The Final Countdown

5 days until I take the biggest test of my life. Sometimes I feel like I am going to rock it and sometimes (most times) I worry about failing.

Failure is my ultimate enemy and my worst nightmare. I loathe failing at anything - I am competitive and driven and I usually succeed in the things that I try. I ran a marathon after the orthopedic surgeon told me I'd never be a marathon runner. I applied (and was accepted) to multiple vet schools after my undergrad advisor gently suggested choosing another career path. I'm currently studying using VetPrep to study for boards, in addition to some other reading materials. It is a bank of 4000+ questions (about 1/3 or so are repeats) that you do as separate practice questions or timed 30 question exams. It tracks your percentage as you go through and tracks your strengths and weakness by species and by category (cardio, derm, anesthesia, toxicology, etc). Up until I got back from the honeymoon 3 weeks ago, I was at a stellar 15% or so. I finally made it to 85% today, with only 600 or so questions to go... KJ made a joke the other day about me not sleeping until I go to that 100% because that is the type of person that I am. Its so true. I'm a freak when it comes to goals. Which is actually a problem sometimes because I get so caught up in accomplishing my goals that I lose track of having fun... not that this particular goal has any relation to fun. You get the point.

Anyway, I'm still alive and here. I can't wait to return to the real world. Im my head, I keep telling myself, "I'll do this when boards are over, I'll do that when boards are over."

I seriously can't wait to do laundry and clean the house. For real.

Whoa Fourth Year!

I can't believe it has been a month since I last posted! The year is flying by and I can hardly believe it is NOVEMBER! So much has happened!

The highlights:

1. KJ and I got married :) YAY!

2. We went on our honeymoon! YAY!

3. I chopped off all of my long, gorgeous, slightly obnoxious long hair and donated it to Wigs for Kids. YAY! My flowing locks that fell past my boobs are now chin length and angled so I feel like I have no hair, which is awesome after two years of growing it out for the wedding!

And now that we have been back in the swing of things for a couple of weeks, I can comfortably begin to freak out because I take boards in TWO WEEKS. So, in two weeks you will be seeing a ton more posts about fourth year adventures and animals and my next marathon. Maybe married life as well ;)

I'm on the diagnostic medicine rotation right now... meaning that I do necropsies everyday and pretend like I have a starring role on CSI: Vet Med. The beauty of it is that all my patients are dead and don't need weekend treatments.

And it happens to fall over Thanksgiving, meaning that I take boards Monday the 21st, I have Tuesday the 22nd off (all of the fourth years get two days off for boards and since mine is a Monday, I'll get a blissful day of freedom after the exam), and I go to school Wednesday the 21st. I figure I'll then drive home Thursday morning, enjoy an awesome, stress-free day with my family, enjoy some nice stress-free shopping on Friday, followed by a stress-free weekend. Then Dad has surgery on Monday, so I requested my first personal day off (you get 5 for the year). I get to be home for FIVE WHOLE DAYS. AND I don't have to worry about studying for boards anymore so I can be stress-free for the rest of the year... relatively speaking.

I cannot tell you how excited I am to be *almost* done with board studying. Its been looming out there on the horizon since we started vet school and it is finally *almost* here. I'm getting my butt in gear for the two week haul of cramming/learning and then its nothing but freedom to have a life again.

And send out those wedding thank-you notes...