Just Another Day at the Office


There's one thing that's always been true about my job. No two days are the same! Now you may wonder why there is a picture of a baby peacock in all its shiny blue and green glory on my blog post when I work at a dog/cat only practice. Well....


Today started out normally. Everything was going well until a patient (aka dog) that had been hospitalized for several days collapsed in the dog-yard during his morning potty walk and...died. The dog had been sick for several months, and a TON of different doctors, ultrasound specialists, radiologists, internists, etc. had not been able to diagnose exactly what was wrong with him. Once we got the go-ahead from the client, we performed a necropsy on the dog. Since it was a busy day and the dog was being sent out for a group cremation, the Dr. decided not to suture the dog closed after taking samples from the body cavity. We bagged up the dog and stuck him in the holding freezer. That's when the client's agent called (yes, to add to the story, he is one famous dude) to inform us that he and his band had decided to come and "view the body." Unfortunately by this time the dog had been in the freezer for a few hours. And, oh yeah, his intestines and organs were hanging out. What a peaceful way to see Fido for the last time. 


With about 25 minutes to go, we RAN back to pull the dog (name withheld due to doggie HIPAA, lol!) out of the freezer. His frosty little paws were not a good sign. We placed his abdomen on heating pads, so that the skin would be pliable enough for us to stick his guts back inside and staple him shut. Also his face had frozen into a funny position so heating pads were stuck there, too. His ventral abdomen (the bottom side) was covered in gut goo and some other bodily fluids had leaked out and frozen by then as well, so the next thing you know there is a dead, partially frozen dog in the bathtub getting a full-on spa treatment. Just for the record, it is super creepy to bathe and blow-out a dead animal. By this time we are all laughing at the ridiculousness of the situation. 


Enter, PEACOCK!! A girl comes running in the front door, and says, "There is a peacock on the highway!!! We are feeding it a bagel but it is trying to cross the street and we aren't sure what to do with it!!" The next thing you know my boss is running out the door to catch the peacock. I'm unsure how that whole chase went, but about the time Mr. Famous and his band pull up, she is running back in the door with a clucking peafowl in her arms. Somehow we all managed to pull a straight face, and it's a good thing this dude always shows up stoned...otherwise I'm sure he would have caught the undertones of hysterical laughter. We were all barely containing snorts of laughter.


At the end of the day Mr. Famous got to see his dog, "sleeping" peacefully, the peacock was contained, and everything was ok but WHAT A RIDE!!!! I guess that's why I stay in this field; it is certainly never boring. It makes me laugh inside when I tell people I work in an animal hospital and they say..."Awwww....it must be so much fun to get paid to play with puppies all day!!"