Emergency!!

Sorry the posts have been slow.. spring and summer is so busy that it's hard to take a shower sometimes let alone post to the blog. It's been mostly enjoyable as most of the things we see this time of year are routine. It's nice to see horses happy, healthy, and not in distress once in a while!

I recently saw an emergency that was a pretty common laceration; a horse reared in the trailer and hit its head, cutting it open. Usually these are ugly (there's not a whole lot between skin and skull and when people see bone they FREAK OUT). Even if you can see bone, it's really not that big of deal.

At any rate, this horse was bleeding and his head was ripped open. I called the next few appointments to reschedule so that I could go see this appointment-- mostly to subdue the overly panicked people. I was an hour away and on my way. However, the people needed to call me 3 times to ask where I was. SERIOUSLY?! I just rearranged my whole day. Would you like me to time travel too?

Long story short, I got there, fixed the horse, it was fine. Rah rah rah.

Days have been too long...

MD vs. DVM

Ha! On ABC news this morning they did a story about an MD who "couldn't believe" animals get the same diseases as humans. She even wrote a book about her shocking conclusions (Zoobiquity); that animals get diabetes, heart disease and even cancer. Whoa! Shocking stuff! The story was closed by her telling the camera "Yea! And vets don't even get to TALK to their patients, so they really have to OBSERVE." Did she not know what vets do everyday?


Sorry to all the MDs out there, but this lady made you look like total idiots. I know it's not all of you, but man, that was embarrassing!

Kind of Psychic

Ok so my premonition was about 80% right. The foal I was talking about was born at 10:45pm on Wednesday night and the entire labor was as easy as they come. (Yahoo!) Everything was so easy that they didn't even have to call me one time. The baby was a big, chestnut with a big white blaze, but it was a colt. Dangit! That's the only part I got wrong! Oh well...I'm very happy it all went well for them. They are super excited too! I should have taken a picture!! Perhaps a picture will be soon to come.

Oh, also someone told me to "Kiss my ass!" today because I wouldn't treat his foundered horse for free. I was also told I don't love animals. This guy was so ridiculous that it was actually hard not to laugh, but still... seriously? He called me Wednesday and proclaimed his horse was foundered and he had no money to treat it-- couldn't even afford the $48 farm call. I tried to advise him the best I could over the phone and told him that I'd call him Friday (today) to see how everything is going. At 10:30am this morning he called my cell phone while I was in an appointment and left a nasty message saying, "You said you would call today, and you HAVE NOT!". Well, being as it was only 10:30am, I fully intended on calling him when I wasn't in an appointment. However, after that message, I thought I'd probably drag it out to the end of the day. By noon he left another irritating message, so I called him back so I wouldn't be continuously harassed throughout the rest of the day. Then he told me again he had no money and his horse wasn't getting better (founder is a fairly intensive, long, drawn out, expensive and chronic disease. I didn't think it would fully resolve in 48 hours.) I explained to him what the fees were and why they were in place, then he exclaimed "Horse shit!". Of course that escalated to the "You don't love animals, blah blah blah".

People. If I have to pay for your animal's medical care by giving my services for free, than I obviously "love animals" way more than you. Idiot.

Indentured Servant

Like every good veterinarian blogger, I have to spend at least one blog post on student loans. I try not to complain about them excessively, because I did sign on the dotted line for them. I chose to go to vet school and  finance my education with student loans.

HOWEVER...my vet school tuition per year was $25,000 (a little less at the beginning, and little more at the end since tuition just soared every year I was in school). My total loans owed came out to be $131,000. Tuition alone cost me $100,000. The remaining $31,000 was a combination of accrued interest and money I had to take out to pay rent, electric, eat, etc. I worked quite a bit in vet school. Sometimes working 2 or 3 jobs at once just so I wouldn't have to take more loans out to live on. This means that between four years, I lived off of $7750 per YEAR plus whatever I could scrape together by working. At any rate, vet school wasn't living the high life, and the neither is the life now.

My student loan payment every month is $970 (one third of my monthly paycheck)...for the next 25 years. This means I will pay off my student loans by age 51. Currently I feel like an indentured servant just working to pay my loans and not much else. I am unable to save significantly for large items like a house, retirement, or anything else. I also get no health insurance from my job nor any retirement savings plan, because, as a small business, they can't afford to provide either. My salary is average for a new vet. Unfortunately, salaries for seasoned vets aren't much higher, and I don't have large raises to look forward to.

Even though helping animals is fun and rewarding job to have, I honestly have to say that my resentment for the profession stews every day because of my student loans. The profession as it is now is unsustainable. How can we sell large debt amounts and servitude to people looking to get into the profession?? I'm lucky. I have a husband that works and brings a decent paycheck. He got a four year degree and has minimal student loans (less than $3000). He makes almost double my salary. I often feel like he supports me while I "play" in a hobby that just barely pays for itself. My financial contribution to my household is minimal; and, honestly, I'm embarrassed. I'm embarrassed that I am a smart person and was kind of tricked into following my passion even though it put me and my family into nearly unpayable debt, and set back many of our financial goals by years and decades.

My boss always tells me, "Don't be resentful of the job and profession because you overpaid for your education." I try to not have ill feelings towards it, but some days it really gets to me, and it stings really bad.

My second choice to vet school was to go to medical school to become an orthopedic surgeon. While perusing jobs, I came across an ad for such a position. The base salary was $450,000 per year. Passion for animals only goes so far, and while it's a nice thought, it doesn't pay the bills. If I was making a $450,000 salary, I feel that I could probably do more to help animals than just being a veterinarian. Sighhhh...

Off to start an insanely long day!

Hugs!

Today an older middle aged couple BOTH hugged me after I handed them the bill and they paid. Did I save their horse from a bad colic? Nope! Did I birth them a live foal? Put their old faithful horse to sleep? No and no. Although these are usually the type of appointments I get hugs for, these hugs were freebies. All I did was vaccinate their 8 horses.

I think 6 months ago, this would have creeped me out. But now I'm usually rushed, hot, and frustrated with a pinch of resentment-- so these hugs were well appreciated by me. It's just nice to feel like someone cares about me instead of always having to care about everyone else and their horses 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Two hugs from some nice hippies really do make a good day.

Foreshadowing

I have the sweetest client who has a mare that is due to foal anytime. It is her most favorite mare who she has shown successfully and absolutely ADORES. This is the mare's first foal and the owner's first foal, so as expected, they are very excited and very nervous. They are even having a party for the foal later this month!

The foal's official due date was yesterday  (May 3). Obviously, I am pretty nervous for this delivery too, because if anything goes wrong, it will be a catastrophic disaster off the Richter scale for this client. So I'm REALLY hoping all goes well, the foal pops out, stands up, drinks, and goes on about it's life normally.

This post is just to simply record that two nights ago I had a dream that the foal was a sorrel filly with a big white blaze. It came out  without any problems, and it was a big happy, and easy event.

Dear God, I hope I can see into the future and this isn't my subconscious jinxing me...

Good Days

So our practice recently started sending out a newsletter quarterly for funsies. I wasn't sure the response we would get, but it's been really wonderful! I am surprised. Turns out all those marketing people know what they're talking about...who would've thought!

This week has been beautiful weather and ridiculously smooth. Every client I've seen has been wonderful, on time, horses have been well behaved. Ahh! So nice to have a week like this every once in a while. It's a good reminder why I chose to do this.

There is no doubt that I'm looking forward to the weekend though! I'm on call, but oh well. Hoping for the best and rolling with the punches.

Cause It's Important To Me

There's been some strife in the veterinary profession. This blog post pretty much sums it up.

http://vetsbehavingbadly.blogspot.com/2012/04/we-are-small-business.html?showComment=1335923717881#c9139934313993372603

Selling drugs or selling our souls?

So--to all 2 people who read this blog, what do you think about vets selling drugs?

Perhaps this is more of problem in the equine part of the industry, but commonly I am asked to sell drugs to people who like to "play" veterinarian. They are diagnosing and treating their own horses. One guy today was injecting his own joints! He wanted me to sell him all the necessary drugs, sedation, and syringes for him to do it. Maybe I'm just being a prick, but if I'm going to do that, then I'm going to inject the joint too-- then at least I know it's being done correctly, humanely, and cleanly. Furthermore, if there are complications (let's say at 12am, because they're never at normal times), do I have any obligation to help these people? I feel sorry for the horse, but that puts me in a tough position.

Sorry, but I paid $130,000 to learn how to do that, I'm not going to sell you drugs so that you can do it on your own. Don't chastise me for being "young" and "scared". Don't misinterpret it--I'm just being ETHICAL.

Wowza

With the sudden increase in appointments seen, also comes a sudden increase in "What the heck?!" moments; sometimes I have multiples a day even. Here are just a collection of short rants to my most favorite people:

1) No you can't be seen today. Especially when you call at 3:00pm demanding your horse be vaccinated before 5:00pm. Please don't give me attitude when I schedule you for the next day and tell you your Coggins won't come back for a week unless you pay double to have it overnighted. You have a YEAR to get these things done. It's not my emergency when you wait until the day before you need them.

2) Don't call my personal cell phone 5+ times then leave a message saying "So sorry to bother you, but..." You ARE bothering me. You're calling my personal cell phone. You're calling my personal cell phone 5 or more times.

3) When you page a veterinarian for an emergency at 12:05am, please do not keep me on the phone for 30 minutes talking about your chronically foundered horse's life story. He's foundered again because you gave him unlimited access to green grass. Yes I am sure. No I do not want to come out at 12:30am to come see him. I can put you on the schedule for tomorrow morning (or is it this morning?). No, you don't want that?? Ok. Then why'd you call the other vet in the practice the next day saying you'd "rather have a male vet" while giggling like a total creep. Wow.

4) I can only get to emergencies as fast as I can drive. When I say that I'll be there in 30 minutes, don't say "That's not fast enough!" Would you like me to jump in my personal helicopter?? Lord knows I'd much rather be sleeping than seeing your horse at 11pm on a Wednesday, but I'm still doing it. Don't be a total jerk.

5) When I see your downed horse that is a BCS of 2/9 and is so dehydrated that its eyes are sunk in, don't waste your breath trying to convince me that you take care of it. Obviously, you don't.


Among these righteous, annoying, and downright rude people, there are plenty of clients who are polite, kind, and altogether wonderful. Thank God for those people, otherwise I'd be quite bitter towards the world in about 3-4 workings days.

Sorry!

Sorry for the slow posts. Spring time has hit in full force and without warning. We went from being kind of busy to full-tilt busy. I have been compiling a long post in my head-- so that will be coming soon. It will be a long rant...I will be back soon; albeit, probably not as often as previously. Since I've eaten my Ramen noodles, onward to finish the last half of the day!

Heart Wrenchers

Sometimes you have cases that disturb you so much that they literally alter your attitude, happiness, and frame of mind for 24 hours or sometimes even more. Unfortunately, I had one of these last night.

I'm not sure why this one bothered me so much. I have performed plenty of euthanasias. Sometimes they make me sad, other times, I'm relieved that the suffering of the animal and humans can finally be finished. This euthanasia was no different. The horse was suffering, and there was no doubt that it needed to be done.

Perhaps it was because these clients have had the worst horse luck of anyone I've known in the last year. They're incredibly nice people who are trying to do things right, have decent facilities, nice horses, and genuinely care and love their animals. In the last year, they've had to put two horses asleep (now three), and have had two of the nastiest lacerations that I've ever seen. I just want something to go right for these people!

Their horse had looked as though it got tangled up in the fence. However after some detective work, it appeared that it got kicked (a strong blow that broke its olecranon and possibly its humerus too) and then fell into the fence. Of course, the horse was young, extremely gentle, and trustworthy. It broke my heart to have to euthanize that horse. It was in extreme pain and unable to move the broken leg. I hate acute injuries that are just "bad luck" and nothing else. "Bad luck" is the story of this poor client's life.

That heart-ache has bled over into today. Some days it can be hard to just get up and do it all over again. Being a veterinarian isn't all puppies, kittens, and happiness.

May-rch!

This week has been a whirlwind so far. I have no idea how it's only Wednesday since each day has lasted 12-14 hours. It has also been in the low 80s which is unseasonably warm for the area. Because of this everyone remembers that they have horses; horses to vaccinate and horses that have been lame, oozing pus, lacerated etc. I have been sweating way more than I should, and I'm getting cranky.

Onward to three on-call weekends in a row. This means I'll be on call for 26 straight days. Hizzah!! I will probably have some good blogging material. Stay tuned...

Writing Letters

Even in my short career, there have been many times people have asked me to write a letter: to describe a prepurchase exam, to describe something to a farrier, to state the condition of humane cases, etc. So when a client called our practice wanting us to write a letter, it didn't throw up any red flags. However when I arrived on the farm, it was clear to me that this was something different...

As the first order of business, the owner wanted me to palpate a mare that was VERY pregnant. They decided that she was not in fact pregnant because she "shoulda had it by now". Ok. Not the soundest logic, but whatever. I stuck my arm in about wrist deep and confirmed that she was indeed very pregnant. (The fetus was large to say the least.) What was the most striking about the mare is that she was extremely thin. (2-3/9 BCS). This is what they wanted me to write a letter about. Apparently someone had called the Humane Society about this mare due to her condition. They wanted me to write a letter stating she was healthy. I told them I'd write them a letter, but it would not say what they probably wanted it to say.

After talking with them, I found out that this mare (a small Quarter Horse type mare) was bred to a Percheron "by accident". They apparently rescued (I use this term loosely) this stallion as a weanling; it is now 7 years old. They were unaware that it was a stallion and put the mare in the same pasture with it. Apparently they thought the testicles of stallions just fell off at some point during their young life; thus, magically rendering them sterile.

So writing this all down is filling me with rage all over again. At any rate, we had a long discussion about proper feeding, how much hay is adequate, improper breeding, and the birds and the bees of the horse world. These people were just plain ignorant, and unfortunately not interested in learning anymore.

Needless to say, I didn't write any letter. It's better that way.

Old Timers

It's been over a week since I last posted. This was mostly because Blogspot wasn't cooperating with my Internet Explorer, and I was always too rush to figured out how to make it work. This morning I finally buckled down and made it work.

Last week I ran into a common frustration many of us young, whipper-snapper vets run into. The old timers. We all learn many things for those people who have been in the profession for 40, 50, even 60 years. However, sometimes the standards they set us up for just, well, suck. Last week I was having a conversation about the cost of vaccination. The client had 5 horses they wanted to vaccinate. Vaccinating a horse isn't cheap-- even our cost for vaccines has sky rocketed in the last 3-4 years. To make matters worse, these people have no business owning 5 horses. At any rate, I quoted them a price (well over $500) and they were shocked. They tried to reason with me, "But Dr. Old Timey used to let us use vaccine by weight and we split the dose of vaccine three ways for the ponies. Then in half for the horses. And he only charged $6 for each dose." *Facepalm* Obviously, if you know anything basic immunology, you can't split a full dose of vaccine 2-3 ways and expect it to be protective. Furthermore, I have no clue what he was selling these people for $6. There are no vaccines that are even close to that price, even at our cost.

To make a semi-long story short, I tried to talk to this clueless lady about some theory of immunology to explain why we couldn't do this now. (Dr. Old Timey unfortunately suffered a stroke last summer and is no longer practicing. Because of this we are picking up quite a few of his clients. So stories like this are becoming more common). Not surprisingly, the people didn't make an appointment to vaccinate their horses, even for the minimum of vaccinations.

While I respect these old timers, I think it is also important to maintain a CURRENT idea of science and medicine. That's your job. From friends and my own experiences, I've heard stories about different old timers doing things like re-sterilizing single use disposable needles and disposable surgical gloves (and treating post-surgical infections routinely); charting medical cases with a date then describing the patient's visit with a simple check mark for notes; treating a severe colic with a shot of penicillin and leaving the horse to die instead of recommending euthanasia. I'm sure all of these things are well meaning. It just makes it really hard for other vets to come in and do the right thing when the preexisting standards for care and cost were set in the 1950s and haven't changed since.

Back to Work

It was a good weekend. I was not on call and in the next state over showing my own horse. I very rarely get to escape from it all, so it was VERY NICE to do something for me, to not evaluate any other horses, and do something I love. (I keep it a close secret that I'm a horse vet at these shows so I don't get tricked into working on my 'vacation'!) I have a Reining horse who is my pride and joy. I saved up all the money I could to buy her and she is just everything I expected and more.

This is only my second show season showing in the NRHA (National Reining Horse Association) so I'm still not that great at it. Luckily, my horse is really good at it, and often does the right thing even though I consistently tell her to do the wrong thing. She is saintly most of the time! I am learning and she is patient.

This weekend was exciting because we did well enough to win our first NRHA check! Woohoo! The run where we won a check wasn't very good. Lucky for us, everyone else in the class did poorly too--and we just did a little less worse than the rest.

It's always so hard to go back to work after weekends like this that make me forget about real life. First step is to call back all those people who called my cell phone and left non-emergency messages over the weekend. I'm happy to help, but some people just abuse the service of free advice. I'm thinking I'm going to change my cell phone number to a 1-900 number so that they have to input a credit card number before they talk to me and then I charge by the minute. :) I think it would be a great idea!

Out Of Steam

Utterly exhausted today..and still have one more day to go. Oye...

At least things are starting to gear up!

Horrible, no good, very bad day

Are some people innately evil? I'm beginning to think so. Today started at 1am with one of those innately evil people; a client of mine whose husband went a little bonkers. She was scared he was going to harm her and her animals. She called me to try to find a place for the critters.

At 1am this obviously disturbed me. The scenario played out and ended in jailtime. My phone stopped ringing at 330 am and began again at 7am with the aftermath. Obviously I'm not getting the whole story (nor do I really want to). I just want the animals I've come to know and love to be safe. The whole day I've been on edge dealing with this. I guess this is one of the "perks" to practicing in a small town. Not only are you the veterinarian, the person who people rely on for animal health knowledge, but you become friends and part of their support system.

The whole situation is just incredibly sad and messed up. People can be so evil to eachother and to their animals. The whole day has been so  heavy...

Taking the Leap

Ok. So I think I'm going to make the first big equipment purchase-- a digital radiography system. This is a leap, but I think it will pay off. Like a farrier once told me, "If you can't invest in yourself, why would anyone else invest in you?"

So true! Here goes nothing :)

The horrible, emergency ear twitch

I recently received a phone call at around 7:30pm on an evening when I was not on call. These phone calls annoy me because I'm only not on call about 25% of all hours in the year. So the last thing I want to do when I'm off is answer the phone for veterinary related questions. However many people feel comfortable calling my personal cell phone for ALL their minute, emergency, and appointment making phone calls. I'm not sure how this happened, and I'm not sure how to change it. At any rate, the poor lady was exasperated.

Ms. Worried: Hi Dr. VetChick, uhh something really bad happened, and I just wanted to call to see what I should do.
Me: Ok, what's going on?
Ms. Worried: Well, my daughter was riding her horse at a canter and then all the sudden he started shaking his head and pinned his right ear FLAT TO HIS HEAD. We looked at there isn't a tick in his ear.
<pause>
Me: Uhh, ok. How long did this continue?
Ms. Worried: Only a few seconds.
Me: Well, I guess I would start looking for pieces of the bridle that may have shifted and caused him discomfort during the ride. Then I would try to re-create the behavior by palpating his head to see where the origin of the discomfort is.
Ms. Worried: Ok we will do that. Thank you! <Hangs up abruptly>

In retrospect, maybe I should have tried to tell her that this wasn't an emergency nor anything to be so anxiety-ridden about. I never heard anything back, so I guess they figured it out. (And I have no clue why she told me there were no ticks in the horses ears. It's not exactly tick season here. Weird.) It's funny what people think is pertinent to tell you.  I once had a lady tell me she knew her horse wasn't colicing because it passed nice, relaxed farts. You know, not those mean, nervous farts.

It was hard to be mad at that interruption of my time. It was kind of funny...

Professionalism

I think that professionalism, manners, and etiquette are all going extinct. What makes me the most infuriated is when another veterinarian can't extend any professional etiquette to me. IS IT REALLY THAT HARD?? Sometimes I blame myself; maybe they don't respect me because I'm young, maybe it's because I'm a lady, maybe it's because they think I'm a push over. However, the more it happens, the more I think it's not really my fault. Instead, I think they're just jerks.

Recent consult from local veterinarian VIA TEXT MESSAGE:

Dr. Classy: Hey, I think that CuteHorse with massive, slow healing wound needs some attention.
Me: Why what's going on?

I attempt to call to discuss the case like professionals. (No answer, no return call.)

Dr. Classy (14 hours later via text): Don't worry, it was a hard case.

Uhhh? What?! It took 3 phone calls to the owners and a subsequent visit to CuteHorse to determine that the wound was actually healing quickly and extremely well. Dr. Classy just hadn't seen it before and thought it looked "weird" because it was an open wound. Wouldn't have a professionally placed phone call the asking proper questions cleared up this misunderstanding easily?

If you can't offer professionalism and etiquette to your colleagues, who do you offer it to? I hear it all the time from seasoned vets: "But Vetchick, I'm just too burnt out, too tired to do that." Perhaps I'm just intolerant, but if you're too burnt-out to treat people with respect, then you need to find another profession, or at least take a LONG sabbatical. Being burnt out is NEVER an excuse for poor service, poor medicine, or just plain laziness. Take care of yourself and do your job.

*Step down from soapbox.*

Emergency Coverage

It's been a while since I posted. I think it's mostly because the last few days have been enjoyable, and I've had little to complain about. The weather has been good, there hasn't been an insane amount of calls, nothing crazy weird, or unexpected. I guess that means that my karma is coming. Oy.

I would like to bring up a subject that has been bothering me though and see what you all think. A nearby all equine veterinary clinic decided last fall that they would no longer see emergencies. I understand this-- it's VERY easy to get burnt out quickly with emergencies, and sometimes you just have to put yourself and your family first.

As far as I can tell, the decision was arbitrarily made and none of the clientele were informed. In fact, if you call the office one minute after 5:00pm, the phone just rings and rings. There's no message, no notification that they will not be calling you back, no name and phone number of a veterinarian that will see emergencies, nothing. Many times, our clinic has received emergency calls from these clients who are downright enraged by the situation. We have even picked up a few clients who have made the switch to us because of the lack of emergency coverage and poor communication about the decision to stop providing it.

My hunch is that this clinic did not inform their clients because they do not want to lose any business to us (the only people in the area that see 24 hour equine emergencies) or to anyone else. Do you think it is unethical to leave your clients high and dry like this? Does not providing the name of an emergency clinic count as "failing to provide emergency service" as it says in our licensure rules and requirements? I'd like to hear anyone's thoughts. The whole situation irks me to no end.

Woohoo!

Hooray! This morning I called back to check up on a laminitis flare up. The lady loves this poor gelding and has literally gotten gray hairs over this 4 week lameness. Last week he was doing well on his 2g Bute, so we are steadily decreasing the dose to test his pain threshold. Today we are at 0.5g with no increased pain. The lady is so happy and I am too. I love when something actually goes to plan. Fingers crossed nothing changes over the weekend! I'm on call...

"But I want more!"

So the area of our practice isn't the most affluent in the country. Most of our clientele have horses as pets to enjoy the countryside with; not as prize winning hunter/jumpers or dressage horses. Most equine veterinarians hate these type of practices. Don't we all want to work on movie star's horses and Olympic athletes?? However, I don't think there are enough high-profile horses to employ every equine veterinarian. Instead of being sad about the situation, I chose to embrace it.

As a service to our youth clients who are often strapped for cash, (I see many 'a 4-H families making many sacrifices just so their kids can have horses) I created a one day event to serve as a "vaccine clinic" for horses that was targeted to those 4-H and FFA kids. People can bring their horses on a Saturday, and we will vaccinate them at a reduced cost from the normal for one day only, and they have to bring them to us.

Today I get two phone calls regarding the vaccine clinic: one guy who was so excited about it, he had to call to confirm it was actually occuring, and then a lady. Oh lady...you are exactly what infuriates me. This lady calls to see if we could sell her additional vaccines so that she could take them home to vaccinate her own horses. After telling her that that was not the purpose of the vaccine clinic, she attempted to negotiate with me, "If I bring 3 horses in person, can you sell me 2 sets of vaccines for horses at home?" "If I bring all 5 horses will you give me a quantity discount?"

Let me make this easy for you. NO. Bring the horses or don't get any vaccines.

You try to do something nice, and people just want more and more. Ugh. Note to self: don't do nice things anymore.

Valentine's Day. I'm going to pay for that one!

Yesterday I finished my mostly office related duties and went to ride my horse. I was on call for Valentines Day and my husband was making the one and a half hour trip back from his job in order to eat dinner. The evening had all the makings for being called.

I cautiously rode my horse, answered a few phone client calls, and headed to the grocery. I checked my phone every 5 minutes with no calls. I get home, clean up some animal puke from the ground, help cook dinner, still fervently checking my phone. I sit down to eat with my husband, eat, and even clean up. Still no calls. Was my phone broken? This is just unheard of! Am I really attending a planned event that is not ruined by an emergency call at the most inopportune moment? SUCCESS!

I got through the entire evening without a call. Take that universe! Ok maybe I shouldn't taunt it too much. It will pay me back, I'm sure.

Welcome! Now don't waste my time!

Alright! I finally can knock this off my bucket list: starting a blog. After spending 4-5 intense days of researching, reading, and following several medicine related blogs (a few from ER doctors, one from a vet), I decided that I could also add to the internet blog-issphere. I have plenty of sarcastic remarks, funny stories, complaints that I could input. So here we go. What the world desperately needs: a blog from an equine veterinarian, finding her way through the world.

I'm going to start with a story that happened today. A message was left for me regarding someone seeking a personal reference. Occasionally we get calls from rescue organizations wanting references for people seeking to adopt a new horse. I called the place back expecting this. After some awkward questions, the caller explained that the reference was for a dietician position for someone who isn't one of our clients. Hmmmm...that's weird. I'll ask Bossman about this. I'll remember that for my next job; put name of someone I don't even know as reference. Recipe for success! Why do people insist on wasting my time??