Hi there; Birdie here!
Once again it's Monday and time for me to blog about last week. Neuro test worked out great, and I made a good grade in diagnostic imaging, too. Next up is our physiology final, focusing on renal phys. I studied a bunch over the weekend but I'm still not sure I'm ready...luckily I still have today to work on it. I had a little more relaxed weekend than the last one and managed to go for a run Sunday morning and watch several episodes of How I Met Your Mother besides my study time. Pathfinder this week was kind of awkward, for in-character reasons...I don't really want to go into it. I'm definitely looking forward to next session, though, and I hope they don't have it without me.
See, this weekend is when I'm going back to Colorado, this time to Fort Collins for SAVMA symposium. I still haven't figured out my shuttle from the airport to the hotel, so I'm planning on doing that this afternoon (or maybe this morning since we don't have class until 10). Luckily it looks like there's a discount code for SAVMA...I'm still annoyed that they didn't do anything to help me out when I'd been led to believe they had a shuttle included with my room rate and it turned out they "never had a shuttle." Symposium should be pretty cool, even if I only get to do one wetlab and afaik it doesn't actually involve live animals or procedures (it's a communication thing). Apparently there's a semi-formal one night so I need to bring a dress...luckily I've got the one I want to bring here in BR with me. A bunch of my classmates are actually leaving for it much earlier than I am...from what I saw, there's an opening reception at 5:30 on Thursday so that's when I tried to be there. I know some people are delegates and have to be there Wednesday for a meeting, but apparently there's also some stuff earlier on Thursday and maybe even before that. I've decided I'm okay with missing that though...if I love symposium and am going to go next year, maybe I can try to go earlier. For now though I'm pretty happy to not be missing any bacteriology lab time (if my calculations are correct). I'll definitely be blogging about the symposium once I've experienced it!
Unfortunately I won't be able to drop off my car at the dealership near the airport like I was planning since I'm getting in on Sunday and they're closed so I couldn't pick it up then. The "maintenance required" light is on, and I was planning to finally get the windshield replaced too (since it still has the crack from when I was driving back from Covington). Since I can't do it then I don't know when I will be able to...
Saturday morning before Pathfinder I also got to do a wetlab. It was with AAHA, and let us practice small animal endoscopy. I've seen a bunch of endoscopy on horses, but now I've actually done one on a dog! They also had a couple of models for us to practice on (which my group did before the live dog): a plastic tubing "colonoscopy" with an apple half in the "ileum" to practice taking biopsies, and a plush tiger with a jar of tootsie rolls in it's "stomach" for foreign body extraction. A couple of the guys in my group wanted to unwrap one of the tootsie rolls with endoscopes, but as far as I know they never did. It was really cool to do the actual dog: I saw its larynx, esophageal mucosa, stomach with rugal folds, pyloric antrum, and even the duodenum! I personally didn't get a good view of the duodenal papilla, but other people did. Getting through the pylorus I was pretty much blind, but the clinician helping me said to keep going so I did and eventually I made it through! And other than that part I pretty much did it myself. That was a lot of fun!
Last week we also had our first path wetlab. There were a few cases: a couple of dogs, couple of cats, and a sample from a snake's mouth! I learned about pyogranulomatous inflammation, which then became relevant to our next bacteriology/mycology class, and I learned that cat eosinophils have rod-shaped granules that look like bacteria. I love doing the clin path wetlabs--since I'm a first year and don't know approximately anything, I feel pretty free to ask questions, so I learn a lot. Unfortunately the rest of our diagnostic imaging club wetlabs (including the abdominal one we were supposed to have Friday) got cancelled due to the lack of participation at the first one. I guess people prefer to come to wetlabs involving actual animals...
Also, I think I mentioned the live Night Vale show in my last post? That was great. I got to have dinner with my sister beforehand, and then went to the show. As I was walking in, there was a guy in a "All Hail the Glow Cloud" shirt (it's a reference), which made me sure I was in the right place even as other people talked about coming for some band (I think they were the weather--by which I mean part of the Night Vale show--but it confused me at first). I wound up walking out right behind him and the girl he was with, too--just a random coincidence, but it was something I noticed. There were a few cosplayers: I think I saw 2 Carloses and one Cecil. Cecil himself in the show (who, btw, was not dressed up as the character Cecil) had a lot of fun with us. When he was reading horoscopes, people would scream for their signs and he basically picked a person to talk directly to for each one (I was not the chosen Cancer). Even as he read his script he was still reacting to the audience (the way he said "There's nothing there!" when someone in the audience screamed--I'm sure it was part of the script but the way he said it sounded like a response). Anyway, it was a lot of fun and I've got the poster on my wall now.
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