I'm in Indiana.  I will miss Katie.  I'm staying with a poultry pathologist (Pat) here.  She seems cool and there's only 100 poultry vets in the country, so I'm sure I'll learn a thing or two from her.  She just survived breast cancer.  She said it could come back even as late as 20 years from now, but she's in the clear for now.  She said she loves her job so much that she kept working through chemo.  

 Upon arrival, I immediately received this furry Siamese cat (Luna) and an equally furry calico (Paisley) to keep me company during my stay--two of the many house cats here.  I was just like..alright, thanks.  I'm more of a dog person but it might be nice to have the cats considering I don't know anyone here.  

 This is Friar John.

 And my fav, King Henry VIII, a lynx pt Siamese.  They also have a Siamese named Prince Charles.  I like to sing, "We are Siamese if you please" to them when no one is around.  

To top off the cat experience, there are plenty of Siamese cat statues and this tiger stuffed animal on the beautiful red daybed in my room.  Pat's husband Mark is a lot quieter than Pat, very tidy, and only likes one of the cats.  Opposites attract, although I'm sure that they have some commonalities that I'm not seeing.  

Went to church

 Mary and Jesus

 Jesus' first miracle--turning water into wine at a wedding feast.  Below this mosaic was inscribed Mary's last  line in the bible, "Do whatever he tells you."  Rather ironic words, considering Mary's whole mission in life was to point people towards Jesus and his teachings.  

 I went rollerblading and took photos of campus.  I'm still partial to ISU's campus, but Michigan does have pretty brick bldgs.  

 And they have a bell tower that chimes every quarter of an hour like ISU.  

 The botanical garden

 Ahh!  This guy walked right up to me.  I'm vaccinated but still leery of rabies.  

 The stadium is right by a river in the middle of campus.  

 The baseball stadium is next to the fb one.  

 I ran into this..homeless?

I am still six.  

 More nerdy squirrel photos.  I just can't help myself, I see them everyday.  

 This one is thinking..why is she staring at me?

 This one is ready to do some kung fu.  

 I got dressed up and went out with Katie again last night and we went to this piano bar in Lansing.  

 We parked next to the cute restaurant, Clara's, that Katie and I went to a while back.  

 This woman was fabulous.  She had a great voice.  

 We got one of these..they throw some dry ice in to make it bubbly!

I necropsied one of these the other day:  an leucistic (white) axolotl.  Mine only had one leg but apparently they can regrow entire limbs in months.  They are from Mexico and the Aztecs used to eat them.  Now they are endangered b/c of pollution and habit destruction...What a surprise.  They have both lungs and gills..in case you were curious.  

 

I wrote a 1 pg paper on atherosclerosis last night.  If you want to freak yourself out, just pick up a human pathology book.  Apparently precursor lesions to atherosclerosis can be found in almost all children.  Maybe next time I'll think twice before I eat biscuits and gravy, although it's one of my favorite foods.   Speaking of saturated fat, I've pretty much become a vegetarian while in Michigan and have decided to stay one.  I had been thinking about it for some time now and I'm liking it.  I like the American cattle industry but I figure that it will survive without my support.  And I'll still eat meat if someone is cooks it but I'll stick to vegetarian if I get the choice.  Vegan-ism is a whole other story.  Maybe someday, but definitely not right now--I drink a ton of milk. 

I decided to take a few pics of where I'm working yesterday.  

 This was sitting in the parking lot.  Maybe I'll be able to afford one of these some day, although there is so much better uses for money...starving children in Africa, world peace, protecting the environment, etc.

 Hydrangeas

 Multi-headed microscope that the residents use everyday to go over biopsies.  Yesterday, I was in here and picked up the Journal of Internal Med and flipped to the first histo photo that I could find.  I asked what is monocrotaline?  David, my fav resident here, replied a toxin from the plant Crotalaria.  I was like, "He's right!"  And he kick he shoe off.  It flew over and hit the wall just as one of the pathologists walked into the room and starting talking to me.  I was dying trying not to have a laugh attack.  

 MSU has BL-3 labs and necropsy floor

 The bldg was built in 08

 I went out with Katie again last night and met a couple of her girl friends from her class at this great restaurant.  The girls showed me how to taste wine--I really like sweet red wines--and we had brie cheese, which was fantastic.  Katie and her girl friends definitely live more liberal lives than I do but I really like them, especially Katie.  They are all gorgeous and super smart and we had some great conversations.  

It had rained and when the sun came out this morning it was beautiful!  I was sitting on the patio tonight and another Chinese girl started talking to me again.  She discovered that I believe in God and she asked if I went to church.  I said yes and she asked, "Every week?"  When I said yes she and her friend let out surprised "Oooo"s.  She said most people in China don't believe in anything.  This I already knew.  She told me that some people there are Muslims.  It is crazy to think that the largest country in the world has so little religion.  And what little religion is there is one that broke of from Christianity, believing that an "angel" told Muhammad that Jesus wasn't God.  Islam is actually the fastest growing religion.  Although Catholics still have them beat in numbers I fear this will not last.  China could use some missionaries...there is soo much opportunity there to save souls.  I think the language barrier is huge (Chinese sentence structure is pretty much opposite of English) and it is always hard to convert people, especially to a minority religion.  The girl said that their government is fairly tolerant of Christians.  I know that in some other Asian countries that is not the case.  

The Chinese girl also got me thinking about our own country and Europe.  Christianity is dying here.  You can surround yourself with it if you try, but so many people are losing their faith.  Hence, missionaries belong here too and we are faced everyday with opportunities to share our faith and save souls.