information from Open House together to pass on down to next year's committee. I also met with the clinician and resident I'm doing research with to talk about where we're going (I'm doing a super cool retrospective study on our use of the VAC bandage). I've also made great strides on my cross-stitching project. (I've been working on the damn thing for about a year and a half.) Alright, maybe the last one doesn't quite fit into the productive category but I like it. The flip side of my vacation has been that I've been sleeping a ridiculous amount (almost as much as my cats). I think I've just been catching up from my lack of sleep this semester.

All of that doesn't matter that much to me though. Tomorrow the real fun starts.

I'm doing 4 externships this summer and I leave tomorrow. I'll first be driving to the Atlanta area to visit my parents and give them the kitty cats for the summer. Then I drive to Dallas for two weeks. After that I fly out to LA for another two weeks and then fly back to Dallas so I can drive back home (which is about 850 miles). I'll be home for two weeks before driving up to New Jersey for two weeks then driving to D.C. (the best city on the planet) for two (possibly three) weeks.

So the past few days I've been cleaning my house and putting off packing. Which means the bulk of today is dedicated to packing like a mad woman. How do you pack when you're going to be gone for over a month? I guess I'll find out. Plus I have to pack up the car with all the cat's stuff which includes their cage (which thankfully folds up), two air filters (my dad is allergic), all their toys, some litter boxes, their food, etc. It's like traveling with children. I don't know what I'm going to do with them during the ride (it's about 6 hours). I'll have to stop to give them water I guess and maybe see if they'll go to the bathroom on their harnesses (though I doubt it). If you have any advice on traveling long distances with cats I would really like to hear it.

To add some more excitement to today I have a friend driving up tonight to hang out for a bit. We went to college together and just realized that we live in the same state. I should probably have my head examined for all of this.

I'll be sure to keep posting while I'm on the road and on my externships. This is going to be an awesome summer.

Plan for today

1. Shower
2. Take my medicine final (which I am not prepared for . . . meh)
3. Revel in the fact that I am done with my 3rd year, woohoo!
4. Go out and groom one of the blood donor mares one last time
5. Take a nap
6. Work-out
7. Senior skits!!!

Lets just hope I don't get stuck up on #2. I am really not prepared for this one. Mostly because I'm so over the whole studying thing. My mind is already out of this town and focusing on my ridiculously awesome externships this summer.

Oh, and P.S. Murry is doing fine. So well in fact that he's already eaten another piece of a toy (no obstruction this time) and is back to harassing his poor sister. Stupid cat.

That's it, I'm firing my cat.

Remember that time my cat, Murry, ate a cotton ball and we had to go to surgery. Yeah. Exactly 1 year and 2 weeks after that event we were at it again.

Last week I noticed Murry was doing the usual "I'm sick, I ate something" routine. I didn't think much of it at first because this happens with him often and usually whatever it is passes in a day or so. Well, after 24 hours, a dose of metoclopramide, and several doses of lactulose (the majority of which ended up on his fur) later he had gotten worse. So I took him into the vet school and after some radiographs and an ultrasound it was determined that he needed surgery.

Thing of it is, my parents had told me that the next time he obstructed with a foreign body we would have to consider putting him down. I'll admit, he does have a chronic problem of eating everything and its not fair to put him through surgery once a year. However, I was not ready to let my little kitty go over something that I knew was completely fixable. Luckily my mom came through and told me to take him to surgery, she would help cover some of the expense.

So off we were again, I packed up Murry, headed down to my mentor's husband's clinic (where the surgery is about half as expensive as at school) and watched as Murry got cut open once again.

So here is what we saw:

And here is what we pulled out:



Doesn't look like anything too exciting huh? Maybe another cotton ball? No, he doesn't have access to those anymore. A toy mouse? Hmm, I didn't think so. So I pulled it apart a bit and realized exactly what it was . . .


It was the tail end of this:
That is Murry's favorite fox toy. Note the missing end of the tail. There was a white part that used to belong there, Murry decided it would be tasty. It was a little over an inch long and about 3/4 of an inch in diameter. Pretty freakin' big for a little cat intestine. The sick thing is that he chewed the tail off and then swallowed it whole. What cat does that? I would also like to point out that the toy is missing all four feet. Murry ate those a while ago and proceeded to vomit them up in my bed. I found them when I rolled over and my foot landed in a wet pile of fox legs. I should of taken the toy away then. I'm a moron.

Needless to say the toy is now confiscated, along with all other stuffed animals. In addition, I have finally bit the bullet and bought a cat cage. Its spacious and has little shelves. Murry is about to become a crate-trained kitty cat. No more running around my house destroying things while I'm gone or while I'm asleep. He won't like it but it's better than surgery again right?

Meanwhile, I've been studying for my small animal medicine final which is tomorrow. I'm pretty screwed since I've already been struck with senoritis and I'm not even a senior yet. However, that will all change after this exam tomorrow, I'll be done with junior year and officially be a senior! Woohoo!

I talked to a cow, she asked me not to eat her.

I actually did talk to a cow. She didn't say anything back though. I'm not that crazy.

For the past 3 years or so I've not exactly been a vegetarian but my friends make fun of me as if I actually was one. I generally only eat what my mother describes as "happy cows". In other words, animals that had been ethically raised and slaughtered. That pretty much meant I didn't eat any commercial meat, only locally raised, grass fed animals. Considering that I was a livestock management major in college this was a pretty big deal when I made that decision.

So why did I make that choice? The commercial meat industry is not something I want to support. I don't want to go into my diatribe about the abuse of the common cow or, even worse, the abuse of the people who work for the slaughterhouses. This isn't the place for it. Suffice it to say, the way meat is raised and brought to our table in this country doesn't fit with my personal ethics. I still ate meat but it had to meet my ethical standards.

Well, I've made the final leap. I'm cutting out all meat and poultry, no matter what. I guess its not that big of a leap for me. I barely ate meat as it was. And I love tofu and anything made by Morningstar Farms or other "fake meat" brands (I ate that stuff years before I even thought about not eating meat). I still eat fish and shellfish but give me another couple of years, I'm sure that'll get phased out too.

I guess I just think that if I'm going to cause the suffering of an animal (and I don't think many people would disagree that the animals suffer at some point before they hit the plate) I really should be able to face up to it. And since I don't like causing suffering to anything I just decided to not partake in it. I don't mean to change anyone's eating habits or to be preachy. I was just thinking about this choice I made.

Have you ever wondered why there aren't more vegetarians in vet school? I think there are like 2 or 3 of us in my class. There are more hunters in our school than there are vegetarians. That always seemed strange to me.

Are we done yet?

Its amazing how time flies these days. This past Thursday I went to the sophomore coating ceremony. When we finish our second year we begin our clinical rotations and in honor of that we do a little rite of passage and get our white coats. Its actually a really nice thing that recognizes the ridiculous amount of work that we do our first two years. I got a little choked up though because it seemed like just yesterday that class was starting school. I was one of the students that worked with them extensively during their orientation so I know most of them pretty well. I am so proud of all of them, especially my "little brother" Greg, who I know is going to do awesome on clinics.

What was probably even more emotional was the realization that in a year from now I'll be graduating. Its crazy to think that in one year this will all be over and I'll be entering the real world. For the first time in 8 years I will not be at a university. Hell, for the first time in my life I won't be in school! In two weeks we will be done with classes and we will officially be seniors. That's a crazy thought. I'll be a senior in vet school.

But for now I guess I should focus on the immediate future. Namely my cytodiagnostics and final medicine exams. After that I get a little break before I have to pack up and begin my externship adventures. My car just got a little check-up and it should be ready for the 4000 miles I'll be driving over the summer. My first stop is Dallas. I've never been there before, heck, I've never been to Texas before, so if you know of anything I should check out while I'm there let me know.

Oh, and we had our class elections for next year. I restrained myself and didn't run for class president. I officially have no leadership responsibilities next year. It makes me a little sad but all the same, I think it will be a nice change for me and I'll be able to focus on me and relax a little. Oh, and maybe it'll give me some time to find a job too!