Last week

Last Wednesday, our class went to a humane society, the Franklin County Dog Shelter, and Cat Welfare. The humane society and dog shelter were really, really nice and it was neat to get a "behind the scenes" tour on how the place ran and how they got animals through the system. Of course it's always fun to play with adoptable animals too, especially puppies! The cat shelter, on the other hand, was a very scary place. They had 240 cats and most of them were loose and running around inside the building. I had to shuffle my feet to avoid stepping on anyone. And the poor cats seemed so stressed out. There wasn't room for everyone to have their own space. I know they are trying to do a good thing and keep cats off the street and keep them healthy, but it was way too crowded for those cats...

Thursday was spent getting our accreditation to write health certificates, and Friday we went over a few things, including our student loans and emerging foreign animal diseases. Friday I also found out that the job in Gillette that I had been hoping to get was no longer available and they weren't hiring anyone.

Saturday, I took two friends from school--Mary Elizabeth and Ben--riding with me. Chris joined us too and we all had a good time. Mary Elizabeth felt very safe and enjoyed herself. Ben nearly wrecked twice and enjoyed himself, so experiences are all relative :) It was a day of much needed laughter and relaxation. I hadn't seen Mary Elizabeth in awhile, so it was good to talk to her, and she nearly had Ben and me in tears when she told us that she spontaneously bought a $150 wedding dress online just because she thought it was pretty. That girl is crazy, but I love her :) She has the kindest heart. Sunday I found out that the clinic in Hardin, MT that I had interviewed at was also no longer hiring because the person who was supposed to leave ran into complications and is still around indefinitely...and he's thinking about selling the practice anyway. The rest of the weekend was spent getting ready for my next rotation and job searching, which wasn't terribly fruitful. I'm just so tired of looking for jobs!

Pigs and Turkeys

Monday I went to the hog barn to work until my class got there several hours later. We spent the morning there and then came back to school for a few hours. It was good to be back in the barn, even if I did have to get up at 5:00.
Tuesday, we drove to Fort Recovery to tour egg and turkey facilities. We saw where the young turkeys are housed and it was the cleanest barn I've ever seen. I didn't see a drop of manure anywhere; I don't know how they do it. I would have totally felt fine sitting down in the middle of the barn, the shavings were that clean. The little poults probably only weighed a pound or two and it was funny to watch them ruffle up their feathers and strut around like they were ten feet tall. We also toured a placed where eggs are processed, cleaned, and packaged for shipment. It was fascinating to see and I found it interesting that they said that the "cage free" eggs that people are so concerned about now-a-days are also much dirtier eggs than ones that come from caged hens. Interesting fact. We had lunch and then went to a turkey processing plant. Their days consists of 500 employees on the floor processing roughly 17,000 toms a day, and these birds weight 50 pounds! The typical turkeys that we think of on Thanksgiving day are always hens because toms wouldn't fit in your oven. We saw how the different cuts of meat are removed and processed and also got to see how turkey roasts and turkey burgers are made and packaged. Watching this made me thankful for several things.

1. I am thankful that when I graduate I will get to do a job that I enjoy and one that has variety. I will not have to use a vacuum to suck poop out of turkey butts for 8 hours a day and then return to do it all again the next day.
2. I am truly thankful to the people out there who ARE employed in those jobs so that we can enjoy delicious and healthy food on a regular basis.
3. I am thankful that I have not eaten hot dogs and bologna in years because I just saw what went into making those (including bones) and let me tell you, I wouldn't feed that to my dog...

Family Time

So Friday I headed off to see my horse and check on him for the first time since I've been back from Wyoming. He'd gotten a pretty bad cut on his face while I was gone and Chris had been taking care of it for me. The wound looked really good when I saw it and I took him for a short ride before I had to head to Nathan's track meet in De Graff. He did the long jump and the 800 m. I then went home and the next day I got to see two old friends from high school, one of which had had a baby since the last time I'd seen her. Then I headed back towards Columbus, stopping to see Chris, Ruth, and Jim on the way. Sunday was pretty uneventful but I got a decent amount of things accomplished, which is always nice. Tomorrow is Swine Day and we're going to the hog barn so it should be a pretty fun day for me :)

Cows and Inmates

So today we went to the Pickaway County Correctional Facility or something like that. Basically we went to jail. They have a dairy barn that the inmates work at as well as a slaughterhouse onsite. I don't care how safe they say it is, it made me nervous walking among inmates who were wielding very large knives and giant saws that can cut a cow open. We got to see a carcass go from freshly killed to ground beef or prime cut steaks. It really was interesting, if you could get past the paranoia. We were done in the early afternoon and I came home for the rest of the day to finish the little bit of unpacking I still had to do.

Friday to Wednesday Catchup

Friday morning we packed up the car and I went to the clinic for the first part of the day. We saw a few appointments and then Kelly and I got to sedate four horses and pull fox tails out of their lips, gums, and tongues. The poor horses had eaten the hay before the owner noticed the foxtail weeds in it. Two of them were slobbering, one of which had blood-tinged saliva. The owner just wanted the other two checked as well, since they'd been eating the same hay. The first horse was horrible. The prickly little weeds were embedded all over her mouth and she had a wad stuck under her tongue that had rubbed her tongue raw and ulcerated. It almost felt futile as we tried to flush and remove as many of the plant pieces as we could, but many of them were already burrowed under the mucus membranes. She was the first one that we did and was the worst. One of them barely had any lesions and the other two had a fair amount that we had to pull. It was a good lesson in not knowing what the heck you're doing and being willing to try various methods to see what works. Hopefully these horses never have to go through this again. In the afternoon, dad came to pick me up at 2:30 and we headed out for a 6+ hour drive south to Laramie. It was sad to leave the clinic as I really enjoyed my time there, but I was excited to see Ryan and Jackson in Laramie (both are guys I've met from Paradise and have been friends with for years) and I was also excited to just go home and sleep in my own bed with no traffic, trains, or sirens going off. We stopped in Casper to eat and then drove through the Shirley Basin. I've been through the basin once before and it was gorgeous then, but it was even more gorgeous this evening with the storm clouds behind us, a rainbow in front of us, and an ever changing sunset to our right. AMAZING!

We got to Laramie and headed to Ryan's apartment where we were staying for the night. We watched the movie Buck and got caught up on each others lives before calling it a night. 

Saturday morning, we got up and met Jackson at a local restaurant for breakfast at 7:00. It was so good to see him! There's something about Paradise people. I hadn't seen Ryan in 15 months and Jackson in 8 months, but it was like we'd just been together yesterday. That's how you know people are lifelong friends :)

After breakfast we drove out to see where they kept their horses and I was amazed at the progress Jackson had made with his mare. When I last saw her in July, it took us about an hour to even catch her. His hard work has paid off. Dad and I headed out and made it to West Liberty, Iowa around 9:00 their time and stopped for the night. Got up early Sunday morning and spent Easter driving about 8 hours to Aunt Carrie's in Bellbrook, OH where dad had left his truck. We visited with her and two of my cousins for awhile before heading out, dad towards home and me towards Columbus. I was exhausted when I got back and had to take care of a few things like bills and laundry before falling asleep, not bothering to unpack. 

Monday morning was a harsh reality. My alarm went off at 6:30 am but my Wyoming brain said it was 4:30 am. I headed to school for my first day of Preventive Medicine. We spent most of the day in the University Laboratory Animal Resources building (ULAR) getting a tour and then doing some hands on work with mice, rats, and rabbits. It's not something we get to do elsewhere in school so it was a good experience, except one of the mice promptly died after we were finished with him, which was sad. I spent the rest of the day catching up on other important things and still didn't make it around to unpacking even though I could barely walk through my room. 

Tuesday was pretty boring. We talked about managing outbreaks and then had 4 hours of lecture on poultry and their diseases. It made for a long afternoon. 

Wednesday, we went to the zoo, which was fun, but we didn't get to really see anything or do anything out of the ordinary. I did see 2-3 week old baby lynxes through a window... And Brutus and Buckeye the grizzly bears were tussling around in the cool morning air which was fun to watch.