You know you're a vet student when...

I had a dentist appointment today. I was having a titanium implant put in my lower jaw to replace a missing molar. It's a relatively minor procedure, just done with an injected local anesthetic, then a hole is drilled in the bone and the implant is put in place. Over the course of a couple months, the bone bonds to the implant, and it's used as an anchor for a prosthetic tooth.

So there I am in the chair, having my gums cut open and a hole drilled into my mandible, and these are a few of my thoughts...
1) What size scalpel is that? Eleven? Looks like an eleven...
2) I wonder what they're using for anesthetic. There's a couple of syringes, I wonder what's in all of them...
3) Is it pure titanium or an alloy?

So after the implant was in place and the sutures were done, they did took rads to check the placement in the jaw. The practice has a panoramic x-ray machine, like this:

Your head goes in the middle and the white arms rotate around to give a full mouth radiograph. All I could think was, "When will someone invent these for animals!?" Our radiology professor has always stressed how difficult it can be to get good dental radiographs of animals. It requires some interesting positioning and maneuvering to get the teeth lined up in a way that lets you see everything clearly. One of these things would be awesome in vet med.

Post-Exam Period Decompression

It's like deep water diving. You need some time to depressurize and come back to the world of the normal, land-dwelling people. After Histology on Friday, there wasn't much to report. Other than a "WTF??" moment while looking at a slide of an anal gland (only found that out later...), it was pretty uneventful. Since I was confident I hadn't failed anything, I basically entirely stopped thinking about school once I left that exam room. Some friends and I had dinner that night and went to see Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows (because nothing eases the mind more than looking at Robert Downey Jr...). On Saturday, there was something of a mass exodus of my classmates off PEI, though some of the Americans left on Friday night to get a head start.

I'd almost been too busy over the past few days to even think about marks. I was pleasantly surprised when they came in. One or two were a bit lower, but only by a few points. Notable surprises were Physiology and Histology. I managed to drag Phys kicking and screaming up from a B to an A-, which means I must have aced the final. Woo! And Histology bumped up a couple of points too. The overall breakdown was: 1 A-, 4 As, and 2 A+s. Merry Christmas to me!

So that's that. I have another 12 days of rest, before jumping into Semester 2. Bring it on!

Running on empty

If motivation was gas, I'd be running on fumes and about to call CAA. Unfortunately, there is no CAA for motivation. I have a reasonably good mark in histology already, so even if I just pass the final, I still end up with a 70% or something. On top of that, it seems like a lot of the material has been covered in other classes, so I already know it. So I'm mostly reviewing images to see if I can tell stuff apart. And listening to a lot of J-Core. For non-lyrical interesting music, nothing beats J-Core.

Animal production systems went fine. It was...short, if nothing else. I was done in 15 minutes, and I wasn't the first person by a long shot.

I made chocolate peanut butter truffles. Or I'm in the process of making them. The ganache is cooling in the fridge now. It has to set for a few hours, then I need to roll it into balls and dip them in chocolate and add sprinkles. Yum! They'll be tasty. I just don't know how esthetically pleasing they'll be.

It's snowing like the dickens out right now. It's supposed to warm up and rain tomorrow though, and then be clear on Saturday for my drive home. Ooh, so close but so far away!

And a classmate has just informed me that they've posted all our winter semester courses to our online course content site. Just so we don't totally forget about school!

Countdown - 24 hours, 39 minutes to the end of Semester 1.

And here they come down the homestretch!

Yes, AVC 2015 turned the bend toward the finish line today when we finished Physiology. We aren't all that pleased with it, I might add. It was a seriously rough test. I passed, no question about that. I probably pulled a 70%, and I'd be happy with that. I think neurophysiology saved my butt. The neurophys professor chose short answer/explanation type questions instead of multiple choice, so I could actually thoroughly show what I know. Some of my classmates aren't so sure about it. It's really hard to see your friends struggle. I'm keeping my fingers crossed for them.

So just three more exams to go. Anatomy, Animal Production Systems and Histology. I feel okay about all three. Anatomy is probably my best subject. I've put in a ton of time recently, and I think it shows. I know my stuff. So I just need to review the lecture material a bit this weekend and re-watch some lab videos my friends and I made.

Animal Production Systems will probably take up most of Tuesday studying for me. It's going to be just about all pigs and chickens. Yawn! Oh well. It's not hard material, and a lot of it is pretty common sensical.

Histology and I... I don't actually hate it as much this term. I have some solid study guides, and I feel like the lab material for this test is actually easier than it was for the first one. There's more identifying features this time, it isn't just all pink squiggles and purple blobs. I do need to review for the written part, but luckily, that's not until Friday, so I've got some time.

Onward and upward!

The state of my "Give-A-Damn"

It's busted. Totally broken beyond all recognition. I'm seriously hating on immunology right now. I've been working on it off and on for about 3 hours now (really? it seems so much longer...). The final is tomorrow. I think I'm ready, but I'm never really sure until I get in there and see the questions and I see exactly what I can pull out of the recesses of my brain. Immunology isn't a hugely important class and I've already got good marks in it, so this shouldn't be stressing me out this badly, but it is. It doesn't help that there's a $2500 prize riding on the highest mark in the class.

In any case, I'm tired, I'm cranky, and I want to go home. Not like, leave the library and go back to my current residence home. I mean HOME-home. Home to NS. To my parents. To my dog and my cat and my horse. I want to be done now.

"Reach down your hand in your pocket,
Pull out some hope for me.
It's been a long day, always,
Ain't that right?"
-Long Day, Matchbox 20

Well, that's (almost) all she wrote

Two projects done this week. One more assignment to pass in tomorrow morning. And that's it for Semester 1. On Saturday, we start final exams.

We're all really tired. Most of us are severely lacking in motivation (myself included). We're still mostly having a good time. Tomorrow is Ugly Christmas Sweater day. I couldn't find an ugly Christmas sweater. So mine is going to be Slight Unattractive Sweater with Ugly Christmas Tie. Close enough!

There's some movement of groups. People are scoping out new groups for anatomy next semester. Next semester we do ponies and goats. If you're doing a goat, it's three people to one cadaver. If you're doing a pony, it's six people. My group is one of the few that still really likes each other and still works really well together, so we're sticking with each other. (People formed groups before they knew each other, so now some people hate each other. Or some people are still friends, but can't work well together.) We're opting for a goat. I know horse anatomy reasonably well as it is, and J and A didn't care either way.

Speaking of J, A and I... None of us will be brain surgeons. Who would have thought the brain is so damn complex? I can just about manage "cerebrum", "cerebellum" and "brain stem". But there's so much more than that... We have to know what every single part of it is called, and what they all control. And everything seems to have three names. And do eight functions. And it all looks the same. Except the cerebellum. It looks like cauliflower.