Well, today was our groups turn to take the bus to Oatridge. It is north of Edinburgh city. About 45 minutes by bus to be precise. We had our two lectures this morning and had about a two hour break. I studied at the main library for about 1.5 hours and headed back to the school. We got on the bus to Oatridge and 45 min later arrived. We had to sit through a lecture for 40 min regarding pigs. Once that was over, we all got on our waterproofs and split into two groups. One group to vaccinate piglets and one to weigh pigs. I was in the group to weigh pigs. This was quite interesting now. I was placed in charge of the scale and the rest of the group had to use a pig board and chase each individual pig into the scale. The scale was a cage and if the pig was over 90kg, I got to spray the back with red paint. A lot of the pigs would not budge into the scale, so I did a lot of slapping pig butts/backs and pushing with my knee. So, once we were finished with weighing the pigs, I was given the lovely job of going down the very narrow walkway where all of the pigs had collected and chasing them back to where they came from. I thank god that I was wearing steel toe capped wellies because I was stepped on about 6 or 7 times. The pigs, they squeal, A LOT! It was jolly good fun though.
Once we were finished with weighing the pigs, we then switched and got to vaccinate piglets. Now, remember, this is the first time I have ever had experience with pigs. The way that they pick piglets up is from the hind leg. You basically grab the proximal region of the hind leg (thought I'd throw some terminology in there) and swing each piglet up into your arms. There was an oral vaccination and also an intramuscular injection. The IM injection is injected about 1cm behind the ear. They do not give IM vaccinations in the hind end because this is where the cuts of meat are taken from. The last thing you want is an abscess in your store-purchased meat from an IM injection. So one of the girls in the group had the syringe gun and needle and had stabbed the girl that was holding the pig on accident! Silly vet students, when will they learn how to properly give injections? Do I have to show them everything? Hahaha!
Once we were finished with the vaccinations, we hosed ourselves off and it began to rain, A LOT! We got back on the bus to the city centre and I was so hungry I ordered chinese at this place off the main road. Now, this gets interesting. I picked out what I wanted to order on the menu, which happened to be the "Cantonese Chow Mein Special". I go inside the restaurant and ask for an order to go. So I tell the chinese lady what I want to order, "could I order the Cantonese Chow Mein Special please?". So, this is what her reply was (I kid you not!) "Cat meat? No! We have no cat meat here!". This lady seriously thought I said cat meat? Come one! I was laughing quite hard when she said that, hope she did not feel I was making fun of her. Anyway, I joined Blockbuster as well, was quite easy. Next is to go check out Costco (I wonder how different their products will be from the USA?). Well, off I go to continue studying. I must study all of the origin and insertion points for muscles and revise what I have already gone over. This is a long process! I am actually still enjoying it though. Except for the boring lecture on Farm Economics. Hope everyone is doing well! Talk to you soon!
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4 comments:
But did they have pig meat in their chow mein???
A 'jolly good time'? You're starting to write with an accent!
We had one of those pig days, too. It was amazing how LOUD they are! We had to get blood samples from all the little pigs. While the group I was in was touring the facility one of the girls in the blood draw group accidentally killed a pig (you draw the blood from the jugular and apparently she sliced the vein when the piglet squirmed). By the time our tour group got back the blood draw group was getting lectured on how not to kill pigs and we weren't allowed to try. It was very sad.
Guess what? I read that chocolate milk is a good recovery drink after a long run! I always knew chocolate was good for you. :)
Hmm, yeah, I guess I did write that didn't I? Well I guess that is how it works then. You first develop the word usage such as when you are typing and THEN the accent kicks in later. I have found myself quite often using words that I have been exposed to and also spelling words like they do here. I even do it naturally on the keyboard. It's very weird when you first notice that you are starting to type 'behavior' like this: 'behaviour' or 'colour'. Yeah, those piglets are terribly loud! I had one that was squirming about and even though they are small, they sure are strong. My restraint techniques for dogs worked somewhat, but otherwise, too squirmy to hold onto for any extended length of time. Hmmm, I'm going to say slicing a jugular vein is probably not good...Scotland probably got wind of what happened in Washington when you were there and since then, they have not allowed students to draw blood on the piglets. We were not shown how to do this. So you are going to start drinking chocolate milk every time you run then? In my opinion, I would say that it defeats the purpose of the run.
There probably was pig meat in the chow mein, but I was too hungry to notice. I do know that there were about 3 or 4 types of meat in it.
I also started writing the way they spell things in other countries! When I came back from a trip to Holland to visit Bob, I started spelling 'beer' as they do over there - 'bier'. So Dan, go have a delicious white bier for me!
Love you! Hopefully you didn't upset that lady at the asian food restaurant, or next time you might really get some cat meat hehe!
Love you!
Kristin
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