Work has been crazy lately. I’d tell you, but I don’t want to get “dooced” (or the government version where they put on a “special project” where you can’t ruin anything). So instead, I’m going to talk about Wilbur…the fetal pig.
He was a nice pig…despite being dead AND stinking of formaldehyde. Nearly 20 years later (see that wanna-baa – 20 years!!!!) I still remember Wilbur with a certain amount of fondness mixed with grossed out disgust. You see, Wilbur (not a very original choice) was for dissection. (Before you get too grossed out – the year before ours dissected cats)
Now for context, wanna-baa (of the comments – love ya!!!) was my lab partner and, if you don’t mind w-b, I should explain that I was fast tracking myself to medical school and my dear friend was heading down the English/philosophy/liberal arts path. So I was excited about dissection! I was going to be a doctor! It was all about scalpels and surgery babbeeee!!!!
Fast forward to 4 weeks later when I finally concluded that:
Dissection sucks
The smell of formaldehyde is awful
There is nothing inside a pig that I have any desire to scrutinize in detail
I can’t tell a liver from a kidney
My lab partner is Dr. Frankenstein (“Ooh! Ooh! Let’s crack open the skull and look at the brain!”)
Of course it took me another 2 years – one failed organic chemistry course and a rat in University Biology I managed to convince my lab partner to dissect by herself while I watched – before I pulled the plug on doctoring dreams.
Learning from experience? Not my strong suit.
Something I found out today: people on the bus don’t want to sit next to someone knitting a sock. Do you think it might be the four bright shiny pointy needles? Because knitters are dangerous? Because Canadians wouldn’t want to make a knitter feeling unfairly scrutinized when she is the ONLY one on the bus knitting? So the seat beside me gets sat in last and I figure the poor guy who sat there probably wondered if I smelled particularly awful or something since it was empty and decided to risk his life despite the sharp pointy sticks and possible odour.
Tuesday, April 11, 2006
Wilbur
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2 comments:
Ha! Laughing out loud and fondly remembering Wilbur. What on earth made you think of our wee little piggy? I guess he gave his little porcine life not in vain, he taught us both something (I must have his portrait somewhere in the basement, still). Feeling much nostalgia now, for Wilbur and for lost high school dreams, or more precisely for the time when anything was possible, even when it wasn't probable (and when finding out what you thought was your 'thing' wasn't your 'thing' wasn't a big deal because you had all the time in the world for your new 'thing' to hit you over the head and send you on a new path). Although now is good, too, because I can ramble on in a 450 word sentence and nobody can give me a C- for lack of clarity :)
No, but I'll give you an A for nostalgia!
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