the title belies my true attitude. i had a shitty day. well - with the exception of a nice dinner with my in-laws and the arrival of our mercedes benz SUV. sounds like it should have been swell, eh?
this morning, i drove sam and my friend over to school. our favorite professor (whom the three of us are having lunch with on monday) had her incredibly skilled technician place a catheter to save us the strain (and because this woman is amazing with her hands - she never misses a catheter - and it's like watching an incredibly skilled artist). afterwards, they handed us the propofol and fatal-plus and left us to our sad duty.
of course - on the way there - i was distraught. i had an extremely important 11:00am appointment which i could not miss. the euthanasia was scheduled for 9:30. i hadn't been to alisha's new place (she recently moved in with her boyfriend), so i google mapped the address. for some reason, google found the wrong address. it was 7:00am in the morning, i'd slept terribly (about 3 hours of sleep) and i just read the directions without looking at the address - and thus wound up about 20 minutes beyond her house in BFE. i turned around and found the place - and then we were late - which i hate. i was driving fast to get to school, not only because we were late but because i couldn't be late for the 11am appointment yet i didn't - OBVIOUSLY - want to walk out of the euthanasia mid-way. further, sam was distraught in the car (as most cats are) - and alisha just held him and cried. i breasted a big hill before our exit and coasted down, forgetting that the speed limit had been recently dropped. sure enough, a cop waited at the bottom and didn't hesitate to pull me over for going 75 in a 55mph zone.
he was going to let me off. i could see it in his eyes when he looked at alisha and sam in the passenger seat as i explained the situation. and then he asked for my insurance card. like a good tennessean, i am insured - as is the law. i fumbled around in my wallet and produced my card. only to find i handed him the expired card. more fumbling. i found another card. also expired. i had no proof of insurance - despite being amply insured. it was right around that time he mentioned that my tag was also expired. i'd known this. it expired during vet school (in february -when i was in the barn - i.e. hell). and then i'd just never had a chance to renew it. since graduation, i should have - but i figured i'd gotten this far - and we were getting the mercedes that VERY DAY. with the 3 strikes, i think the cop thought his hands were bound. he was very polite and dropped the offense to 66 in a 55mph zone - which takes me out of the 15-20 mph over bracket - which is usually $150-200/ticket. sigh. my insurance is going to go up. this is the 2nd ticket in 7 months or so. i really have a lead foot. at least it was legitimate.
anyway, after the distressing euthanasia (i managed to hold it together fairly well), i had some personal things to attend to (also extremely emoti0nally exhausting and which i won't discuss here) - and then went home for a bit. i was drained, because i slept poorly last night and was spent. as a result, i lapsed into a brief coma before jim's dad called to tell us they were in murvul with the mercedes. we met them there and had dinner together, which was lovely.
the ONLY bright spot today was driving our new car home. i've never owned a nice car. not really. and i've always made a sincere effort to not be materialistic. but it's such a nice vehicle. 10 years old, heated leather seats, a sun roof, everything is power, everything works, i have A/C that is reliable. i have a car that hums quietly on the road. one can have a conversation at a normal level of speech (rather than scream over the unfortunate wind noise that seems to be the bane of the station wagon's existence). i hadn't been particularly excited about the mercedes previously. it's big, it likes it's mid to high grade gasoline, and it's hard to work on for my husband. but as i drove home in its cool, quiet, sleek interior, i felt a tiny, tiny bit better. i think i'll lightly embrace my materialistic side and just enjoy the nice car for once.
The High Cost Of Becoming A Vet
7 years ago
No comments:
Post a Comment