Has anyone noticed a pig flying around?

Yesterday, Dr. A and I went to lunch at a cafe in town. It's been around for awhile, but neither of us had tried it. We decided to try it today. I doubt I'll be running back for more anytime soon.

We walked in and got in line - there were probably 4 people ahead of us. We found a menu and perused it while we waited. And waited. And waited some more. The guy behind the register looked like he didn't really care about much of anything to be honest. He had a completely blank expression; in fact his face never once changed the entire time we were in the establishment. The other guy in the "kitchen" looked about as excited as Guy #1. Eventually, Guy #2 gets off his lazy keister, and starts taking orders.  Of course, then there's no one to start fixing the food that people have ordered. Seems like a great system.

Dr. A finally reaches the front and orders. I'm after her and order the "turkey BLT, minus the TOM". Because I don't like tomatoes. They're slimy and disgusting.

I think Guy #1 took me literally. Very literally.

Twenty minutes or so later, Dr. A and I finally get our sandwiches. I look at my sandwich and notice the TOM  (as in tomato) on the sandwich so I start peeling them off. Dr. A looks at her sandwich and says, "I think I got yours." I hand over my plate with her sandwich (after putting the tomatoes back on and apologizing for fingering her sandwich). She handed me the plate with my sandwich and her side salad . . . keeping the side salad. Yeah. I know. The dude totally messed up.

So I look at my sandwich, and there's still tomatoes on it. When I lift up the bread to peel off the tomatoes, I notice there's not a slice of turkey on the sandwich. It's a regular ol' BLT. Dr. A starts laughing at me, and I bite into it because I'm too hungry to wait for the blank-faced idiot to waste 20 minutes more attempting to fix the error.

The reason I say that Guy #1 took me literally when I said "no tom" is that a male turkey is called a "tom". Although, in most restaurants, tomato is often abbreviated as "tom".  So, I guess, if you want to get highly technical (which I don't), I guess he got the order right and didn't serve me a "tom".

I'm quite positive that there has to be a pig flying around on this earth somewhere, because I swear that would be the thing to get me to eat a tomato.

I did text my mom with "would you believe I'm eating a tomato?" She replied with "no fucking way!!!!!" (with about a dozen more exclamation points behind it). Then she came back with, "and it didn't kill you?!?!"

Yes, yes. I know. It didn't kill me. I hate tomatoes, but I was starving and lucky for me, the tomatoes were sliced very thin. But they are still slimy and disgusting.

And keep an eye out for that damn pig. It's gotta be around somewhere. 

A lil sumthin'-sumthin' to make your lady bits pucker

Oh yes, folks.

Awhile back we had a cow that had a prolapsed vagina. A pregnant cow, with a nursing calf, with a prolapsed vagina. First, the mere idea of this made me cringe in sympathy for this poor cow. Then I saw it. Yikes!

We were in the middle of work, so I didn't snap a picture of my own, but here's the gist:

 If you're hurting in places you can't mention, then I'm sure you're quite normal. This sort of thing happens on occasion and during a cows pregnancy, can almost be normal. Sometimes when a cow lays down, you might see a little something poking out, but generally not quite this size. When she gets up, it gets sucked back in. I think generally the further along the cow is, the more apt it is to happen. However, once in awhile, in early pregnancy, like what happened with our cow, the above image happened.

This is not something ranchers like to see and take care of, because typically this means that as soon as her current calf is weaned, she'll need to be culled before she calves. If you keep her, you'll have to be there for the birth as there are likely to be complications. So, to save yourself the headache, you'll get rid of her before she calves. Also, once a cow has had this happen, she's likely to do it again, and become a migraine instead of a regular headache.

The vet came out and cleaned it up and put it back in. He also put sutures in to prevent a recurrence. 

So, for our cow, she's still out with her herd-mates, nursing a calf that will probably weaned in the next month. After that, we will amicably part ways.

Last Friday, K calls me a few minutes after 5pm saying they had just pulled a breeched calf (meaning it's butt wanted to come out first), and the cow had a prolapsed uterus. She couldn't remember Dr. J's cell phone from the voicemail, and asked me to call him. I did, and left a message. It was close to 6pm when he finally got back to me, and I told him what was going on. He said he'd call me as soon as he was done with a horse he was working on. About half an hour later, he called me back and told me he was on his way. K and her brother had stayed with the cow in the barn. The calf survived, and is doing well.

Mamma obviously wasn't doing so hot because a vital part of her anatomy was hanging out on the barn floor. Not sure about y'all, but when K told me about the prolapsed uterus, I swear I felt a twinge.

Dr. J and K's brother were the two trying to push this poor cows uterus back inside her body, where it rightfully belongs. Some things we gals just don't want hangin' in the wind. Now, I stole the following pictures from another website, obviously, and I feel I should warn you about their graphicness. As you can imagine, this is a bloody and serious mess, and in the ranching world, is a serious emergency as a cow could easily bleed to death. So, I've given fair warning, these are pretty ugly.

 It's definitely a two-person job. The goal is to safely get all of the uterus back inside, without puncturing it.

 In our case, K's brother kept getting back spasms. You can see why, as it's not as easy position to push on something so heavy.

 It's easy to feel sorry for the cow, as she basically has to lie there and take it. Most times, the cow is given a sedative. Also, as you can see, barn or field, it's a challenge to get it back in clean. (FYI, at this stage, this particular cow in the picture, they got about half of it back in)

 It's also easy to see that Dr. J left my grandparents a bloody mess, literally. He had to basically shower before going to his next emergency. (Yes, he had a late night)

 In the end, a cow gets sutured up, and gets lots of antibiotics to help ward off infection.

Just so you guys know, both cow and calf are doing well. Mama cow is still getting antibiotics, and has bonded well with her calf. We are keeping them in the barn at the moment, so we can easily get her in the head-catch to continue the antibiotics. This cow will probably not get culled from the herd. According to my grandparents, it's not likely to reoccur  - not like the vaginal prolapse.

Oh and poor Dr. J had a rough night. After cleaning up after this bloody mess, he went to look at a horse that hadn't been able to pee for a couple days. Wound up having to do some special surgery that he's never done, as the bladder was so damn big and they knew there had to be a stone somewhere in there blocking up the poor guy. In the end, the pee came gushing out and guess who got hit? Yup, Dr. J. Poor guy.

Scary Water and Politics

Evidently Mexico is not the only place with water that you shouldn't drink. Or swim in. Or possibly be in the same zip code as.

Three people have died from a brain eating amoeba in the water.

What the . . . ?

This little brainless organism was discovered in the 60's, and it doesn't kill everyone it comes into contact with. Picky little buggers. But it seems that 3 or 4 people die each year from this single-celled organism as it climbs up their noses and eats their brains. One kid died after being dunked in the water at a fishing camp. Another after just swimming. And the last guy from using tap water for his "neti pot". The CDC found that it was just his house that was contaminated, not the general supply and suggests that only distilled or boiled water be used for "neti pots".

Moral of the story?

Plug your nose.

Know what else is scary? Brain eating Politicians. Now, normally I don't talk politics. One, because it's typically not discussed in my family, because in some cases, it's polar opposite views. Two, I'm pretty much of the "middle of the road" mentality. Three, all politicians lie to varying degrees. Four, it's getting worse - like to the point I'm ready to claim I'm Canadian. And five, it's just a really big can of worms, because it opens up all kinds of worm cans.

Politicians have always seem more full of hot air than the average person. However, the new crop of politicians for our Presidential 2012 race is scaring the heebie-jeebies out of me. The Republican front-runners, to me, come off as more Evangelists than politicians. And that kind of combination has me shaking in my Skechers.

Now, this where all the other worm cans get opened. Anymore, politics isn't just "politics". It's religion. I'm not sure how religion became such a huge part. Maybe it's always been there and I've just been completely blind. That's entirely possible. But this Presidential race seems worse than just four years ago. I myself am not very religious. I have never attended church, and it actually just doesn't appeal to me all that much. I do have decent moral compass and try to be a good person and citizen. I recycle my bottles and my cans. I don't make fun of people with disabilities. I volunteer when I can. I don't believe in cheating on a significant other. And I try not to hold other people's decisions or beliefs against them; I try to keep an open mind.

But this . . . this I don't get. I recently read this about Michele Gagman Bachmann:

“She’s a perfect product of the religious right…” In detailing Bachmann’s biblical world view that stemmed from Francis Schaeffer, “All reality is determined by theological starting point, and so basically every single aspect of public life, science, history, economics, everything is determined by your religious beliefs and only those with the correct religious beliefs can correctly perceive any sort of reality, and it’s a way in which you can dismiss huge swaths of history, evolution, you can basically say that anything that doesn’t fit with your ideology is the product of mistaken theological premise.” source

Call me crazy, but I'm not sure I understand. I understand religion plays a huge role in a lot of people's lives, but I'm not sure even the Pope is so extreme. What really confuses me is this:

" . . . everything is determined by your religious beliefs and only those with the correct religious beliefs can correctly perceive any sort of reality . . . "

Yeah. I don't get that. Just stick a dunce cap on me and stick me in a corner. Religion is one thing. Extreme is another. I'm not really sure I want someone who thinks that way to lead my country. Actually, I'm damn sure. Religion isn't really going to help get our country back on track, it will only divide the masses further. What the candidates should really worry about is the economy, jobs, the country's credit rating and debts.

God didn't have a hand that mess. Man did. So man needs to fix it.

So, if the world ends in 2012 as the Mayan calendar suggests, do we get to blame the world leaders (at the time) for that? Or an ancient civilization?

According to a recent poll, 35% of those who support Michele Bachmann thought the rapture was coming on May 21.

Yeah. That is scary.

Hmmm. Politicians or brain-eating amoebas?

Anyone got a coin to flip?

Guac? Yuck!

When I'm at Job 3 on the weekends, I sometimes like to treat myself to eating out. I don't eat out a lot anymore - not since moving to Sticksville. Mostly because there's not much to choose from. But also because Papa D and K feed me. And K is a pretty darned good cook. And she puts up with my "persnicketiness". God Bless her.

Anywho, there are a few options when I'm in Town to eat at. There are a couple of sub shops, a couple of burger joints, a Mexican restaurant, and an Italian place, even a Chinese restaurant. Since I could live off burgers, I typically enjoy a nice burger when I go out. Or I'll hit a sub shop.

Awhile back, I went in to one of the sub shops and asked for a turkey sandwich. The sandwich moves down the line, although I don't because the line of people is actually quite long. I can't see over the counter because I'm too short. I can't see through the glass for all the stupid stickers. As I finally edge over to see the third set of hands touching my sandwich, I see her with the icky green stuff - guacamole.

As the knife is in the air with that icky stuff on it, heading towards my sandwich, I said, "Oh, no guac please."

She didn't hear me because that nasty green stuff got spread all over my sandwich. All I could get out was "NONONONONONONONONONO".

I not only caught the young girl's attention, but everyone else in the sub shop, too. I also scared the poor girl. She stared at me with the deer in the headlights look. I finally could put together a cohesive sentence and told her, "I don't want guacamole." She started scraping it off, apologizing profusely. The gal that had started my sandwich offered to make me a new one. The line was already out the door, so I was trying to be nice to those behind me, and told them she could just scrape it off, I'll live. The poor girl kept apologizing to me while scraping that nasty green crud, taking quite a bit of bread with it.

I apologized to her for scaring her, and told her that I didn't see it until it was too late due to the stickers on the glass. I told her if she just put extra mayo and mustard on it I should be good. The last gal to touch my sandwich told me that my food was on the house due to the mix-up. I thanked her and told her she didn't have to do that, it was an honest mistake. (Most people like guacamole, so the poor girl was just in a groove) She insisted that she buy my lunch, so I let her.

That was a pretty good sandwich. And no, whatever guac that was left on there didn't make it good.  ;o)

April Blogging Challenge: Z is for Zoology

I DID IT! I managed to write a post for each letter on the day it was supposed to. And thank God I'm done, because writing six days a week was killing me. Seriously. That's a lot of blogging people. But I made it, I did it, and I managed to snag a few new followers. Although it appears I lost one in the last couple days, but oh well. So, to the new followers that I haven't welcomed, Welcome! Thanks a ton for stopping by and commenting. I hope you continue to stick around. *hint hint*

Onto today's post: Zoology. This was one of my favorite classes at Chico State. It was hard, but I enjoyed it. Well, most of it. I didn't really enjoy the spiders we had to look at; I didn't give a snit if they were dead - they were still spiders. Seriously, someone near me dropped a spider out of the little dish they were in, and I jumped and screamed like it was alive and going to kill me or something. (Sad, I know).

Sharks are also quite disgusting. Did you know they still excrete their slimy coating even after they're dead? I didn't either until I had to dissect one. No, it's wasn't a big one. It was one of those small shark species. But let me tell you, a week left in a drawer made that lab room quite rank. Seriously. None of our dead things were kept in coolers (which might have been slightly more logical); they were kept in drawers. Each lab section had their own set of drawers, and then we had to put our names on our own drawers so we knew were our lovely leftovers were. We would hate to unknowingly grab someone else's screw up. But, yes, the sharks got quite rank. And even wearing double or even triple layer gloves on did not prevent said shark stink from permeating those gloves. You'd leave the room smelling a bit like dead shark stink. Yeah. Not something I'd go marketing to the masses, that's for sure.

We had to learn dog and cat skeletons. We had to do the frog. Seriously? I started dissecting frogs in like 3rd or 4th grade. Why must kids dissect one every year of their scholastic lives? It's not like the frogs change or anything. (Oddly enough, every time I type the word frog, for some really strange reason I want to type like this: frong. Don't ask.) Same with squid - they are all the same. Not to mention we had to do other species of fish, other than the sharks. Luckily, the other fish didn't smell nearly as bad as those sharks.

One of the hardest things to study for was the fetal pig towards the end of the semester. We had to know the respiratory and the circulatory systems. Luckily educators are smart. These pigs had these systems dyed blue and red so us confused students could keep them separated in order to learn them. So, we had colorful piglets.

I know some people have a hard time with people (scientists or educators) raising animals for science like that, just so evil people like us science students can cut them up. I can understand their side, but how else are we to learn? Growing up, I knew kids who couldn't handle dissecting animals in biology. I knew kids whose parents refused to let them do so. I was usually the kid who thought it was gross but did it anyway. I was also usually the kid who was the least grossed out by all of it and being that my other lab partners were far too grossed out, I had to touch it or do it by myself because the others were bigger pansies than myself. By the time I was in college, I was among pre-vet students, so I was among "friends". Some of you would be shocked by some of the things I did in class - and not Zoology.

Maybe another day I'll gross you out with those stories.

And that my friends, concludes this year's April A-Z Blogging Challenge!