A sad day for the body modification community

http://www.zentastic.com/blog/

Shannon Larratt, the founder of BMEzine died.  I've read BME or his personal blog almost every day since I was 13 or 14.  If you're not part of the bod mod community, it's hard to explain his influence, but I'll give it a shot.  BME was built as a community - not just a website for sharing information or pictures, but as a "homebase" for people who may not have had one in real life.  BME strove to cover all aspects -> spreading accurate information, including detailed risks, while covering the cultural and fringe aspects.  It gave people a voice, and a cohesiveness that hadn't existed previously.  It was a place to browse photographs, read about new techniques for new modifications, read/listen to interviews with practitioners and the heavily modified, and fight poorly written legislation and discrimination. BME was what provided me with the information to become a body piercer, and to be the best damn body piercer I could be.

In 2000, Shannon built iamBME, a social networking page that allowed its members to form subgroups, share their photos and thoughts, and once again, served as a way to connect the community.  It doesn't sound like a big deal, but iamBME preceded all the other social networking sites like myspace and facebook by a good 3-4 years.  That's right, the freaks had it first.

His personal blog exposed me to some great things I may not have stumbled upon otherwise.  My love of earthship architecture is because of Shannon.  He's the one who really got me thinking of the advantages of off-grid living and self-sufficiency.

Whenever I emailed him, he would always reply, even though we'd never met, and he never had any obligation to me.  Whether it was 14 year old me asking about the steps necessary to break into the industry, 20 year old me asking about different piercing techniques, or last may, when he wrote me a very well-thought-out reply to my blog post on the need of modified people to be more visible in a professional capacity, he always took time to support members of the community.

Within the past few years, he started experiencing some problems.  What started out as an odd mass on his leg, eventually turned to muscle wasting, pain, difficulty walking, and eventually apnea even when he was awake.  He spoke about the difficulties getting diagnosed (finally with a rare disease called tubular aggregate myopathy), and sadly about the difficulties of getting proper pain control in a system that would rather withhold real relief for people who need it rather than risk medicating a drug seeker.

I left the body modification industry in 2009, when I quit piercing in order to work at a veterinary clinic full time.  I never left the community.  Shannon became less important to me as a representative of body modification over the past few years, and more important to me as a philosopher and fellow human being.  Even though today's news was expected, it feels like there's a gaping hole left in the world.  I'm so happy for him that he's no longer suffering, but so sad that he's gone.  Even if you're not the least bit interested in tattoos or piercings or extreme mods, it's worth clicking the link at the top of this entry and reading his last post.

I survived small animal block

I just wrapped up my final's week for small animal block.  Looking at my test scores - apparently having a Dr. Who marathon instead of studying the weekend before exams wasn't my brightest plan I've ever had.  Oh, well, I'll just chalk it up to a life lesson in not allowing myself to get too complacent with things.

To celebrate exams being over, I went to the Aquarium of the Pacific with Sarah, then walked around Long Beach, and ate lunch overlooking the harbor.  After having zero free time for the past 2 months, and a shitty exam week, it was exactly what I needed.  I got to spend the day relaxing, with no time constraints, just great conversation and beautiful weather.  I was really surprised at how unimpressive the actual aquarium was - I've been to the aquarium in Denver, and I thought that an aquarium in an even bigger city, right next to the ocean would be phenomenal, but it was way smaller than expected, overrun with kids and strollers, and with way fewer and smaller fish than I was hoping to see.  And it didn't even matter, because I got to spend the day with my best friend.

Next week's rotation starts at a diagnostic lab - from what I understand from people who have already done this rotation is that you battle hellacious LA rush hour traffic there and back, you're sleep deprived because of the commute, but that you learn so much that it's all worth it in the end.  Fingers crossed.

It's only taken about 3 years....

But I just crossed 50,000 views on my blog!  I started out writing here, thinking that maybe the occasional family member who I forgot to call would read what I'm writing, and instead, I've managed to pick up a decent number of monthly pageviews.  Not bad, considering I never really expected any readers at all.

I have one week left of my last small animal rotation of 3rd year.  Finals are the week after. I'm pooped, I feel like I haven't done near enough studying, and I just want a couple days to myself where I can goof off and not have to worry school.  Luckily, spring break is at the end of March, but that's sooo far away right now.

Oh, and if you're reading this, and you're not a vet or in vet school, you probably haven't seen this article plastered across all your social networking sites today.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/24/business/high-debt-and-falling-demand-trap-new-veterinarians.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

I think I'm a little bit in love with emergency medicine

I still have 2 more days on my emergency rotation, but I have definitely learned that the things I loved about seeing wildlife are the same things I love about emergency medicine.  Trauma cases come in, and you're frantically working to fix them or humanely euthanize them.  While working with injured wildlife has the advantage that they don't come attached to owners, emergency has the advantage of great hours and actually pays.  This could very well change my plans for after graduation.  

The only downside of the past few weeks is that my credit union disabled my debit card due to an "external compromise," then forgot to send me a new one.  I called them and asked when I should expect my new one in the mail, and the CSR was like "we don't have a record of having sent you a new one.  Would you like me to send one now?" No, dummy, I just want to never be able to access my bank account.  When I asked if they could overnight one, since they screwed up, they would only do it if I paid $50 to cover their screwup.  Gah.  For some reason, my debit card has been canceled and replaced 3 times since I've moved to California due to security breaches on the bank's end.  And it always gets replaced just as I memorize the number and can order stuff online without having to pull it out of my wallet.  Every time without fail.  

I'm a space case

I forgot to mention earlier that I got to do something fun and not-school-related.

Last week, Tyler and I went to see Gojira at the Glass House.  Gojira's a metal band from France that tends to be very environmentally themed.  Hell, they've donated a shitload of money to Sea Shepherd, and briefly had an anti-whaling boat named after them.  They're one of the bands that is actually articulate and thought-provoking in interviews, and apparently, live, they just rock your socks off.



An aside - stupid smartphones.  I haven't been to a lot of shows since moving out here, but each one has progressively more and more people in the crowd holding their phones above their heads to record the show.  Sure, it's nice so I can always find a clip on youtube to embed here, but just watch the freaking show!  You don't have to record every second of your life!  Sorry, I got a little sidetracked there.

Speaking of getting to do fun things - Tyler and I actually had a day off together today, since my emergency rotation has us there over the weekend, and gives us weekdays off.  I'm pretty sure in the past 6 months we've only had Thanksgiving and Christmas off together.

We took the day to drive to LA and check out some strange museums.  First stop was the Museum of Jurassic Technology, which was unfortunately closed on Tuesdays.  We then backtracked to the Museum of Death, which featured a ton of antique embalming and funeral home supplies, stuff from the Heaven's Gate cult, and serial killer memorabilia.  They also had a conjoined turtle (or should that be plural?)  Anyway, the turtles are over 16 years old now, and doing well.  I asked if they had radiographs of them, but unfortunately, they didn't on-site.

We then made a just-before-closing-time trip to Necromance where I picked up a diaphonized rat.  It was a spur-of-the moment choice between this, and about 6 framed os-penises.  It's probably for the best that I chose this one.  

Halfway though small animal block

I just finished up my second rotation at a Banfield.  Last Banfield I'll ever have to be in.  It was interesting - I got a lot of practice putting in catheters, drawing blood, monitoring anesthesia, and intubating animals.  The clinic I was at did probably 95% wellness care and dental cleanings.  It's an interesting business concept: pre-charging customers a monthly fee, and then bundling together a couple wellness appointments, yearly blood work and dental cleanings.  I could see how it would promote better compliance with some things, since clients have already paid for the services.  It's interesting.

Next week I start my 2-week emergency rotation.  I am so freaking excited for it.  Not only do I get to sleep in for 2 weeks (which after being constantly sleep deprived, I am so looking forward to), but I'm sure I'm going to see a ton of amazing cases.

The first two blocks I did this year, I had all the same rotations as two of my good friends in our class.  We got separated for the last 2 blocks.  One of the things I've been loving about this block is getting to spend time with classmates that I wouldn't have otherwise, and just getting to know them.  I have some pretty fantastic classmates.

Other than that, my life has been pretty uneventful for the past 2 weeks.  I did order a used kindle off of ebay to replace mine, which got broken at some point during large animal block.  The ebay listing said it would be reset and ready to attach to my amazon account - I figured it'd be blank.  Imagine my surprise when I turn it on, and find 200+ books on it.  My thought process went kind of like this: "Yay, more books, you can never have enough books!  I don't recognize any of these authors, maybe I'll find something new that I wouldn't have found otherwise.  Oh, wait, these are all romance novels.  Some of them are umm... more erotica than romance novels.  Wait, here's a zombie book.  I'll see what it's about.  They make zombie erotica? Stupid unreadable free books."  Good times.

On a note completely unrelated to vet school rotations, or zombie erotica, if you have time to listen to an hour-long podcast, this is really interesting.  http://majority.fm/2013/01/30/will-potter-targeting-eco-activists/

I didn't mean to go 2 weeks without an update!

I just finished up my 2-week on-campus Banfield rotation.  It really is a pleasant rotation - you get primary patient care, you actually get to interact with clients, and the vets you work with are all pretty awesome.  The first week killed me though; coming off of winter break, where I was on a night-schedule, to suddenly having to wake up at 7am, coming from our on-campus block where I pretty much turned my brain off for 2 months, and suddenly being quizzed about pathophys; and me and one other classmate getting slammed with patients, while other classmates had hours of free time to study. The second week was much smoother, and I actually managed to sneak some studying in most days.  Yesterday, we had an oral examination that was pretty freaking stressful - I got the clinical diagnosis, but I definitely stumbled on some physiology and pharmacology, so fingers crossed that I passed - and of course, we don't find out if we did or not until after finals, so I get to stress about it for 7 more weeks.

Tyler and I had a friend from Colorado out last week, and it was pretty fan-freaking-tastic to have somebody around from back home.  I keep counting down the days until I finish my radiology course out here, and I can move back.  It was also distracting as hell to have somebody hanging out when I was trying to study, and to keep having to tell them to go do fun things without me, so I could get school stuff done.

I wish I had a personal assistant who I could rope into dealing with all my crap for me that I don't want to.  I got summoned for Jury duty, and I need to make that go away.  I chipped a molar, and I need to get it fixed, and research a good dentist in this area who is open on weekends.  I still am hounding possible 4th year rotation sites, and waiting to hear back from people.  I gave up on calling the mechanic I found with good reviews on yelp - I have a manifold leak, and apparently returning messages so I could get my car fixed before rotations started again was not one of their priorities.  Anybody want to volunteer for the job?  For free?  No?

Monday, I start a 2 week rotation at another Banfield location.  That's a 30 mile drive away.  In morning rush hour traffic. I hope it kicks ass to make up for all the time I'm going to be spending parked on the highway.