The Trip to Ohio

So before I tell you about the actual visit to Ohio, let me start with a perfectly ridiculous anecdote from the day we left Philadelphia. As always, I had way too much to do and not enough time, so was trying to pack, run errands, and get the house and animals in order before I left. Of course, everything seemed to be going ok, until I realized that the refrigerator (that we got fixed 3 months and 3 days earlier) was not working again. After a call to the repair company, confirming that the repair was only under warranty for 3 months, poor Brian got sent out to buy another fridge, while I finished getting ready. Already, thanks to that, running behind, I went upstairs to take care of Jenga, the foster kitty, before I left. When I opened the door to her room, I found that she had been trying to burn my house down, as smoke and the smell of smoking electronics wafted out at me. How does a cat in a small room try to burn down a house? Why, by vomiting on the power strip, of course! And trust me, if you think vomit smells bad, try burnt vomit. Luckily, my timing was somewhat fortuitous as I was able to unplug the smoking power strip and throw it away. So yeah, that was the day that I left Philadelphia... Really, I don't understand how such ridiculous things seem to happen to me every time I try to leave town...

But, get out of town I did! And while the majority of the week was spent in the hospital, the trip to Ohio was also a chance to catch up with a bunch of friends I haven't seen in a long while and a chance to spend some time with Shana, since she and I were traveling out together (she was doing the Animal Behavior Clinic Rotation at the same time that I was playing with all the food animals).

We had a pretty uneventful drive out. Highlights of the trip were crossing state lines, increased speed limits, and finding an ungodly amount of beef jerky once we crossed into Ohio. Oh, and doing a home visit and placing Grady, one of our rescue dogs that had an adopter outside of Pittsburgh!

While we were in Columbus, we stayed with Meghan, a friend from her time as the behavior resident at UPenn. We got to spend most of our evenings catching up with her and her three pets: Hercules (the adorable biting terrier), Juno (the princess chihuahua), and Primo (the best cat in the world), not to mention Josh, her boyfriend, who cooks the best turkey burgers I have ever eaten.
On the first weekend we were there, Mary, another behavior resident friend from UPenn who is now living in Montreal, flew down to visit us. I unfortunately spent most of the weekend in the hospital, but we did get to enjoy a few meals together (and drink a few glasses of wine). It was awesome to see her, but unfortunately I didn't do a very good jobs documenting the occasion with photos. Here is the only proof I have that Mary made it to Columbus...

During the second week, we got to have dinner with some other friends from vet school, Lisa and Jordan. Lisa was in our veterinary class and is now finishing a dual Pathology residency/PhD; she is almost as crazy as me! Jordan is a "real" doctor, finishing his Radiology residency. We got he exciting news that they will soon (next year) be coming back to Philadelphia for a few years AND we got to meet their two newest additions- Frank, an adorable puggle, and Archer, a really cool cat. Their house is amazing, the food Jordan cooked for us was unbelievable (even for vegetarian food :) ), AND the company far surpassed the rest of the evening! It's funny how a few years can pass without seeing friends, and yet you can pick things up just as if you had seen them yesterday...

The second weekend, Lisa, who was in our original vet school class, drove down from Michigan to spend some time with us. We once again had a fantastic time, but failed to take pictures of most of it. Even so, here's one of Lisa and Meghan eating sushi at the little Japanese cafe I accidentally found when I was driving around looking for a quick lunch one day. That weekend we spent running a few errands; we went to the Verizon store to get Shana a new phone, went to TJ Maxx for some shopping, and finally managed to get Shana's hair cut. She donated enough hair for at least three needy children!

After brunch with Lisa on Sunday, we headed back home to Philadelphia so I could finish preparing for my thesis presention (the following Wednesday) and Shana could start her Small Animal Dentistry Rotation.