thank god that's over with!!

and by that, i mean THANK GOD that's the last open house i'll ever have to do at the vet school. it's utterly exhausting. not only was i (and my other chair, sharon) in charge of all the student workers, their pets, set-up and tear-down, making sure everyone had breaks and lunches, etc - i also had to take care of the american eagle foundation staff, the rehab people, the appalachian bear rescue, and keep tabs on how the zoo was doing with the bird show. the first day of open house, one of the hawks (a harris) decided it would be fun to hang out in the arena's rafters and not come down for an hour. naughty bird. he was eventually retrieved. in the meantime, i swear that bird was laughing at its handlers.

at any rate, our exhibit turned out beautifully, the flow of traffic was easy to handle - although we were SWAMPED. saturday was busier than any other saturday of open house i've ever worked. i'd estimate we saw about 1000 people or more. it was insane. but it's over. all our planning turned out marvelously, and we had no mishaps. titus permitted over 400 people to handle him, although he still didn't allow anyone to pet him. cheeky parrot. i was very proud of him. i felt bad, however - on the 2nd day, he was obviously (as was i) exhausted. despite the large crowd checking him out, he tucked one foot up, fluffed his feathers, and attempted to nap. it was the funniest thing i'd ever seen. he was swaying forward slightly, like a student in class, fighting to stay awake and failing. anyway, he got lots and lots and lots of peanuts from lots and lots of people for his good behavior. children in particular found it very exciting to feed the parrot. and titus found it very exciting that he got 2 lbs of peanuts in one day - when ordinarily, he gets 2 peanuts every other day. all in all, everything went swimmingly. i'm just thrilled it's over.

now all i have left to do is my ultrasound final on tuesday, write my advanced imaging paper, tutor a first year student, arrange the farewell BBQ for one of our most beloved and dedicated professor (30 years at the vet school), plan a dinner meeting for friday night, host a behind the scenes zoo trip for the AWE club, work on my dermatology unknown cases, and study for finals. oh, and finish up 16 accreditation tests for 4th year. i think that covers it all. *gag* i have a lot to do. so i guess i'd better stop procrastinating.