Diary of a Vet Student

Hello. Oooo this is so eery. I've come to the vetschool quickly to write my blog and there's just me and one other person in the computer cluster. Logging on was so easy so computers jamming or anything! Everyone is tucked away in their little study holes. Actually most are in the library just along the way.

Well what do you think I've been doing from 9 am o 12 midnight everyday? Wooohooo study.

Nearly there now. We are on the home stretch. Last Wednesday's physiology exam was a bit weird. It was problem solving. That meant annalysing graphs and statistical things and then using your physiology knowledge to explain them. the problem was each question was worth a maximum of 3 points and I found my self writing almost a page for each one as I wasn't quite sure what they wanted. Other people said the same so unless they were just trying to make me feel better, that's probably sometghing we need some practice on!

On Tuesday its the anatomy written paper which is a bit of a beast looming on the horizon since there is so much stuff for us to cover and before Wednesday everyone had been concentrating on biomolec and physiology. I could freak but I won't. I'm a calm cool sophisticated veterinary student who really knows what she's doing. ooooozah. Just send some calming vibes please.

Hello!

Nice to make contact with the outside world again after being stuck in my flat revising. Only kidding although it has been pretty intense over the past 4 days. It's just been study 12 to 14 hours a day (yes I am milking it). We just had physiology. It was 2 essays out of a choice of three. One essay I did asked to describe ways in which cardiac outpt can be altered and then then how these can be applied to excercise and haemorrage (I can't spell that). Then the second essay question was to descibe how the kidney regulates glomerular filtration rate in euvolaemia and then during hypervolaemia and hypovolaemia. Then we had 80 multiple chouce questions. It's all very taxing. Then tomorrow we have another physiology paper and this is problem solving.

So far I think physiology went Ok. I'm nackered now and feeling a bit woozy so will have to have an early night and do more study tomo. The exam is in the afternoon.

Planning lots of nice things to do after the exams like the vet school raft race, which involves constructing a boat and near drowning to get it about 100m down the river. Also going to the Hive at the union, which involves me getting drunk and showing my nickers to lots of people.

Until later............

Oooo feeling sore after today's animal husbandry practical. Was feeling rather nervous about this one as didn't have a scooby about what to expect and know from past experience that despite ooooodles of revisioni animal husbandry can go mightily pear shaped if that be the way the wind takes it.

It wa'nt that bad. We had 2 sessions each of 20 minutes. This is at Cochno farm. In my first session I was asked a load of questions on horses. This was great as I know quite a lot about horses. Then we moved onto calves. I managed to put a halter on, but then things started getting hairy when I was asked to estimate the age of the calf and had a bit of a blip (brain- wise). It really was common sense, but got it spectacularly wrong. I was asked other stuff too about what to feed the calf, when is the last date she had to be tagged by. Then we looked at the cows in the field. He asked me what stage of lactation I thought they were in. It turned out they were dry cows, with heifers mixed in. I was asked about poultry (what is the point of lay?) Then I went to my next station and I was asked about lambing routine, which was great after lambing. I was asked about the bullocks in the cow sheds -background and breed. Then I was asked what advice I'd give to a new puppy owner. Sounds all pretty common sense stuff. This can be a tad difficult when your head's in a spin and you end up telling them that a broiler breeder is the parent bird of a commercial broiler, which produces rabbit meat (doh). That was one of my blips though, I thought the rest went reasonable. Fingers crossed.

The other exams have been pretty OK. Animal husbandry is always a bit of a sticker for everyone as there is just so much to learn. I do like learning it though and the orals are actually another opportunity to learn a little bit more!

On Tuesday we had 3 hours to do 5 essay in biomolecular science, which was a bit steep. Needed a couple of chocci bics after that one. Then Wednesday was biomolecular science 60 multiple choice qestions in 2 hours. That can be a bit mind wrangling. I felt Ok about both those though.

We've got 4 days until physiology so I'm chilling tonight and back to it tomo. Talli ho

Okee dokee then let me tell you all about my exciting week.

Basically it's been study study, icecream, toast soaked in butter and Mum's good cooking, then study, study, study, "Coronation Street" study.

I had a bit of a fright the other morning. I texted my mate Alice to see if she knew anything about the animal husbandry practical we've got this Thursday. She started reeling off all this stuff we've got to know: How to age a sheep. How to cast a cow. How to tie a halter for a cow. How to worm a sheep. What comes after shearing in the sheepy calendar? What to feed a 70kg ewe bearing twin lambs in late pregnancy? She just sent the willies up me as I realised I was a tad behind with my revision. Although looking back at what I've just written it does seem a lot like common sense. Anyway I said, "fllipping heck" and had a bit of a flap then started in earnest on my animal husbandry past papers. Normally I like to read my notes and then use mindmaps as revision notes. This is really hard to do in animal husbandry, because there's only so much time and shed-loads so learn. Past papers help to direct you to the really important stuff. They're also less boring.

Anyway I realised I needed a night off tonight. Mum came in to say that tea would be an hour late and I burst into tears. What can I say? I'm an over-tired over-emotional girly. I'm entitled to be every now and again. Anyway I went for a wee walk and was back at the grind stone within about 15 minutes and managed to work until tea time. Then "Friends", "My Family" and "Will and Grace" came to the rescue. Ooooo yes I'm re-freshed, re-vitalised and no-longer hormonal. Phew.

My good friend Bob text me last night to say He's been made social member of GUVMA for next year. That's great! GUVMA is the Glasgow University Veterinary Medicine Association. Basically it organises our piss-ups. It does a whole load of other really important stuff too. Like giving us a say in how the course is run and organising the rodeo. Members meet once a week. There's the big "school committe" which Bob is now on and there's year reps, one from each year group, who also attend the meetings. It's a great thing to be involved in. Even if you're not on the committe, they always need a hand organising entertainment and everyone mucks in, which makes the social dos even more fun. Can't wait to see what next year brings.

I also can't wait until the end of these exams, when there will be much elation and clanking of glasses and general tit-like behaviour, which has been sadly lacking in my life of late! Oh sorry to moan. I love it really. :)

Right then. Here's the problem: I'm a bit short on material today. Firstly I'm not actually at vet school so although this is still the diary of a vet student, today it's the diary of a vet student who ain't at vet school. Secondly I haven't really done a right lot other than study for 12 hours at a time for the past few days.

My exam crawl is going to begin a week on Tuesday with biomolecular science. Thus I'm trying to go over all my BMS stuff this weekend (and yesterday and the day before!) . Then I'll try and recap on it next weekend before the exam. I've got animal husbandary practical immediately after BMS. I've no idea what to expect on that one. I hope it's something to do with sheep after all my lambing experience, but I've a feeling it will be something really obscure like trying to estimate how much a pile of silage weighs. Thankfully there's about 1 week between each of my subjects' exams. That's really good because we really haven't had a lot of time to revise for 2 years worth of stuff! This is especially because most of us spent the whole Easter break (4 weeks) lambing and doing other work experience. I definitely wouldn't have wanted it any other way! However this means we've all got to get our jollio skates on! Nothing like a bit of pannick to get you motivated though ay?

Okee dokee. I'll be back before too long to let you know of my adventures in the next fun packed week of study! Got to get going now as I've scheduled a good session of vegging infront of the TV and doing nothing as a special no-study Saturday night treat!

Tara

Here I am again to fill you in on the past week. The rodeo was a truly sunkissed day. We couldn't believe how sunny it was and there were fun and games for all the family. My flat mate's folks came along and brought her dog. We entered the lovely Molly in three of the dog show classes. Sadly she didn't anything, but another of my mates came third by entering her flatmate in the "most unusual dog" class. I ate lots of ice cream and managed to get a scorching red-hot poker glow, but only on one side of my body. fabdabbydozy.

The evening do was a really good laugh. I managed to get trolleyed on 1 glass of wine and a bacardi breezer, which has to be a new record for me. I've still got a bruise the size of a small planet on my thigh where someone jumped on me as I was showing off my gymnastic rolly-polly to a gang of my over-enthusiastic mates. there was a great celidh band and we all walked back home after the do feeling absolutely shattered. ahhh

oooo and I won a teedy on one of the game stalls.

Lectures finnished last Friday. We had our last behavioural lectures then. I think they were really important even though we probably won't get assessed on them. I think that behaviour and its link to animal welfare is something I might like to go into when I graduate, although I must admit I change my mind on what I want to do every week!

So I've been doing very serious studying. I jumped on a train on Tuesday and came home. Actually I staggered onto the train, because my rucksack and suitcase contained all my 1st and 2nd year notes and text books. I'm going to study here for the next week as my exams don't start until next Tuesday (and that's ages away - no really it is...eeek). I am refusing to get stressed although it is a tad scary. It's quite good that the exams are reasonably spread out . I'm actually enjoying re-learning everything again. It's also great being at home. Dad and I have got this routine going, whereby he brings me a fresh cup of tea and a(nother) flapjack every 2 hours. It's great. I love home. It's also good because I get to palpate my lovely dog Lucy and revise all my anatomy. Although I still haven't found her infraorbital foramen....

Night night.