On my way home!

I am currently in Heathrow airport trying to kill some time since I have a 4 hour layover.  I have been up since 3:45am and have another 12 hours of travel left but it will be worth it to be home!

I finished up my exams yesterday.  I had 5 exams in 5 days which was quite gruelling.  The first exam Monday was a Surgery OSCE exam (Objective Structured Clinical Exam).  It was a practical exam.  For this exam we had to know how to scrub for surgery, put gloves on aseptically (sterilely) two different ways, three different suture patterns and a hand tie.

My three different suture patterns.  Banana skin is good for suturing practice!

My hand tie done with rope

My exams Tuesday and Wednesday were for my clinical foundations course (Anesthesia, Pharmacology, Oncology, Diagnostic Imaging, Surgery and Evidence Based Veterinary Medicine).  Tuesday was 40 multiple choice and Wednesday was 8 written questions.

Thursday and Friday were my pathology exams.  Thursday was 50 multiple choice and Friday was 10 "spot questions".  The spot questions you are shown a picture and then have to describe what you see and answer some questions about how the pathology developed.

I am cautiously optimistic the exams went well but I will have to wait until the end of January to know for sure!

My 600+ pages material examined in five exams

Last night a couple friends and I went out for drinks at a place called the Candy Bar.  They had awesome cocktails we will definitely go back when it is a little less busy.  We then went to the Christmas market and got some fish and chips and split an order of churros with nutella and sugar for dessert.  It was a wonderful end to a very stressful week.

Finally I have a few other Christmas pictures from when I actually left the house during my revision week.

The Dome - always have incredible decorations

The Street of Light

The Christmas Tree in Jenner's

T-minus 12 hours until I am reunited with my family, friends and pets.  Can't wait!

It's starting to look a lot like Christmas

Last Friday I ventured down with a friend to the Christmas Market.  It opened the week before but it was the first chance I had to go.  As usual the market fills you with Christmas spirit (even though it was only the 27th of November... I have sort of always felt Christmas celebrations should only start at the beginning of December but the market is too hard to resist.)

The stalls are very similar to last year with the odd new one.  We each indulged in a Bailey's Hot Chocolate and a chocolate covered marshmallow.  Both turned out to be excellent choices.  I will probably have to venture back at some point as a study break.

On the Sunday, I managed to get free tickets for a friend and I to tour The Palace of Holyroodhouse.  Commonly known as Holyrood Palace, it is the Queen's official residence in Scotland.  Built in the 16th and 17th centuries it has a lot of character.

The Entrance

What remains of the 16th century Abbey at the back of the Palace

Looking toward Salisbury Crags

 Lastly,  this past Thursday it started snowing outside the city.  When I left campus at 5pm there were snowflakes the size of golf balls.  They may have actually been the biggest snowflakes I have ever seen.  And in true Scottish fashion the snow started causing mayhem.  I was fortunate enough to have left campus early in the snowstorm so my bus ride was only about 10 minutes longer than normal.  But into the evening when I was home, we started getting emails about how bad the conditions were on campus and that all buses were cancelled and essentially every bus route was delayed.  It sounded like it was terrible conditions on campus!  But to put it in perspective for my Canadian friends and family, they got two inches of snow...  Not quite a Canadian quality snow storm but all the Scots were impressed.

The beginning of the snow storm

Some snow on the Kelpies the next morning (These are mini models of Kelpies statues that
are about an hour away.  The Kelpies were commissioned to honour the horse powered
heritage of Scotland.  These mini statues have been travelling around Edinburgh.)

A bit of fun before crunch time

Saturday I went to Glasgow with some friends to see the comedian Michael McIntyre.  I hadn't heard of him until I was invited to go along to his show.  He is probably now my favourite comedian.  I don't think I have ever laughed so hard.  By the end of the show we all felt like we had done an ab workout from all the laughing.  He is able to turn everyday events into absolutely hilarious stories.

His live show in Glasgow - Happy and Glorious

Here is one of my favourite skits of his.  He describes how he thinks the kilt came about.

Michael McIntyre - The Birth of the Kilt


Last night a few friends and I went to see the last Hunger Games movie.  While not my favourite movie in the series I still really enjoyed it.  Plus it was nice to have a night out and relax since exam stress is starting to loom.

Lastly, I promised photos of my room many posts ago so here they are (finally!)

Desk with a view

Tonight I am headed back to campus at 9:30pm.  I am helping out with a telethon.  From 10pm-3am I will be calling North American applicants who have been given an interview to see if they have any questions.  I really appreciated it when I was called after being accepted to Edinburgh so I thought I would call and hopefully make someone else happy.  (Plus the offering of free food at midnight and a grocery store gift card didn't hurt!)  It should make surviving lectures from 10am-5pm tomorrow quite interesting!

Bonfire Night

November 5th is Guy Fawkes night, also know Bonfire Night or Fireworks Night.

I hadn't heard of Guy Fawkes night until coming to Edinburgh.  It is a bit of a strange holiday in my opinion.  Essentially, in 1605 Guy Fawkes tried to blow up the British Parliament but was caught guarding the gunpowder he and his fellow plotters had placed beneath the house of lords.  To celebrate the fact that King James I survived the plot on his life, he lit bonfires around London.  So now as a tradition every November 5th in the UK, people light bonfires to burn effigies of Guy Fawkes and light fireworks. So they celebrate Parliament almost being blown up, but not quite.  And boy do they take this tradition seriously!

My first encounter with Guy Fawkes Night was last year.  I had decided to stay late in the library and study.  After a while there was an overwhelming smell of smoke in the library.  However I couldn't see any smoke, the smoke detectors weren't going off and the few people around me seemed perfectly calm.  After I left the library I was able to figure out where the smell was coming from.  Outside!  The air outside smelled like a bonfire.  And there were fireworks going off everywhere.  And the number of fireworks only increased as we went into the city.  People were setting them off in the street, in their gardens and in parks.  There are also professional displays set to music.

So this year I decided I wanted to be in the city for Guy Fawkes night.  And I was not disappointed.  I was able to sit in my bedroom and watch the fireworks out my window.  Not a bad way to spend an evening!

The view from my sofa

Now the other thing is, Fireworks Night really turns into fireworks week.  Starting on Halloween there are fireworks every night and there are still fireworks going off tonight!  Although the winds gusting to over 50 miles per hour tonight does seem to be hindering their fireworks displays.


Finally a picture that goes with my last post.  The winning Dick Vet Hockey Team!

Vet Mummy, An Assessment and Dick Day

I have officially graduated to being a vet mummy.  A few weeks ago, with two other former Graduate Entry students, we hosted 6 current graduate entry students for Mummies and Daddies night (or in our case Mummies x3 night).  The night is meant to be a fun, stress free evening where the current GEP students can see that it is possible to survive the GEP year.  Each one of the mummies was responsible for a course for the meal.  We had puff pastry with cheese and caramelized onions as an appetizer, mac and cheese with salad for the main course and chocolate peanut butter bars for dessert.  We played some cards against humanity and then headed to a bar to meet up with the rest of the mummies and daddies and the GEP class.  All in all it was a very successful evening.

Two weeks ago we had our in class assessment for pathology and clinical foundations course.  The assessment consisted of 20 multiple choice questions for each course which covered material from the first four weeks.  I have to admit having absolutely everything we had learned for four weeks examined on one cumulative integrated exam was very stressful.  However, I was quite pleased with my marks, but what I did discover is that the clinical foundations course is quite a bit more challenging than pathology.  Will definitely have to put a lot more work into that course when December exams roll around!

And lastly, this past Wednesday was Dick Day.  Dick Day is a sporting event between the Edinburgh Royal (Dick) vet school (hence where the name Dick Day comes from) and the Glasgow vet school. The schools compete in lots of different sports including Netball, Badminton, Rugby, Lacrosse, Soccer, Field Hockey and Horse Riding.  This year the event was held in Edinburgh.  I got to play both field hockey and lacrosse.  The hockey was first and after a pretty even first half, we took control and ended up winning 7-3.  That makes is 5 years in a row that Edinburgh has won hockey.  After that I had to run with several other hockey players across to another field to play lacrosse.  Lacrosse was also successful winning 19-3.  Overall it was a great day for Edinburgh winning 9 of 10 sports!  Once the team pictures get posted I will add them to the blog.

So after all of Wednesday's fun it is time to buckle down and get back to work.  I have fallen behind since the assessment.  But in just over a week's time a friend from Guelph is moving to Edinburgh to start a job.  So that is my motivation to get caught up this week.  I want to be able to be her tour guide for her first few days here and not feel guilty!

Today's Halloween sunset - View from my bedroom window

(I know I said I would post pictures of my flat... I'm still working on that I promise!)

Almost done the second week of second (third) year

It is hard to believe that I am almost done my second week of second year.  I am now technically in third year of the program because my graduate entry year last year was equivalent to first and second year of the five year program.  Time is already flying by.

At the beginning of September I flew back to Edinburgh with my parents.  After spending a very jet legged day in Edinburgh we headed out on our vacation around western Scotland.

Our first destination was the Isle of Skye.  We drove through the Glencoe area which was incredibly spectacular on the way to Skye.

We also stopped at the Glenfinnan Viaduct.  For Harry Potter fans, that is the train bridge that Ron and Harry fly the car through in the Chamber of Secrets movie.  The viaduct was built in just a little over a year at a cost of £18,904 in 1897.

We took a ferry from Mallaig to Skye.  And in perfect Scottish fashion,  it was raining.  But it made the ferry crossing quite spectacular with the hills and cliffs of Skye covered in a mist.  We stayed on Skye for two nights and went from picturesque site to picturesque site and it even was sunny!

The fairy pools

Following some Scottish Blackface sheep back from Talisker beach

Neist Point

Looking at the Outer Hebrides from Neist Point

Cows crashing a party

From Skye we went to the Outer Hebrides.  Our first destination was the Isle of Lewis and the Isle of Harris (They are named as two islands but they are really one island... figure that one out).  They were the land of beautiful beaches.  And even more incredible was the weather that went along with the beaches, it continued to be sunny!

Cow out for a stroll on Europie beach

The Callanish Standing Stones (built between 2900 and 2600 BC)

Luskentyre Beach

Then it was off to North Uist followed by South Uist.  Now the Uists were my least favourite part of the trip.  But I got my absolute favourite picture from the entire trip on North Uist (and yes it does involve a highland cow!  Can you tell I am a vet student with all the animals featuring in my pictures?)

She posed so beautifully for me!

Then it was off to the Isle of Barra.  Barra has quite a unique airport.  The airport has limited times when planes can land because it is a beach.  So for half of the day the airport is unusable because the tide comes in and covers the runway!  It is the only beach airport in the world with regularly scheduled commercial flights.

"Keep off the beach while the windsock is flying, and the airport is active"

"Beware of sand blast during aircraft movements"

Hoof prints on a beach

After Barra it was time to head back to Edinburgh.  My parents helped me get fully settled in my new flat (pictures in the next post!).  Since then I have been trying to get back into the groove of vet school.  This semester I have Pathology and Clinical Foundations Course (which include Pharmacology, Oncology, Diagnostic Imaging, Anaesthesia and Critical Care and Surgery).  I am looking forward to it but the amount of material we have been given is already starting to pile up!

Summer Blogging Hiatus

Since arriving home to Canada after my placement in Jersey I have been keeping busy.  So blogging sort of slipped my mind.

I completed my two final husbandry EMS placements.  The first was my small mammal placement.  I went back to my old university to work at the Central Animal Facility at the University of Guelph.  The central animal facility is responsible for caring for all research animals used at the university.  I was sort of dreading this placement because I didn't think it would be interesting.  But I was pleasantly surprised I was wrong.  Learning the measures required to ensure the welfare of the lab animals was really interesting.  And I got to work with lots of different animals including mice, rats, a rabbit, shrews, turkeys, chickens, frogs and calves.

My second placement was my poultry placement.  I went to a layer farm near Ottawa.  I unfortunately timed my visit with very hot weather.  In the morning I would help in the egg packing station.  I would put cartons on the conveyor belts for the automatic egg packer, and put the eggs that had been collected by hand on the conveyor belt to go to the washing station.  But my main job was collecting eggs from the barns.  They had just received new birds so the birds hadn't all figured out that they were supposed to lay their eggs in the nests.  On my second day I spent 4 hours in the 30 degree barn collecting over 3500 eggs by hand.  Although interesting to learn about the egg production industry, the poultry placement was definitely not my favourite.  The highlight of my placement was getting to visit lots of family in the Ottawa area.

I have also been enjoying my summer break and doing some non-school related stuff.  Toronto hosted the Pan Am Games.  I got to go watch the Canadian women's field hockey team play Argentina.  The Canadians lost but it was still a great time.

A couple weekends ago I toured around Toronto with a couple friends.  I also went up the CN tower for the first time.  Since I have lived about an hour away for my entire life I figured it was time to finally go up.  The view from the tower was beautiful.

Looking down through the glass floor

The PanAm Games Torch

Panamania (free cultural shows from PanAm countries in Nathan Phillips Square)

It's hard to believe that in just under a month I will be heading back to Edinburgh and in a month and a half I will be starting my second year of vet school.

Maybe The Best EMS Week Yet

Time for another post from an airport.  I am in Southampton for my layover flying home from Jersey. I had an incredible time in Jersey.

My placement week unofficially started Sunday evening with feeding the calves.  I discovered that Jerseys make very cute calves.

Monday I officially started working.  They had me start by feeding the heifers that were going to be shown on the weekend.  The heifers were tethered in a small fields so that they could get used to wearing a halter and being restrained.

This young girl was in the under 12 month class

After feeding heifers I started taking them for walks.  Those girls had never been led before so they had to be taught how to walk.  This involved a lot of tugging on their halter ropes and periodically some input from another person pushing them from behind.  But it was amazing how quickly they learned.  By the end of each of their sessions they would walk without much, if any struggle.  The next walking sessions with them involved trying to make them walk more like a show animal and less like a young animal excited to be out and about on a walk.

Next up was walking the cows.  Most of the cows had been shown before so it was just reminding them how to walk properly.  They generally walked really well and it was just like walking a very slow 450kg dog!

On a walk with the cow that I think had the best personality

Over the next few days I continued walking heifers and cows and did some other tasks around the farm.  One of the days I fore milk stripped every cow during the milking.  (Foremilk stripping is done to clear teat canal and also allows you to check if the milk is healthy and the cow doesn't have any infection in their udder.  In the perfect world you would do it every milking but it is time consuming.  The perfect thing for free labour like me to do!)

Towards the end of the week it was time to start prepping the cows for the show.  This involved giving them a summer shave all over their body and also shaving their udders to make the milk veins look more prominent.  The young heifers have more fur than the older cows, so they leave a strip of fur along their spine.  They then shape it and cut it into a sort of mohawk to make it look like their spines are perfectly straight.

The weekend rolled around and it was time for the show.  Saturday was the cows.  We loaded up the cows into the trailer and took them to the show ground.  When we got the cows there, it was time for a good scrub to make them perfectly clean.  After their cleaning everyone was on the lookout for any cows pooping.  If a cow pooped, the poop was scraped up right away (to prevent them stepping in it) and their bottoms were wiped with a baby wipe.  I have to admit, when I signed up for a dairy placement I did not expect to be wiping cows' bums with baby wipes!  Then it was time to grease them up.  They sprayed their fur with WD40 to make them look shiny and keep any fly away hairs down.  After that they sprayed their hooves with black spray paint to make them look perfectly black, and their tails were back brushed to make them nice and fluffy (I was in charge of that).  

In the first class (Heifers in Milk) the farm I was working for had 5 cows to show.  Not having five people to show them they asked me to show one.  So about 2 minutes before their class I got a 30 second run down on how to show a cow.  My cow placed 9th of 14.  But my farm won the class which was fantastic.  They went on to win every subsequent class except for mature cow.  And when it came to the championship, the were both Supreme Champion (what a great title name!) and Reserve Champion.  In non show terms it means they finished first and second overall which is incredible.

Ansom May Anemone, the supreme champion over Jersey June 2015

Sunday was the heifer show.  The farm didn't do as well but still had a very respectable day.  The show was such a fun experience.  I had never even seen a cow show before so to be involved in one was incredible.

When booking my flights I decided to stay an extra day to be able to be a tourist for the day.  I started by taking a walk along the cliff path close to the farm.

On a clear day you would be able to see France in the distance

Next I went to a Museum called La Hougue Bie.  Throughout history La Hougue Bie has been many things.  It was a neolithic site of worship 6000 years ago, has a medieval chapel on the mound and during World War II was a bunker for a German Labour Camp.

The Medieval Chapel

I finished the day off by going to Gorey, a small village on the Eastern Coast.  There I visited Mont Orgueil Castle.  It was first mentioned in history in 1204, but most of the modifications and buildings that remain today were built starting in the 1500s.  Its location was strategically chosen to protect Jersey from French invasion.  After the castle I spent a little time walking through the village and along the beach.

Looking toward France

Mont Orgueil from Gorey Beach

My week in Jersey is definitely up there in the rankings of my best EMS placements.  I would go back in a heartbeat!


PS:  I made the Jersey Paper!

You can see a gallery of pictures from the Jersey Summer fair here http://jerseyeveningpost.com/news/2015/06/15/gallery-thousands-enjoy-a-flavour-of-the-islands-country-life/