Almost the end of another week...

Week 3 of 4 is coming to a close...this week has been quite slow as far as animals coming in for the Diagnostic Service, but yesterday I got to watch a dolphin necropsy! This was a dolphin that washed up on the Georgia coast awhile back, and they saved the necropsy for a time when students would benefit. It was very interesting, and something I'd be unlikely to see if I hadn't been here. Also, it turned out that the pathologist performing the necropsy used to work at the MSU Experiment Station in Stoneville; it was nice to have a quasi-Mississippian in the same room.

During the day yesterday, I spent most of my time helping 3 other people put little pieces of lymph node in little vials to be tested for Chronic Wasting Disease. It wasn't exciting work, but it was a good chance to get to talk to a few other folks that work at SCWDS.

Today, we did have a few necropsies: 2 baby squirrels and a Common Grackle (picture...
).
and a buck head came in with a brain abscess, which is quite a common cause of death in male deer. We're still anticipating a Key Deer from Florida, and I hope for the UPS man's sake that it gets here tomorrow!

I looked at my list of "Places to Eat in Athens" and realized I better get to eatin' if I'm going to get through my list before I leave, so after school/work, I went downtown to eat at Five Star Day Cafe. I hadn't been downtown all week, so it was nice to walk around for a minute, and see the Athens local panhandlers that I've grown to know and love (not really...but you definately see the same ones every time). There is one old man that looks sorta like a grungy Santa Claus and he plays a flute. The night I stood in line forever to get my free scoop of Ben & Jerry's, he was sitting next to the line serenading all of us with his little flute pipe instrument. I've seen him at least 3 times since and he's been playing the same "song" on the same block."