Only the greatest dog name EVER
Schweed Mermelstein. I picture the perpetually-stoned surfer-dude son of a Jewish jewelry store accountant. . . in reality, a dog.
A long-haired daschund puppy named Einstein was euthanized today because his owner's well-meaning but ill-advised attempt to coax some semblance of a normal life out of him with MEDICATION for hydrocephalus was failing. Because he had a CT scan some time ago, his owner knew that he basically had enough ganglia in his head to remain alive, but really nothing to speak of, brain-wise. Yes, that's something I would seek to cure with medication . . . if I was retarded. Poor little guy. One of my coworkers teased me for scritching on a dead dog--another said the dog could feel it in Heaven.
Watched the amputation of the left forelimb of a dog with osteosarcoma in the joint analagous to our wrists, and discovered that a dog's front legs are connected to the scapulae, but the scapulae are connected to no bone at all, only muscle and tendon. So taking off a foreleg is really quite simple, once you figure out how to cauterize all the squirting vessels you come across while hacking away. Dr. Caplan did it in 1 hour, start to finish, while I gawked like a tourist. And, luridly, the amputated limb sat on a table in front of me for quite awile, continuing to twitch in spots.
While I was watching the surgery today, I kept thinking about the differences between being the veterinarian and being the tech, and even though people ask me if I plan to be a veterinarian, and seem to think it is somehow better than being a tech, I find the tech job more satisfying in a few ways. One, I don't have the ultimate responsibility--I don't make the treatment choices that could be wrong, and I'll never misdiagnose a patient. And two, the doctors really don't get much time with the animals, but as a tech, today I crawled into a cage with a black lab named Lily to hold an ice pack to the fresh scar on her knee for 15 minutes. In those 15 minutes, she relaxed visibly from her upright position until she was laying in her cage with her head resting on my leg, sighing. I get to talk to them, feed and clean them, basically nuture them, and that's what I want to do, not poke and prod them, pronounce a diagnosis, and go on to the next one.
Someday, I'll be getting paid to do this, and I'm having difficulty wrapping my brain around the concept. Part of me is pissed that I didn't discover how much I love doing this until now, and the other part is pretty certain I couldn't have handled it earlier.
But really, any time a job allows you to meet a Schweed Marmelstein, it's gotta be good!
A long-haired daschund puppy named Einstein was euthanized today because his owner's well-meaning but ill-advised attempt to coax some semblance of a normal life out of him with MEDICATION for hydrocephalus was failing. Because he had a CT scan some time ago, his owner knew that he basically had enough ganglia in his head to remain alive, but really nothing to speak of, brain-wise. Yes, that's something I would seek to cure with medication . . . if I was retarded. Poor little guy. One of my coworkers teased me for scritching on a dead dog--another said the dog could feel it in Heaven.
Watched the amputation of the left forelimb of a dog with osteosarcoma in the joint analagous to our wrists, and discovered that a dog's front legs are connected to the scapulae, but the scapulae are connected to no bone at all, only muscle and tendon. So taking off a foreleg is really quite simple, once you figure out how to cauterize all the squirting vessels you come across while hacking away. Dr. Caplan did it in 1 hour, start to finish, while I gawked like a tourist. And, luridly, the amputated limb sat on a table in front of me for quite awile, continuing to twitch in spots.
While I was watching the surgery today, I kept thinking about the differences between being the veterinarian and being the tech, and even though people ask me if I plan to be a veterinarian, and seem to think it is somehow better than being a tech, I find the tech job more satisfying in a few ways. One, I don't have the ultimate responsibility--I don't make the treatment choices that could be wrong, and I'll never misdiagnose a patient. And two, the doctors really don't get much time with the animals, but as a tech, today I crawled into a cage with a black lab named Lily to hold an ice pack to the fresh scar on her knee for 15 minutes. In those 15 minutes, she relaxed visibly from her upright position until she was laying in her cage with her head resting on my leg, sighing. I get to talk to them, feed and clean them, basically nuture them, and that's what I want to do, not poke and prod them, pronounce a diagnosis, and go on to the next one.
Someday, I'll be getting paid to do this, and I'm having difficulty wrapping my brain around the concept. Part of me is pissed that I didn't discover how much I love doing this until now, and the other part is pretty certain I couldn't have handled it earlier.
But really, any time a job allows you to meet a Schweed Marmelstein, it's gotta be good!
posted by Stef | 7:56 PM
1 Comments:
I love reading this stuff, but you should make the names more obscure so you don't get Dooced for this kind of thing. Really, you called a client retarded in a public forum. It's not that you're wrong, it's just not a great career move to say it publicly.
Post a Comment
<< Home