Done!

Classes are over.

Finals are over.

Grades are in.

I got an A- in Management and I passed everything else. I got an A on my Toxicology final. I can't --- Whoa! What did you say?! Did you say, you got an A on toxicology?!!

Why, yes, that is correct. I got an A on my toxicology final.

How does such a thing happen, you're wondering? Well, I'm guessing it had to do with the addition of a bunch of extra points, as occurred on the midterm, only they didn't tell us that they did that this time. Otherwise I have no clue how multiple of my friends, and myself, could have also gotten an A.

So I'm feeling pretty good about the end of this semester.

Course evaluations are over, and I remembered to do them the day before they were due, so I had enough time to provide some thoughtful answers and hopefully some constructive criticism that will make sophomore courses better for the classes under me.

Handbell concerts are over and all went pretty well.

The big church stuff, save for an extra rehearsal tonight and Christmas Eve services, is over.

Daisy the extra foster cat has gone to a new home where she will (cross your fingers) be very happy and they will want to keep her! She is on a 1-2 week trial to see how she settles in. The house seems much quieter without her.

After 4-6 months of attempts and having it on my to-do list, I finally have a Colorado driver's license, Colorado car insurance, Colorado car title, Colorado car registration, and Colorado license plates. I feel that since I am now so prepared, I have almost jinxed myself into getting pulled over...

Grocery shopping for this week's big meals, holiday festivities, and feeding a group of 5 is done.

Christmas shopping is done and almost all the gifts are wrapped.

The house is partially cleaned. Some piles of junk that have been taking up corners for months or longer have been sorted, discarded, or hidden elsewhere in the house. A few things left to clean tomorrow, but much of the big stuff is done.

Wedding and family pictures have been framed and are ready to be hung on the walls.

CLH's family is checked in for tomorrow's flight to DIA. Fingers crossed that the weather holds out, as we are supposed to get snow tomorrow and Thursday.

Plans are in place (depending on weather) to drive to Minnesota next Monday and stay till Friday or Saturday. Should be fun and hope we can make the 15 hour drive without too much delay! Cats will NOT be coming this year, which should be a pleasant change.

All in all, with 48 hours left until Christmas Eve, everything is falling into place and I can finally feel a bit more relaxed. Tomorrow's to-do list still has plenty of items, but they will all get done and it will be a great holiday!

Friday's academic highlight of the day

....was being DONE with the semester! (DONE WITH THE SEMESTER!)

The Toxicology final was not great, but I am fairly confident I got at least the minimum 43% I needed to pass the course.

I got a B on my Prev Med final, A on Clin Path, A+++ on Pharm, probably an A or B on Management, and almost passed BoD (but did well in that course overall).

Yesterday's activities, post-final exam, included running a bunch of errands in Fort Collins: stopped at the dollar store, Michael's, JoAnn Fabrics, Panera, Target, JC Penney, the gas station, and RedBox. Then came home to crash for awhile.

CLH made a yummy new pork tenderloin recipe for dinner, with leftover rice and green beans. Ice cream after dinner, then watched "Julie & Julia."

Slept till 10:15 this morning, when Johnny got into the bedroom and stuck his whiskers in my face. Played some Farmville, caught up on some email, and started cleaning the house (although CLH got a huge head start on this!). Organized and put away all of this semester's papers and notes. Cleaned up the corner table that holds all of our miscellaneous documents, receipts, and stuff to save. Sorted through some of the stuff that has been sitting in the corner of the kitchen for a year. Emptied the dishwasher, did some laundry, investigated why the Christmas tree keeps leaning to the left (no answer).

Tonight we have our handbell concert in Loveland at 7 pm, so I'll need to leave a little bit after 4 pm.

Tomorrow morning is extra early church choir warmup, with our Lessons & Carols service. Then helping CLH record his organ competition pieces. Then rushing home to be back in Windsor by 2 pm to warm up/set up for our handbell concert here in Windsor. Then: no more handbells until January!

Monday's exciting tasks will include cleaning the house further, preparing for in-laws to arrive on Wednesday, grocery shopping, changing litterboxes, and hopefully finally getting my Buick titled and registered in Colorado.

Mostly I'm just glad that school is over. Several of my finals ended up being a bit more stressful than I anticipated, but I think everything worked out in the end. However, I am still in that mode of "What do I have to study next??" Nothing, for awhile! Give me about 2 weeks before I get anxious to be studying again....

Thursday's academic highlight of the day

...was logging onto RamCT just now and discovering that I got 100% on both parts of the Pharmacology final (take-home/open-book and in-class/closed-book)! Whoo hoo!

After this morning's management exam, all that remains for this semester is the Toxicology final tomorrow morning. They gave us the option of taking it this morning or tomorrow morning, and everybody figured that no one would take it early, since we all need time to study. But evidently someone did take it today, because one of my classmates mentioned seeing someone crying afterward.... :(

Toxicology has turned out to be my iffiest class this semester. I got an 82 on the first exam, worth 40% of our grade, and 100 on the two homeworks, each worth 10% of our grade. By my calculations, that means I need to get at least a 43 on the final (worth 40% of our grade) to get a passing 70% in the class.

So I'm studying lots of toxicology today: rodenticides, avicides, biological toxins, toxic household plants, heavy metal toxicities, ionophore and urea toxicity, household toxins, and radiation toxicity. Fun, fun!

In other news, I got an 81.5 on Monday's Preventive Medicine final (which was a bit lower than I'd hoped, considering I got 100, 100, and 94 on the first three midterms). Tuesday's Clin Path results aren't up yet, although I plan to stop by and look at the answer key tomorrow after Tox. My original score of 14/26 on Monday's BoD repro exam was raised to an 18/26 (which is almost passing!) with the addition of some extra points. (But I got 100, 100, 93, 79, 100, and 94 on the first 6 exams in that class, so all's good.) No Ethics final or essay or anything like that, so I guess I'm going with a "pass" for that class.

All in all it has been a fast, though at times very boring, semester. I am greatly looking forward to seeing family and friends, doing a little bit of travel, having Christmas with a new church family, getting the house thoroughly cleaned, finding a home for Miss Daisy, and still having 2 weeks left to relax in January before classes start again!

(Now I just have to pass Tox tomorrow...)

Academic highlight of the day

Today's vet-school-finals-week highlight involved arriving to school at 8:50 am for our 9:10 pharmacology final, and discovering that an equally large class of ecology undergraduate students was preparing to take their final... in the same room as us.

A few minutes later, our professor arrived, was informed of the dilemma, and went off to the pathology office to get things sorted out. (Poor guy. He is shy and seems not to like conflict.) He came back and told us that the problem wasn't that the room was double-booked. The problem was that somebody in the vet school forgot to book the room for our final. Whoops.

We ushered the undergrads into the classroom, while 140 of us stood in the lobby and waited. And waited. And waited. Finally, at about 9:09 and 45 seconds, the ecology professor showed up with his class's exams. Bummer! No room for us in the classroom, after all. (Will we have to find a stable in which to take our exam??)

So, being the professional, resourceful, and flexible vet students that we are, we each grabbed a copy of the exam and hunkered down in the hallways, lobby, computer lab, conference room, empty classrooms, etc. And took our exam. I personally found it most comfortable to lie on the carpeted floor in the building's lobby. It was certainly a unique testing environment.

We got an email later in the day from the assistant dean, who apologized for the lack of a room and commended us on our professionalism and good behavior in adapting to the "stress of having to find a place to take a final, in addition to the stress of the exam itself." Apparently that means we will all do great when we get to clinis, at least according to him!

Meh

Ever take 3 finals in one day, and also squat down to pick something up from the floor, and rip a big hole in the butt of your last pair of decent-looking jeans?

Ask me how my day has been. :-)

Happy one-year Bloggiversary!

Yes, that's right: Yesterday was my blog's first birthday! It sure has been a long while since my first post on December 12, 2008. (2008? Retro!)

I have had a great time blogging and I hope you have had a good time reading. Next semester, I will focus a little more on posting things besides (a) whining about school, or (b) animal reproduction.

Over Christmas break, you can anticipate a "year in review" post as I reflect on all of my posts from the last 12 months.

Thanks for reading!

Have YOU ever been to a Testicle Festival?

Yep, I thought I might be the only one.

This week, we finished two weeks of studying reproductive tract pathology in Biology of Disease. We spent most of the time on the female repro tract - normal female repro, pregnant female repro, and mammary. The instructor allowed about 40 minutes to discuss "the less important stuff" - the male reproductive tract.

The day after she made fun of how unimportant the male repro stuff was, she evidently felt bad about belittling the whopping 1/4 of our class that is male, so we had a Testicle Festival.

The professor baked a round sugar cookie for everybody in the class, and decorated them with different colors and shapes of frosting, marshmallows, sprinkles, chocolate chips, etc. There were about 8 or 10 different types of cookies, each signifying a different pathological condition that can affect the testicles.

So, we had cookies with white frosting and a sperm made out of a chocolate chip with a squiggly frosting tail: seminoma!

We had frosted cookies with half of a sliced marshmallow, and sprinkles: abscess!

We had cookies with red frosting and red sprinkles: hemorrhage!

We had cookies with gummy worms stuck on top: verminous orchitis!

Additional cookies portrayed Leydig/interstitial cell tumors, Sertoli cell tumors, and granulomas.

It was, in a very strange way, actually a good review for next week's repro path exam.

Plus, the cookies were really tasty!

(Sometime I wonder if there's something wrong with me. Then I look around at all of my classmates, and they're just like me!)

Quote of the Day x 2

One of our pharmacology professors, who also happens to be the assistnat dean and the administrative person who has the most contact with students, is board certified in anesthesia and thus teaches us most of our anesthesia, sedation, and pain management stuff.

We were having a review and integrative discussion about anesthesia yesterday. The scenario is a 2 year old black lab who lacerated his footpad and needs to be sedated, anesthetized, and sutured. We have already put him under anesthesia and now his heart rate is 160 bpm (should probably be more like 70 bpm).

The professor is trying to get us to say that a heart rate like this is noteworthy but not a huge cause for concern. The class is not getting it and doesn't understand what he's asking. (He wants us to make the connection that this puts humans at a greater risk for myocardial infarction, which the dog probably won't get.)

Professor: Let me put it this way. Would it be worse for this dog to have a heart rate of 160 while under anesthesia, or for me to have a heart rate of 160 while under anesthesia?

Class: You.

Professor: Okay, why?

Class: ......

One student: Because you're the dean!

Quote of the Day

Clinical pathology professor teaching the last section of cytology; we are discussing transmissible veneral tumors and she is explaining that you don't see many TVTs in Colorado but there are other areas where they are really common:

"There are some places in the world where you can just stand in the street and watch dogs copulating. If you have nothing else to do."

I'm cold!

7:23 am. Current actual temperature = -15 degrees. Current windchill puts us at -27 degrees.

Can it be spring now??

Good times

Nothing quite like a nice Saturday evening spent at home studying the intricacies of dog urine. We vet students sure know how to have a good time (me more than most, I'm sure).

Thankfully, things are looking up now that it's the weekend. It's weird how blogging about stress tends to decrease it...

TGIF

Yep, I think that about sums it up.

I wish I could speak British

I am listening to NPR and they just had a BBC segment where the anchor was talking about "melting glaciers" except he pronounced it "melting glassiers." Awesome.

Logic? I think not.

Every semester of vet school, every student is required to pay a $120 fee for class notes. This isn't included in our tuition. It doesn't cover any of our textbooks or other supplies. It's just so we can get about a ream and a half of paper printed with all of the PowerPoint slides and supplements we'll need for the semester.

The price seems a bit high, but we begrudgingly pay it every semester. Admittedly, it is convenient to have everything printed out that you'll need (at least in theory). Plus, they don't exactly give us a choice.

The other thing we are supposed to get with our physical notes is a CD containing PowerPoint or PDF versions of everything that is printed -- so that we have a back up in case we lose anything, or a digital version if we just prefer that.

In mid-August, we all trooped over to the vet school bookstore, picked up our notes, and paid our $120 plus the several hundred additional dollars we owed for textbooks.

Shortly after, we received an email explaining that "Sorry, we did not get the CDs with the digital version of the notes made up in time. Some technical difficulties. We will get the CDs to you asap."

And, at long last, with a whopping 6 days remaining in the semester.... the CDs appeared in our mailboxes today!

-->sarcasmfont<-- Everybody is so excited about all the wonderful things we can do with this marvelous technology that has finally arrived! -->/sarcasmfont<--

But really, why do things logically? We'd much prefer that you wait till we are all stressed, and then rub it in that we haven't had this tool that we paid for, for 95% of the semester... People wonder why vet students are so picky and finicky and whiny when things don't go right. Well, it's because some of us are paying $48,000 in tuition and fees and we expect to be treated well.

(Do I sound stressed? I think I might be. Note to self: stop being so crabby all the time.)

Life attack!

I feel as though all the activities and stresses of life spent several weeks in hiding and geared up over Thanksgiving break to ambush me this week.

We have 6 days of class remaining, mostly with no assignments (one quiz due earlier this week, another couple next week).

Finals are looming. They are Dec 14-18. Mostly cumulative/comprehensive. Need to study, but when do I have time??

Fortunately my grades are good enough in most of my classes (actually, all of my classes except toxicology) that if I don't get to study a whole lot for finals, I should still be just fine.

We have an extra cat in the house. She is a sweet, petite, stray little girl but is shaking up our routine. Several people interested in her but most of them are sketchy folks who saw her on Craigslist. Send responsible adopters my way!

I am trying to get registered for the next business class for the spring semester. The curriculum coordinator emailed us when we registered for classes and told us not to worry, we wouldn't be able to register for the undergrad business class just then because they needed to put in an override for us. She said she would email and let us know when we could register. She emailed a couple weeks later to say, "Just checking to see if you have been able to register yet?" None of us have. All the sections are full. Bleh.

Handbells is starting to consume my life. In the next 3 weeks, we have 5 concerts (2 in Cheyenne, 1 in Windsor, 1 in Fort Collins, 1 in Loveland) and 2 rehearsals (1 in Windsor, 1 in Cheyenne). Next Tuesday is our last pre-concert rehearsal. We need about another month of rehearsals! The director mistakenly thought we actually had 2 weeks left. He was running late this week so I led the first hour of our 90 minute rehearsal. I'm playing in 2 small ensembles that require extra rehearsal every week, and I'm accompanying on piano for a bell solo and a bell duet. Our first concert, Dec 11 in Cheyenne, is with several other musical groups including a winds ensemble and percussion ensemble. Our director composed a piece for us to play with them, and I saw the music for the first time two days ago. They didn't have an extra copy so I have nothing to look at before the next rehearsal ("dress rehearsal") unless I can borrow one from someone, and the piece is hard! I think I have the hardest part. I have to simultaneously thumb-damp G7 and A7 shelleyed in my right hand to simulate sleigh bells for most of the song, while playing G6 and A6 four-in-hand in my left hand as part of the melody. Occasional transitions to G flats and A flats. Arrrgghh.

Also trying to work out a conflict between handbells and pet hospice. The one mandatory hospice meeting of the year happens to coincide with the Thursday night when we are supposed to be having a handbell rehearsal up in Cheyenne. Still not sure how we're going to work that one out... have not been able to get the pet hospice person to respond.

I can look forward to several extra trips down to Denver in the next few weeks for CLH's choir concerts. One of them was last night, and again on Dec 16. Got to learn some new piano accompaniment before then.

Just realized I haven't put anything on my word blog for over a week.... good thing nobody is clamoring to get their daily word! I know how popular that one is. :-)

We are doing lots of new Advent & Christmas music at church, most of which I have not sung before, and I am missing most of the Thursday night rehearsals due to various other activities. Extra Christmas Eve service between Sunday services, plus an extra choir rehearsal that week since Christmas Eve is on a Thursday!

The Christmas tree is up with most of the lights on, but almost no ornaments and we haven't gotten any further in the Christmas decorations (although the boxes are sitting in the living room).

In-laws coming to visit and stay with us later this month. I would love to not have to clean the entire house on the day before we have company, but that may end up being when it gets done.

In the meantime, I get to try to not fail my classes and also try not to go crazy. I have memories of being a kid and thinking of May as the worst and busiest month of the year.... but I think December will win for the current academic year.