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Full moon weekend fun
Jun. 26th, 2010 06:28 pmYou should all feel loved--this is the first time I've had to sit down all day, and here I am talking (typing) to you. Not really complaining here; so far nearly everyone I've seen/talked to this weekend has been appreciative and friendly (except the getting stood up thing, more on that later).
Last night, I left work shortly after 5, made it about half way home and realized I'd forgotten the work phone. Turned around and went back, grabbed the phone and headed out again. As I was pulling out of the parking lot, someone else was pulling in. I dunno who, because I thought they were pulling into the coffee shop next door, and headed out around the back... turns out they were driving in to the front. I decided that if it was an emergency, they'd call. By this time it was after 20 past, and we were clearly closed.
I had just made it home when I got the first call of the night. This is a very condensed version, since I talked to the woman for quite some time. She'd just gotten a dog from someone else, who'd threatened to shoot it. Female that had just weaned pups, skinny and has big mammary glands. Woman was all freaked out about the fact that the mammary glands were still big even though the pups were weaned, and wanted to know what to do with the dog. This is an emergency? What? Apparently she thought so, as she told me that she'd already called the emergency number for the clinic north of here but they were busy.... Short answer: feed it, and get it spayed before fall. Long answer was an explanation of the time it takes for mammary glands to shrink back after weaning, and a discussion of internal parasites, a recommendation to bring us the dog for an exam or at least a fecal sample to rule out parasites, discussion of feeding and introducing the new dog to her current dogs, etc. She then tried to make an appointment for next week, and I told her to call during business hours because I didn't have the appointment book at home. She said she'd bring in a fecal sample tomorrow.
At 6:30, got a call from a guy who'd just gotten home and his dog's eyes were swollen shut. Rinse them out, give him Benadryl. If he's still swollen tomorrow, come in for steroids.
At 9:00, S.G. called in. I like this guy; he and his wife are always happy and appreciative. Really--I've never seen them when they weren't apparently having the time of their life. So insert stifled (or not so stifled) laughter through out this entire conversation. "I've got a horse that managed to run a stick up into herself between her bag and her leg. Think maybe we should do something about that?" "Nah, it's normal. Just leave it!" So turns out that this is a free horse they were given only a week ago. They had just been out riding, and turned the horses into the field. They saw this happen, so we know just how freak-chancey it is. Mare stepped on a stick, which broke and flipped end-up into the air, impaling her. And I do mean impaling. 2 inch diameter stick, and it went in a good 5 inches. How microscopic are the odds of that!? Lucky horse though; the stick pushed up into the space between thigh and abdominal muscles, with no tear or puncture into the abdomen. No significant bleeding either. Sedated her to explore and flush the wound, boostered her tetanus and sent her home with pain killers and antibiotics.
At 9:45, while I'm working on the horse, I get a call from a fellow who says his dog's just been kicked in the head by his horse. We go through the first aid discussion--eye is still in socket, dog can see, gums are pink, oozing blood but not gushing. Owner already has Rimadyl at home from a different dog, so ice pack his head and give him Rimadyl. Warned about blood in the eye obscuring vision temporarily, and the possibility of sudden pressure changes in the eye damaging the retina. Told him what to watch for in way of concussion signs. Went back to working on the horse.
Came home and climbed into bed, only to be called again at 10:45 by the fellow with the kicked-in-head dog. He's very worried, and admits that he's probably over-reacting, but his other dog just got hit by a car and died on Monday...went through the concussion signs again, talked about enucleation if the globe is damaged (but he doesn't think it is, though now it's full of blood and the dog can't see). Even if the dog is blind, don't need to take the eye out if it's not painful. Owner debates whether to bring dog in now or during office hours... decides to watch him overnight.
Woken up at 1:00 by the guy with the allergic reaction dog again. Swelling is worse, and dog is uncomfortable. Okay to give aspirin, and went over Benadryl dosage again, and emergency vs coming in tomorrow costs. He'll come in tomorrow.
So this morning, first thing I do is hand Receptionist a list of numbers to start calling people back so they don't all show up at the same time.
Allergic/swollen face dog shows up at 8:30, as Receptionist is trying to call owners... They drop him off as they are on their way out of town. We give him a dose of steroids, as his face is pretty miserable.
Kicked in head dog comes in at 9. Really nice dog, but his poor eye is really sad... all the tissue around it is so swollen that there are splits in the surface of the conjunctiva that are oozing bloody fluid. I think the eye will make it though. Sent him home with eye drops and continue the Rimadyl.
Had the usual run of vaccines and routine exams to keep me busy most of the rest of the morning, plus one euthanasia on a really old cat.
Last appointment was a little dog that got stomped on by a mule last night. Lucky for her, nothing seems to be broken, but she's so arthritic and fat that I'm surprised she could walk before she got her butt kicked by a beast 100 times her size.
Woman with the rescue dog never did drop off a fecal sample... we'll see if she calls to make an appointment next week.
Just thinking about closing up shop when we get a call from a woman whose dog has tried to eat a porcupine. I run out to grab lunch, and come back to the clinic. And wait. and wait. and wait. But not to worry! We weren't bored during the wait, because the lady with the bobcat turns up as a walk-in/emergency about 12:30 (the time the porcupine dog should have arrived).
Bobcat acts like he's got something stuck in his mouth, but is way too freaked out to let me look, so we knock him out to get a better exam. Nothing much of interest in his mouth, oddly. We'll chalk that one up to yet another yellow jacket sting.
Just as I'm finishing with the bobcat and getting ready to wake him up, we get ANOTHER unannounced emergency walk-in. No, the porcupine dog hasn't shown up yet. This one's a fawn that's been chewed up something fierce by a dog. Receptionist takes the fawn and puts her in a kennel, and woman proceeds to freak out... "why are they putting it in a pen? is it going to die? what's wrong with it?" I try to explain to them that I need to finish with the one I'm working on now first, but ends up the receptionist has to corner them back out to the lobby and explain, because the woman just won't listen and I can't leave the cat unobserved on the table. (Probably not helpful to the fawn's piece of mind to put her on the table with the cat!)
Wake the cat up and am walking back to the kennel to get the fawn when the cell phone rings again. Egads. Weigh the fawn, quick look--yup, that's pretty bad--dose her up with antibiotics and pain killers, and put her back in the kennel, because I'll need to head out to see to a cow having trouble calving.
Called the people with the porcupine dog before leaving, because it's now been 3 hours since they called and they have not shown up. Get a man, who says that the woman decided to take the dog to the veterinary clinic north of here, because they "might be less expensive". Well, fine. Works out well for me in this instance, but still a fucking asshole thing to do. Also, I know for sure that they will not be less expensive, nothing there ever is. (No point telling him that, I suppose, since it's not like I really want people inconsiderate enough to call me in on an emergency and then stand me up as clients, so I didn't).
Small incident on the way out to the cow; making a left hand turn off the highway, and there's a woman who has managed to get her entire car over the stop-line, thus nearly obstructing the entire turning path I need. I turn anyway, giving her car an ample 4 inches of clearance as I go. Hey, I knew exactly where my truck was going. I may appear reckless, but I was watching. And since both my window and hers are rolled down, I clearly say her saying "Damn, Bitch!" as I pivot the truck around her car. Like it's my fault that she feels free to totally disregard the clearly marked stop-line? Whatever, you psycho. Learn how to drive before you start swearing at other people on the road.
Nice, exciting wrestling match with a very disgruntled cow, resulting in a live (but not terribly lively) bull-calf and a sore but intact mama. We'll see if the calf makes it; was a really hard pull and he was in pretty rough shape.
Head back to the clinic to patch up the fawn, but sadly find her dead in the kennel when I get back.
Since I'm already covered in cow goo and nastiness, and need to hose off my calf-jack anyway, I decide to tackle cleaning the raccoon cage, which is a stinky mess (I gave them a bucket of mud with worms and other goodies in it to dig through, and they tracked mud EVERYWHERE). Pull everything out, hose and scrub and hose some more (getting splattered and soaked in the process), put everything back and go to move the 'coons back. The bigger one is definitely getting people shy; she does NOT want to be picked up anymore. Which is good, because I want them wild, but inconvenient as I'm chasing her around the kennel to move her back to her pen. At least she's not trying to bite me (yet).
And then, finally, home for a shower and to update all of you on my oh-so-exciting life. Wish me luck for the rest of weekend! (And just to make you all jealous, Bruce is making cinnamon rolls!)
Last night, I left work shortly after 5, made it about half way home and realized I'd forgotten the work phone. Turned around and went back, grabbed the phone and headed out again. As I was pulling out of the parking lot, someone else was pulling in. I dunno who, because I thought they were pulling into the coffee shop next door, and headed out around the back... turns out they were driving in to the front. I decided that if it was an emergency, they'd call. By this time it was after 20 past, and we were clearly closed.
I had just made it home when I got the first call of the night. This is a very condensed version, since I talked to the woman for quite some time. She'd just gotten a dog from someone else, who'd threatened to shoot it. Female that had just weaned pups, skinny and has big mammary glands. Woman was all freaked out about the fact that the mammary glands were still big even though the pups were weaned, and wanted to know what to do with the dog. This is an emergency? What? Apparently she thought so, as she told me that she'd already called the emergency number for the clinic north of here but they were busy.... Short answer: feed it, and get it spayed before fall. Long answer was an explanation of the time it takes for mammary glands to shrink back after weaning, and a discussion of internal parasites, a recommendation to bring us the dog for an exam or at least a fecal sample to rule out parasites, discussion of feeding and introducing the new dog to her current dogs, etc. She then tried to make an appointment for next week, and I told her to call during business hours because I didn't have the appointment book at home. She said she'd bring in a fecal sample tomorrow.
At 6:30, got a call from a guy who'd just gotten home and his dog's eyes were swollen shut. Rinse them out, give him Benadryl. If he's still swollen tomorrow, come in for steroids.
At 9:00, S.G. called in. I like this guy; he and his wife are always happy and appreciative. Really--I've never seen them when they weren't apparently having the time of their life. So insert stifled (or not so stifled) laughter through out this entire conversation. "I've got a horse that managed to run a stick up into herself between her bag and her leg. Think maybe we should do something about that?" "Nah, it's normal. Just leave it!" So turns out that this is a free horse they were given only a week ago. They had just been out riding, and turned the horses into the field. They saw this happen, so we know just how freak-chancey it is. Mare stepped on a stick, which broke and flipped end-up into the air, impaling her. And I do mean impaling. 2 inch diameter stick, and it went in a good 5 inches. How microscopic are the odds of that!? Lucky horse though; the stick pushed up into the space between thigh and abdominal muscles, with no tear or puncture into the abdomen. No significant bleeding either. Sedated her to explore and flush the wound, boostered her tetanus and sent her home with pain killers and antibiotics.
At 9:45, while I'm working on the horse, I get a call from a fellow who says his dog's just been kicked in the head by his horse. We go through the first aid discussion--eye is still in socket, dog can see, gums are pink, oozing blood but not gushing. Owner already has Rimadyl at home from a different dog, so ice pack his head and give him Rimadyl. Warned about blood in the eye obscuring vision temporarily, and the possibility of sudden pressure changes in the eye damaging the retina. Told him what to watch for in way of concussion signs. Went back to working on the horse.
Came home and climbed into bed, only to be called again at 10:45 by the fellow with the kicked-in-head dog. He's very worried, and admits that he's probably over-reacting, but his other dog just got hit by a car and died on Monday...went through the concussion signs again, talked about enucleation if the globe is damaged (but he doesn't think it is, though now it's full of blood and the dog can't see). Even if the dog is blind, don't need to take the eye out if it's not painful. Owner debates whether to bring dog in now or during office hours... decides to watch him overnight.
Woken up at 1:00 by the guy with the allergic reaction dog again. Swelling is worse, and dog is uncomfortable. Okay to give aspirin, and went over Benadryl dosage again, and emergency vs coming in tomorrow costs. He'll come in tomorrow.
So this morning, first thing I do is hand Receptionist a list of numbers to start calling people back so they don't all show up at the same time.
Allergic/swollen face dog shows up at 8:30, as Receptionist is trying to call owners... They drop him off as they are on their way out of town. We give him a dose of steroids, as his face is pretty miserable.
Kicked in head dog comes in at 9. Really nice dog, but his poor eye is really sad... all the tissue around it is so swollen that there are splits in the surface of the conjunctiva that are oozing bloody fluid. I think the eye will make it though. Sent him home with eye drops and continue the Rimadyl.
Had the usual run of vaccines and routine exams to keep me busy most of the rest of the morning, plus one euthanasia on a really old cat.
Last appointment was a little dog that got stomped on by a mule last night. Lucky for her, nothing seems to be broken, but she's so arthritic and fat that I'm surprised she could walk before she got her butt kicked by a beast 100 times her size.
Woman with the rescue dog never did drop off a fecal sample... we'll see if she calls to make an appointment next week.
Just thinking about closing up shop when we get a call from a woman whose dog has tried to eat a porcupine. I run out to grab lunch, and come back to the clinic. And wait. and wait. and wait. But not to worry! We weren't bored during the wait, because the lady with the bobcat turns up as a walk-in/emergency about 12:30 (the time the porcupine dog should have arrived).
Bobcat acts like he's got something stuck in his mouth, but is way too freaked out to let me look, so we knock him out to get a better exam. Nothing much of interest in his mouth, oddly. We'll chalk that one up to yet another yellow jacket sting.
Just as I'm finishing with the bobcat and getting ready to wake him up, we get ANOTHER unannounced emergency walk-in. No, the porcupine dog hasn't shown up yet. This one's a fawn that's been chewed up something fierce by a dog. Receptionist takes the fawn and puts her in a kennel, and woman proceeds to freak out... "why are they putting it in a pen? is it going to die? what's wrong with it?" I try to explain to them that I need to finish with the one I'm working on now first, but ends up the receptionist has to corner them back out to the lobby and explain, because the woman just won't listen and I can't leave the cat unobserved on the table. (Probably not helpful to the fawn's piece of mind to put her on the table with the cat!)
Wake the cat up and am walking back to the kennel to get the fawn when the cell phone rings again. Egads. Weigh the fawn, quick look--yup, that's pretty bad--dose her up with antibiotics and pain killers, and put her back in the kennel, because I'll need to head out to see to a cow having trouble calving.
Called the people with the porcupine dog before leaving, because it's now been 3 hours since they called and they have not shown up. Get a man, who says that the woman decided to take the dog to the veterinary clinic north of here, because they "might be less expensive". Well, fine. Works out well for me in this instance, but still a fucking asshole thing to do. Also, I know for sure that they will not be less expensive, nothing there ever is. (No point telling him that, I suppose, since it's not like I really want people inconsiderate enough to call me in on an emergency and then stand me up as clients, so I didn't).
Small incident on the way out to the cow; making a left hand turn off the highway, and there's a woman who has managed to get her entire car over the stop-line, thus nearly obstructing the entire turning path I need. I turn anyway, giving her car an ample 4 inches of clearance as I go. Hey, I knew exactly where my truck was going. I may appear reckless, but I was watching. And since both my window and hers are rolled down, I clearly say her saying "Damn, Bitch!" as I pivot the truck around her car. Like it's my fault that she feels free to totally disregard the clearly marked stop-line? Whatever, you psycho. Learn how to drive before you start swearing at other people on the road.
Nice, exciting wrestling match with a very disgruntled cow, resulting in a live (but not terribly lively) bull-calf and a sore but intact mama. We'll see if the calf makes it; was a really hard pull and he was in pretty rough shape.
Head back to the clinic to patch up the fawn, but sadly find her dead in the kennel when I get back.
Since I'm already covered in cow goo and nastiness, and need to hose off my calf-jack anyway, I decide to tackle cleaning the raccoon cage, which is a stinky mess (I gave them a bucket of mud with worms and other goodies in it to dig through, and they tracked mud EVERYWHERE). Pull everything out, hose and scrub and hose some more (getting splattered and soaked in the process), put everything back and go to move the 'coons back. The bigger one is definitely getting people shy; she does NOT want to be picked up anymore. Which is good, because I want them wild, but inconvenient as I'm chasing her around the kennel to move her back to her pen. At least she's not trying to bite me (yet).
And then, finally, home for a shower and to update all of you on my oh-so-exciting life. Wish me luck for the rest of weekend! (And just to make you all jealous, Bruce is making cinnamon rolls!)
