Leaving on a Jet Plane (soon)

Time has somehow dwindled down to less than 2 weeks before I head across the pond. I've been able to get so much done this summer that I feel ready to go. One more time to hang out with everyone this Saturday (my LAST Saturday in Canada!!) and then I'll have to start packing.
I haven't been able to update people on my dairy goat farm experience but I'm sure most of you have seen my pictures on facebook. It was an amazing experience and I'm really sad that I was only there for a week. The goats were all very hilarious and the family were really REALLY nice to me. I was able to follow a large animal vet around for an entire day and somehow I got really lucky and was able to experience a very exaggerated typical day. Dr. Jenny Kungl was the vet I followed around, and she is definitely a vet I would trust my animals to. She knows her stuff and is so friendly and outgoing to all of her patients. I was able to watch her perform 2 twisted stomach surgeries, and was even able to stick my hand into the cow!!! I mean, not in the butt section, but through the incision that was made perilumbar on the right hand side. She injected lidocaine into 3 different nerves that branched off from the spinal cord and *shwing!* it was open. When I stuck my hand into the cow's abdomen, I thought that I would have a good idea of where everything was..except everything felt the same!!!!!!! Man, I'm going to fail SO BAD when I start vet school. The 2nd twisted stomach surgery, I felt the omasum and it was rock hard, it should have been like a stress ball, solid but still squishy. I felt like I was touching a basketball (with all of the little grippy things) with a thin slimy membrane over it. This meant that even if we fixed the twisted stomach, the cow would have still had the same eating problems and would have had a painful death (unable to digest). The owner was not too happy (although he was VERY nice to me!) and said, "oh well, that's too bad. I'll just call my friend to come in the morning to shoot her". In my head I made the D: face! I realized just how different the owners/patients are between large animal and small animal situations. Large animal, being mostly cows, horses, pigs, are part of the owner (aka farmer, usually) income and they don't usually see them as anything other than that. Compare that to the small animal, where a tiny little punting dog was adored by her owner, and she would do anything to fix this dog, no matter what the trouble was and no matter how much it cost.
I still haven't decided whether to practice in the large or small animal category yet, but now that my doctor told me I have a mild case of asthma, I might opt not to be too near hay and other dusty allergens too much. Yea, I know what you're thinking, "you have asthma, and you want to be a vet?!". Definitely is a tough choice for me, but I have always liked challenges and this will be the biggest one of all. I know I'm not allergic to dogs or cats (I volunteered in a small animal clinic for an entire year without problems) and it was after working at the goat farm that I started having breathing problems. However, I don't know if it's the hay or the poop or the combination because I've been around horses in Kyle's reserve and I didn't have ANY problems. Oh well, I guess I won't be able to avoid what I'm sensitive to until I finally run into it. I'm currently reading "Tell Me Where It Hurts" by Dr. Nick Trout and it makes me feel a little bit better that even a veterinary surgeon who wrote a book had an allergy to something.
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In other news, I went and bought vaccuum space bags today. Their not the ones we've seen on tv and I don't know if they'll work the same either...oh well, I'm excited to try them out later this week! Wait...is it a bad thing that I'm excited by a vaccuum sucking out all of the air from a bag?! Lol, I need to get out more.
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Went to Kyle's cottage this past weekend and although it was pretty miserable on the Saturday, the Sunday was amazing! We went tubing, went to Killarney to have some famous fish and chips, and got to spend some extra time with the guy I love. I just wished my dad had some more trust in me and wasn't so worried about me driving at night. He was pretty peeved when I saw him back at home. Oh well, there's not much more I can do other than shut up and take it. I know I didn't do anything wrong so there's no point arguing with someone else about it.

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Dragon boat practice this Wednesday! Ahh!! I can't believe I'm going to be able to be on a dragon boat ONE more time before I leave! Good luck to McMaster at the Montreal Regatta! You guys are going to be awesome! :D

Update on my life

Say whaaaat?! It's July already? How can this be? You mean I am going to be in Scotland in exactly one month?! Who am I asking these questions to? I have no idea......

Anyways, loads has been happening to me in the past couple of weeks since my last update, here it is as simplified as I can be because my fingers can't go as fast as my brain:

• Mac raced amazing at TIDBRF. Mac-Attack came in 1st in their heat, Mac-Row-Ni came in 4th in their heat, and Mac-Row came in 3rd in their heat as well as 3rd in our University finals. Let it be known though that for all of the Mac teams in the Premier Mixed Divisions, we were seeded 4th-6th which meant no one was expecting us to win any medals...we showed them didn't we? Mac-Row-Ni came in 4th which is a HUGE accomplishment because all 3 of our teams came in under 2:20 this year and we have more than 45 new paddlers this year. Thanks to everyone who came out to support us, we feed off the cheering and yelling from the sidelines. And PETER GEORGE came to cheer us on!! Holy crap! That definitely hyped up the crowd.
  The funny thing is that for Mac-Attack we were lane 6 while PA da Pirates were Lane 5. Oh wait..that sounds a little familiar doesn't it? Very similar (or should I say exactly the same) as at Milton Regatta when I rammed them and "Tim was hanging on for dear life" (quoted from the PA website). Whatever, we smoked them. They came in 4th we came in 1st so good job but I learnt how to steer...beat us now! Muahahahaha!!! The announcer even said it was a major upset when Mac Attack won...we got 2:14!!!! Best time McMaster has ever gotten since the dragon boat team was created back in 2002.
  
• Mac End of Year Party was held at my house. Had so much fun but it was definitely draining to host a party. Didn't get to play Rock Band 2 at all but now I know that the max volume for my tv is 89. Had a lot of BBQ food that is now overflowing in my basement freezer. Thanks to everyone who brought food! It was SO delicious!!! And who brought the cloudy jar of pickles? Is it still edible? My mom is afraid of it.
  
• Went up to visit Kyle in Sudbury for 5 days..definitely not enough time. Just came back tonight and I miss him already. It rained on and off so we didn't get to go outside much. We did play 9 holes of golf and I wish we did 18 now but I was so scared it was going to thunderstorm that I didn't want to risk a raincheck. I lost 2 balls in the bushes but Kyle found me 2 other ones. This really nice orange one that I didn't want to lose, even when it went into the water. I hung on to grass and reached to grab it when it fell in. My hand was definitely a different colour when I brought it out of the water...ew.
  
• My visa has been accepted! So now I just have to wait for the WorldBridge organization in TO to give me an e-mail so I can go pick it up! I'm so happy that I got it done, I was really worried I didn't have the right documentation. Definitely nerve racking. I met some more GEP students on the Facebook group and I'm glad to meet people who are going through the same things as me. Although I just got an e-mail from accommodations people asking what I needed for my residence since I apparently have a disability. I have no idea why they have that on my application. I would remember if I checked off that question for sure!! Anyways, hopefully I don't get stuck into a res that is far away from all the other GEP students. I definitely want to mingle more with people next year and have some good study mates :).
  
• Going off to a farm for volunteering from the 4th to the 12th. I'm really excited but and hopefully I'll get to learn a lot while I'm over there. Which reminds me that I still have to fill out those EMS forms to hand in...*sigh* Time seems to be going so much faster than it was back in May...