want

http://basketoflove4you.blogspot.com

just sayin.

fire hands

Last week, the fruit man who comes to campus had hot peppers for sale. I was really excited because it is very hard to find chilies of any sort on the island, and as everybody knows - I like me my spicy food. The peppers look like tiny little red bell peppers, and the fruit man assured me that they are nice and hot. I bought 2 bags and froze half of them for future use.

Today, I decided to make some homemade salsa to go with the burrito I was having for dinner. I chopped up the tomatoes, onions, and peppers... added some cilantro, and bam! Salsa for my burrito. It was delicious, and by delicious I mean nice and spicy (I added chili sauce and hot pepper flakes to the rice in the burrito as well).

This evening after dinner, I decided to go to the gym. I ran for half an hour on the elliptical machine.. and now that I am back, my hands are on fire! I don't know what's with the delayed reaction, but the hand I used to hold the hot peppers as I sliced them is burning like crazy. Apparently I touched my face at some point too because the area under my nose is also burning. I need to keep those peppers away from my hands next time I cook with them. I guess I can use the magic bullet blender that I bought used for 50EC dollars on the SGU Post Website to make the salsa next time. That should work.

i'm going to go do a facial mud mask and see if that helps the fire skin. Then its time for more Histology.

friday night fun

its 1am on saturday morning and I have been studying for histology all night. What a way to spend a friday! It will be worth it if I can keep my A though - there's another exam on monday and I want to be prepared.

In other news, people are going all crazy right now trying to find roommates and arrange where they will be living next semester. I applied for a position as an RA on campus for next term. If I got it, I would get free room and board on campus and $20 a day in pay... but I would not be able to have my dog with me. I would also be stuck on campus - which sometimes gets me down because I have no private place to retreat to at the end of the day and it is very much like highschool here .... so I have very mixed feelings about the whole thing. If I don't get that position, a couple of people have asked if I would be interested in rooming with them, which would be ideal for saving money but would require that I have to share my space (a challenge for me sometimes). I also looked at a studio suite at a hotel near the beach for myself. The resort started renting to students and did so well that they are almost fully converted into apartments now. It is fantastic - pet friendly, all utilities included, safe location, a pool, and many classmates living there - but it is about equivalent to what I pay on campus right now. It is really hard to make up my mind on what I want to do. I will keep you posted on things as they develop. Now.... time for some Burn Notice (an awesome tv show i'm currently watching) and then some sleep.

flip flop tan

as you can see, my flip flop tan is getting pretty severe.

Also, I can't even believe it. but I pulled off an A in my anatomy lab and lecture exam. I have never had a 4.0 in my life. I hope I can keep it up for the whole term. it feels pretty good.

happy car ride

yay blood!

So today was awesome. In anatomy lab, I got to do my first blood draw ever! AND I was the only person in my class who got to do it.

here's the story:
Our anatomy lab doesn't have any TAs because the upper term students are in lecture while we are in lab. Instead, we have this cool Irish veterinarian/anatomist who helps our main professor. She's friendly and nice and she really knows her stuff. Sometimes, when my lab group has questions, she will sit down and chat with us for a while and tell us stories. I like her. Anyway, today she brought her dog Mojo into class. He is a little dog that looks like a cross between a pomeranian and a jack russell terrier. Apparently he hasn't been eating for a few days, so she wanted to draw some blood so she could test for tick caused diseases (a big problem here on the island).

My group was minding our own business dissecting out the brachial plexus in our dog, and she came up and asked if I wanted to get some blood on Mojo. I immediately said "Yes. Yes I do." She asked me if I had experience with blood draws, and I told her that I have a lot of restraining practice, but had never poked an animal before. She said that is was ok, and that I could give it a try. My lab partners have all worked in clinics for years, so they immediately piped up and told the Doc that they would help me, and if I wasn't able to get the blood, then they would have me hold Mojo and they would get it for her.

I was nervous, but super excited to be given the chance to try. Procedures like this aren't normally done in first year classes so this was a special exception... and I have no idea why the Doc asked *me* if I wanted to do it (probably because i'm awesome I guess. hehe) She warned us that Mojo can be a little rascal, so the person holding him would need to hold his muzzle tightly to make sure he didn't bite. My friends assured me that they would hold him still and keep us all safe. I was ready.

I scooped Mojo up into my arms, and he growled at me. I told him to smarten up, and didn't let his grouchiness phase me. I could tell he was all talk. After holding him for a minute, he started wagging his tail, so we took him into a side office where I could poke him in a more quiet place.

My one friend held him still, keeping a good grip on his muzzle and front paws, while the other friend showed me how to feel for the vein and line up the needle. The external jugular vein is in the neck and it's nice and big... but it can roll around under the skin so it is sometimes hard to hit with a needle. I was shaking a little because I was nervous, but I was determined to do it. I felt for the vein, lined up, and gently poked Mojo. To my delight, the syringe started filling with blood immediately! I hit the vein on my very first try!! I slowly drew back on the needle until it was completely full, and Mojo behaved himself the whole time. He didn't growl or wiggle at all.

After I finished, I was so happy. I felt like I just won the lottery or something. My friends all congratulated me on a great first blood draw, and the Dr told me that I did a good job. I am so proud of myself - and I am really starting to feel more like a vet every day. I can't wait to try more procedures!

cliff jump!

So i had a fantastic day today. By 11am, I had already finished my laundry, cleaned my room, went to the mall for groceries, and did a blog post all about toast. It felt great to be so productive. At noon, one of my favoritest friends came with me to get coffee, and then we went to the field in the middle of all of the dorms to watch the vet student softball tournament. All of the different terms competed against each other and our term (term 1) ended up placing second. It was nice to bake in the sun and cheer on our friends. After the games, the same friend and I went into town because I had an appointment to look at an apartment for next semester.

The apartment is actually a room in a resort near the beach. The resort started renting to the vet students a few years ago and it has become such a good place to live, they have nearly no rooms available for tourists anymore. The rent is less than what we pay in the dorms, and all utilities are included (this is a big deal because most of the time air conditioning is not included and can end up costing hundreds of dollars. and its important because i don't want my little canadian dog to get too warm here). There is also a pool, a social area, a study/internet lounge, and a shuttle to the school bus stop every day. The place is just down the road from the police station so it is very safe, and there is security at the gates all the time. the view is incredible, and i would have my own apartment but many of my classmates would be right next door in their own suites. it is perfect and I will most likely put down a deposit for next september later this week.

After the apartment tour, my friend and I went for some food, and then walked the rest of the way back to campus. Along the way we met about 15 of our classmates who were on their way to Bananas (the nearby nightclub) for one drink (yeah right) to celebrate the softball win. We were invited to go along, but opted to go back to campus instead. When we arrived at campus, my friend on a whim suggested that we go to the cliffs and check out the water.

The water was perfect for jumping. Last week when we went to the cliff, the water was rough, the waves were high, and getting out after jumping involved pulling yourself half a body length up a barnacle covered rock face using only your upper body strength (of which, i have none). When the waves weren't sucking you under (very scary) the barnacles were scraping gouges into your skin. I was actually afraid to jump but eventually I decided that getting some good blog material was worth it. I ended up having to be pulled up out of the water like a beached whale. And my leg got all banged up. Also, I asked a stranger to shoot the video of me jumping and she totally spazzed out like a noob and stopped the video before I even hit the water. fail. I was sooo disappointed.

Anyway, tonight I was really glad we went to check it out. The water was a lot higher, so it was pretty much as easy as getting out of the deep end of a (barnacle encrusted) pool. I jumped two times and it was fantastic! So... here is the video. It was a fantastic way to end a great day.

ZOMG TOAST!!!

living in a suite with minimal kitchen appliances..... i can't even begin to describe how happy this makes me.

nom nom nom.

hilarious items for sale

I had a really nice day today. I slept in. I woke up and got a coffee at the student centre outside my dorm. then I went in to town with some girls from school that I hadn't hung out with before. We had a really great time. We went to the tourist mall and shopped around. We each got dresses and I feel so pretty when I put mine on. I can't wait to wear it some place nice. I also found a toaster oven for $100 EC dollars - which is the price that the used ones cost around here when you can find them. I was stoked to find such a great deal.

On the way back to the bus, we walked past a vendor selling bootleg DVDs on the street. One of my friends stopped to buy some fruit at the next stand over so I had a chance to browse through some of the titles. Am I ever glad I did! I found probably the most hilarious movie cover ever. I really should have bought the DVD and given it to somebody as a gift. Anyway, check out the fantastic-ness below.

friday

well, it's friday again and the end of the day can't come soon enough. This afternoon, I have my anatomy lecture exam. I studied hard, but I don't think I know everything as well as I should. There is just too much information to learn in such a short time. Hopefully I anticipated the kinds of things the professor will want us to know. If he asks the right questions, I may do very well. If not, we have the option to drop the lowest test score from our record at the end of term. So either way, i'm not going to panic or anything.

After my test, I have to go into town to the Grenada post office because I have ordered a few items from eBay and they have arrived (some things are very difficult to find here). Hopefully I don't have to pay too much duty on them. There is a big SGU party this evening that is at a club called Kharma. The tickets were 50 EC dollars each (like $20 normal dollars) and there will be a DJ, air conditioning (woo!), and all you can drink. I do not plan on drinking more than 1 or 2 tonight... but i am sure that some of my classmates are. It should make for some fun people-watching. And if for some reason I decide I don't feel like going at the last minute (which is a common occurrence for me), I can sell my ticket no problem since the door price is wayyyy more.

Tomorrow I plan to lie in the sun and study histology and work on my tan. I will also post the video of me jumping off the cliff last week. (sadly, the video I ended up with was not worth the pain of climbing back out of the water on the barnicles). I will also try to get some cool St. George's city pics this afternoon. It will all depend of the spot I get on the public bus.

Have a good day peeps!
-Dayna

birds!

My anatomy lab exam went well. I haven't gotten the grade back yet, but I may have pulled off an A. I hope so... but a B+ is cool too and I KNOW I did at least that well. Next up, Anatomy lecture exam on friday. Mucho studying to do between now and then. I have decided that I want an A in all of my classes this term and I am going to do my best to get some. Hopefully I don't crash and burn half way through the semester in the classic Dayna-style.

This afternoon I had the most productive afternoon of lectures since I started vet school. I was engaged for the entire 4 hours and my anatomy professor's wife (also a vet) gave us our first lecture on animal well-being. It was an entire lecture on birds and it was AWESOME! She brought a in little love bird named Kirby for the class to pass around and hold, and she brought a big parrot Oscar (a yellow crested amazon) in for us to see as well. She raised Oscar from a featherless little chick, and he is now 5. He is named Oscar because apparently he is a grouch. heh. I got to pet him a little and he squawked at me, but he didn't try to bite or anything. Big birds can be kind of scary - and the really big ones can bite so hard that you can lose pieces of your finger to their sharp beaks. I saw some nasty ones at the emergency clinic in Calgary before I came to vet school. Anyways....

Here are some cool facts I learned about birds today (and when I say "birds" I am meaning exotic birds like parrots and your other typical pet types)!

1. Birds are an impulse buy pet. People buy them on a whim, because it is fun to have a little bird sit on your shoulder in the pet store. They often have no idea what they are getting into. Birds are a lot of work.
2. Birds are highly intelligent and can live a very long time. Here is a cool movie about a super intelligent African Grey parrot who can answer all kinds of questions that demonstrate that he understands what is being said to him - and isn't just mimicking people's words. In fact, African Greys are about as intelligent as a 4 year old human!
3. Bird cages need horizontal bars in them for climbing. They also need to have perches of multiple sizes and materials as their feet need variety and exercise. Making a bird stand on the same perch day in and day out is like making a person stand around in the same pair of shoes all day long. The feet need exercise.
4. Cage placement is also very important when keeping birds. They need to know that you are the alpha in your flock - otherwise they will begin to boss you around and behave in inappropriate ways (biting, aggression). They must always be housed below eye level so that they know their place in the ranks. If you buy a bird from a store where the cages are kept way up high - you may be in for some behaviour problems in the future.
5. Birds are intensely curious creatures and LOVE to destroy things.
6. Birds need 10 to 12 hours of darkness each night so that they can sleep properly. If they don't get this, they will begin to act out due to sleep deprivation.
7. Some of the most beautiful birds are incredibly loud. Cockatoos have incredibly loud voices, and aratinga conures scream all day long because it makes them happy. If your bird screams at you for 15 minutes and you yell at it to shut up, you have probably made it very happy! yelling back is exactly what birds want you to do! you are being very bird-like when you make a lot of noise.... (probably not the best way to discourage excessive squawking and screaming).
8. Some birds have feathers that degrade into a fine powder that gets all over the place. Some people are highly allergic to this powder.
9. In general, parrots from Africa are usually quieter than parrots from South America.
10. Macaws are very popular birds. They have life spans anywhere from 30 to 80 years and they are good talkers. The hyacinth macaw is a favorite pet. In addition to being huge, beautiful, and smart, they are also considered to be the jokesters of the parrots. One downside is that they eat macadamia nuts and can cost up to $15 a day to feed. yikes.
11. Senegals make good pets. They like to mimic sounds and are good talkers. They can develop phobias later in life though, so they need lots of exposure to different things while they are young.
12. Budgies are considered by some to be garbage pets. Pet stores will often give you a free budgie if you buy a cage. However, budgies are the best talkers of all the pet birds! Apparently budgies also like to laugh with eachother.
13. You can tell the sex of some birds just by looking at them (this is called sexual dimorphism). A male budgie has a blue cere, and a female has a brown one when she is sexually receptive and a white one when it's not mating time.
14. Cockatoos are also sexually dimprohic. Males have black eyes and females have brown ones.
15. All baby birds have black eyes.
16. Doves and pigeons mate for life. They almost always have 2 eggs to a clutch, and the male and female take turns sitting on them until they hatch.

Did you learn a lot? I can't wait for more of these type of classes. Too bad we don't have them more often!

ok, that's it for now!

xox

cricoarytenoideus dorsalis

- I spent the entire evening in the anatomy lab studying for my exam tomorrow. I feel pretty good about it now. It is going to consist of 50 timed stations on dog and cat anatomy. We have 1 minute per station and have to know all of the major parts of the body (organs, vessels, nerves, etc), all of the bones and bony processes, the major joints, intrinsic and extrinsic muscles of the thoracic limb (the front leg), thoracic limb radiographs, and palpation techniques on a live animal. I hope i kick ass.

- There's this little stray dog who has been hanging out on campus lately. She's small and brown and has the prettiest little face. Some of the students call her "Honey" and some call her "Spaz". She knows that the vet students will pet her and feed her, so she's always near our buildings. Tonight, she hung out with us in the anatomy lab while we studied. She curled up in a little ball on the floor after she got all tired out and I sat with her for a bit and scratched behind her ears. I really miss my dog Neko now. I haven't had a good dog-snuggle session in forever.

- All of the students in my class were on my nerves today. Even my friends. I don't know what's wrong with me but I need a serious time-out from people for a bit.

- I heard that the University of Saskatchewan might be accepting 2nd year transfer students soon. Apparently, when students drop out of school, the university will try to fill the open spots by transferring people in from other universities. One of the girls in my class has the contact information so I am going to seriously look into it for next year if I continue to get good grades. As much as I love it here, I would definitely come back and finish my degree in Canada if given the opportunity. It would be about 1/3 of the cost... and the less debt I have at the end of this - the better. Fingers crossed.

anatomy

we have our first anatomy exam coming up this week. i'm nervous that I may not pass.

wait... you're probably thinking "you have gotten all As so far. i'm sure you will kick ass at this exam too".

not true. I have a lot of trouble retaining new words... and anatomy is almost entirely composed of strange vocabulary... lots of it. There might not be enough time for me to repeat all the names of the bones, nerves, and muscles of the dog and cat enough times for them to all stick. In addition to that, we have to apply what we know and identify structures on radiographs (x-rays). It is not easy and I haven't had a great deal of practice at it yet. I hope I do ok.

I will do another update later on and talk about my cliff jump and post the (crappy) video of it.

also, i do not like valentines day. the one last year was much nicer. that is all for now.

recovery

I somehow managed to pull off As in all of my exams this week and my friends did great too. We were all so happy and spent yesterday afternoon/evening celebrating (which included some interesting cliff jumping and some going out on the town). I am still kind of tired so I promise I will write all about it in detail tomorrow.

here is a little video I took while I was riding on the public bus yesterday on my way back from the downtown post office. I was sitting in the front seat beside the driver because the bus ride on the way to the post office made me feel super car sick (too much window tinting + windey roads + heat + not sitting by a window on a crowded bus = recipe for vomit). There's not really much of anything in this movie, but you can see what a typical street looks like in town. Its very green and lush but as you can see, it is quite third-world as well. There are more people and cool buildings closer to downtown, but I haven't gotten a good chance to really film/photograph it yet. After I took this video, the bus driver told me that he thought I was pretty. He was nice looking and was very polite, but I got off the bus before he could ask me what my name was. hehe.

Please disregard the watermark in the middle of the video. I am working out some movie format compatibility issues and am playing around with some video converters to try them out. the watermark bugs the hell out of me, and this blog website compresses my videos so the quality is awful, but i like the song that is playing on the bus in this movie, so at least there's that. Anyway, enjoy!

The hunter

I am pretty busy studying for my physiology test tomorrow, so this post is gonna be short, but sweet.

Here is a funny product I saw for sale at the tourist mall last weekend. An awesome gift pack of sexy patterned man-ginch.
RAWR!

zomg tests

so school is getting a little intense. I survived my histology exam as well as the weekly anatomy quiz. On Friday we have our first Physiology exam and everybody is freaking out. The professor is this happy german man who is the WORST at explaining concepts. His notes are very confusing, and apparently he writes his exams in german and then uses an online translator to convert the questions to english... so the grammar is all messed up and its hard to tell what he is asking sometimes. When I have asked upper-termers how to prepare for his exams, the advice they have given me is "pray". lovely.

Hopefully I will lock it down and pull off a decent grade. Keep your fingers crossed for me.

In other news, to help with stressy feelings, I have been going to the gym a lot. I kick the living shit out of the elliptical machine, and then I feel nice and tired and calm.

I also just found out I got the Jason Lang Scholarship for my good grades in monkeyschool last year. $1000 in mah pocket! woo! I have also been nominated for the Louise McKinney Scholarship which is $2500. It would be fantastic if I got that one too. I would have enough money for a super-pimpin new macbook pro AND I would put the rest towards my old old multimedia school loan (yes, I went to multimedia school... what you think i'm naturally this awesome at making websites? heh)

Finally, on Friday after our physiology exam some of us are going to celebrate by jumping off this big cliff by the library into the ocean. I am really looking forward to that. I have also made friends promise to film me jumping... so you can enjoy it too.
The cliff is right here - but the jumping spot is on the other side of the building! Just imagine me jumping not into rocks and into nice water instead. :D


click the image to see the full sized awesomeness of my photoshop drawing skillz.

histology exam #1

Tomorrow is my first real exam. Histology. I know the material pretty well, but i'm still nervous. There is just so much to remember. The professor for this class is the cutest little indian veterinarian. I like his teaching style and he says that my lab drawings are excellent. I really would like to get an A in this class. *fingers crossed*

In other news, we didn't have class today because it is Grenadian independence day. 37 years of freedom. I had plans to write a blog about how the locals have been dressing in yellow, green, and red (national colours) all week, and planned to go to the parade in town and take photos and stuff. At the last minute, I decided that my holiday would be better spent studying. I did wear my Grenada t-shirt (just like this but in red) in celebration though.

HALP! Starfruit!!

Help! I bought some starfruits from the fruit man who comes to school each friday but I have no idea how to eat them!

How do I know when they are ready? Do I chop them into pieces? Peel on? Peel off? What do I do!?!

Please post in the forums if you know. I don't want to waste my $2.
Thanks!!!
(Also, I hope they are not gross!)

water

Ever since I have moved into my dorm, there has been a leaky pipe in the main hallway a couple of apartments down from my door. A large kitchen garbage can has been set up to catch the water that is constantly dripping. It fills up quite quickly as it is quite a powerful leak. Yesterday, we received a notification that the water for the building would be turned off for much of the afternoon, so that workers could repair it. They apologized for the inconvenience, but assured us that the water would be back by 1pm. No big deal, I figured. I would be in class for much of the afternoon.

At 5pm after class, I returned to the dorm. There were three workers in the hall and they had completely destroyed the whole area. Water and pieces of ceiling were everywhere. By 8pm, the workers were gone, the ceiling was still a disaster, and the water was still not working. I made arrangements to shower at a friend's dorm before bed and reminded myself that while it was inconvenient to have no water, at least the leak would be fixed very shortly. Thankfully, by about 10pm, the water had come back on. I showered and went to sleep. This morning when I went to get my morning coffee, I walked past the spot where the leak was.. and couldn't help but notice that the garbage can was back and the leak was worse than ever. I am beginning to think that when things are "fixed" in the caribbean, they actually get broken much worse before the problem is actually resolved. I expect the water to be taken away at least 2 more times before the issue is resolved for real. awesome.

the shakes!

This morning while I was writing my previous post, I felt the floor shaking in my room. At first I thought that maybe people were doing some construction upstairs and I could feel the vibrations or something... but then I noticed that the water bottle on my desk was rippling quite a bit. I was like "huh. this feels pretty weird. are we having an earthquake?" As I have never experienced an earthquake before, I wasn't sure. The vibrations kept going for about 30 seconds, and then stopped. I looked outside and the locals who were working in the yard didn't appear at all concerned... so I continued with my internet-ing.

When I got to class today, I asked a couple of the others if they felt any shaking. They didn't know what I was talking about and looked at me kind of funny. Then I thought that perhaps I imagined the whole thing and began to feel kind of stupid. However, when my roommate got home just now, she asked me if I felt the earthquake. WOO HOO! I'm not crazy!

Anyway, here are the official details. Apparently our quake was a 5.2 on the Richter scale, and it happened about 95km south west of St. George's. A 5.2 is considered to be moderate intensity; shaking is felt, and damage can be done to poorly constructed buildings. I wonder if any of the corrugated iron shacks in town crumpled up? hmmm

The buildings on campus are very well constructed so don't worry about me. They survived hurricane Ivan in 2004 which decimated much of the island, and we have been told that they were built keeping earthquakes in mind as well. I also live on the ground floor of my building, right by an exit so I think I would be in pretty good shape if a bigger quake happened. Let's hope one doesn't though... I think a huge shaker would be quite scary.

internet fail :(

I have a long day today. Here is my schedule:

• Go to the student centre and buy a coffee. Gulp it down without burning myself or getting all overheated and sweaty (like that's gonna happen)
• Histology lab from 9 till noon.
• meet my faculty advisor for the first time at noon.
• Histology lecture 1-2
• Physiology lecture 2-3
• Anatomy lecture 3-4
• Physiology lecture again (yay) 4-5
• gym sometime before bed. bleh.

The internet is going down for 24 hours this afternoon because of some kind of building move so i won't even be able to obsessively check facebook all evening either. I guess it's a good thing. I won't get distracted while I am supposed to be studying. Tomorrow SVECCS (student volunteer emergency and critical care society) is having a beach BBQ in the afternoon so I might go to that. It's at a beach I have never been to before. i'll bring my histology notes and study in the sun. Happy Friday everybody! ok that's it!
xox

thing i found

I was walking by the pond outside the other day, and I saw this busted up seashell sitting beside the road. I have no idea how it got there, but I picked it up and brought it inside because I thought it might make a decent bookend. It was covered in dust, so I decided to clean it up. While I was rinsing it off in the sink, a little wasp flew out and landed on my face. I squished it before it could sting me.

Now that the shell is dirt and wasp free, it is perfect. Below is a photo of my bookshelf. The heavy books no longer fall over and everything is nice and neat (unlike my desk). The shell adds a touch of caribbean flavour to my cement bunker of a room as well, don't you think? My friends laughed at me for picking it up off the road, but now they are jealous of my cool island style. hehe.

bad anatomy humor

last night one of my classmates posted the following question on her Facebook page:
"if you were a plexus, which plexus would you be?"

Another classmate responded with
"definitely lumbosacral. for obvious reasons".

As the lumbosacral plexus supplies nerves to the abdominal wall, pelvic limb, external genitalia, rump, and perineum, I found this to be quite funny.

(This isn't actually funny, is it? I think i'm just going a little loopy from all the stuff swirling around in my head.)