It is official the holiday season is among us and with that the stress of others expectations and wants falls into our laps and we feel compelled to take care of all the silly things and get it all done. Our to-do list is only getting longer and I found an easy solution. I have gathered a few volunteers in the general San Antonio area and this holiday season will be doing a livestock babysitter service. It should be simple enough, and will help people to go see family or friends in areas that may require travel and spending an extended period of time. Since animals don’t really take vacation time and need daily care, people that raise livestock don’t usually get to participate in the holiday festivities as easily and I think that it would be great to offer people something like this. A few times a day for however long the person is gone we will drive out to the location and feed, water, or clean. The expenses of things like food will need to be covered of course. However, as of right now the few people I have gathered aren’t really expecting any sort of compensation themselves. Though I feel that travel expenses should be covered since we will be driving places we usually wouldn’t and as college students the purse strings are generally pretty tight; especially during the Christmas holidays. Details and quirks of course will need to be worked out, but each volunteer I believe has all the knowledge needed in taking care of livestock.

I have been working on further moving my community project forward for the holiday season. I have made a letter to send to prospective ranches in the area. I figured a letter is more personal than a flyer plus I don’t have to worry about a bunch of people getting my number. I can then address them and place them in mailboxes in the area. I also encourage in my letter that if they don’t want the service themselves they can refer it to someone who may. To those of you that are curious it will be in the San Antonio area, near my home town of Natalia and I will travel as needed but at the cost of the owner, also feed and other supplies will need to be provided. Other than that it will be free of cost and easier than paying someone to come out, on a holiday no less, since I’ll there anyways. It’s a simple and easy way to make sure your animals will get taken care of. However, I feel it is necessary to inform y’all that the volunteers will only take care of livestock, I myself don’t mind dogs and cats but I can’t look after a bunch of different homes with dogs and cats and other livestock as well, I’m not a machine here people. So if you are considering such things keep my schedule and others in mind and remember that just like everyone else we want to spend the holidays with our loved ones too.

The last bit of finals are coming to an end, and people are rushing home to be with their families. So I know that my services will soon be needed. On December 17th the volunteers and I will be delivering letters in my hometown and surrounding areas to let people know about what I will be doing to help. The picture on the left is the snapshot of my letter minutes my contact information. If anyone has any question feel free to comment on this post and I will get back to you as soon as possible. Thank you and everybody have a Happy Holidays!

So as the costumes and candy fade with Halloween the Christmas commercials and decorations come out and before you know the holidays have come along again. Whether you’re a Santa Claus incarnate or a Grinch, the holidays are stressful no matter what you do. From the annoying never ending and sooner appearing television commercials to the holly jolly music in the stores that they play over and over again. It never fails that you will at some point have a total holiday meltdown. I myself used to love the holiday season, especially since I’m a turkey baby, every so often I share my birthday with Thanksgiving, but after one year of working at a store during the holiday season I find myself despising the music and general “cheer” that I think people make up. I had to listen to people complain about their holiday troubles and whines all the while not being able to participate on my families own holiday festivities. None the less I still will give the holidays my all, and just generally avoid others to keep from trying to Darth Vader strangle them. To keep my cool during these stressful times of elbowing other women for that last Tickle-me-Elmo, which by the way my mother had to do one year for me, bubble baths, candles and clean dishes would be the best prescription I could recommend to anyone else who finds this time of year not so wonderful. If you don’t enjoy stewing in a bath you can always treat yourself to a spa day. No matter what stresses you out this holiday season just remember to keep your heads and think about after that New Year, where you have a whole other year to prepare yourself again.

So all this stress talk has me thinking; what can I do to help others in my area with what troubles them? People in the agriculture world have to worry about the same holiday stuff as all the other normal families do plus the fact that when the rest of the world gets a day off, they don’t. Animals don’t take vacations from eating, expelling waste and general living and producing. I can remember my years in FFA when I still had to be up at 7 in the morning to feed my sheep and had to exercise it in the afternoon no matter if it was Thanksgiving, Christmas or whatever the holiday. So I can’t imagine having to take care of herds of cattle, or horses and fields of crops along with all the other holiday stress. So I couldn’t help but think what if we had a livestock sitting service for people? College students don’t always go home and they always need some extra cash, so why not do something useful for your fellow agriculture community and help them take care of their animals while they are away for the holidays. Seems so simple I can’t believe I’ve never seen it before. It may not be easy but if all you’re doing is sitting around in Kingsville, then why not help people out.

Today professionals in the medical field always have to follow on modern techniques and new methods. It may seem as though every day there is some sort of new way of doing something that makes anything you used to do obsolete. However, people get busy, schedules get packed and it makes staying “up-to-date” a burden. A simple solution, have someone else attend those boring seminars and sit through all those lectures and read about it later. That is something that Veterinary Medicine has been dedicated to; I’ll be the first to admit I hate sitting in cold lecture hall with a monotone professional standing in the front talking about something that someone else came up with. I mean in these modern days I want to hear from someone who has a tone and who truly cares about what they are talking about. That’s where Veterinary Medicine Magazine comes into play, they send a reporter to the seminars and the reporter takes notes, and will even go as far to ask other doctors their opinions, and sometimes they go straight to the source. The reporter takes all  this information and types it up into one article, and there you go. You have this brand new information and the views of other professionals just like you with their opinions written in. This idea of simply reading a magazine has revolutionized medicine.

    So you may be thinking to yourself  at this point, “Great so there are journals out there I can read”; problem is  which ones do you read? I'm not saying it may be easy to start a magazine, but how do you know you’re getting good information, from the right place. The answer is simpler than you may think, experience and location. Firstly, if a magazine is known for not producing accurate information then people won’t want to read it and eventually the magazine will die off or its reputation will be known.  Secondly, where you find the magazine is a great indicator, obviously if you are seeing it at the checkout stand of your local grocery store it is most  likely a tabloid and will be of no use. However, if you see it at you library in the reference area or publications it is going to be a more reliable source. I initially came across Veterinary  Medicine at my university library, and I’ve been stuck on it ever since.

    Veterinary  Medicine magazine came upon us to not only keep veterinarians informed but  to help future and prospective veterinarians learn. This magazine isn’t just  about what you can do now but it is about what may come in the future,  something very few people give thought. It has everything a person could use when looking into this as a prospective field and may give the squeamish a second thought. It can also help to give an edge over others looking into the  field since everyone knows how competitive the veterinary medicine field can get. So though you may think it is only for veterinarians it may help those who aren’t quite yet there. Not to mention it can help those who not only are in the field or interested in the field, but those who enjoy the simple things in life such as raising livestock. Anyone who has ever taken their animal to the veterinarian knows, they don’t provide services for very cheap. Having some knowledge into what is going on with the field can help you make better decisions about calling up your local veterinarian, better to not waste anyone’s time here people.

Now to the real meat of what this magazine has to offer, sure I can talk them up all day long, but does it really help you? Does it make you want to run to the library and pick up a copy? Probably not, so here is the real ringer people, what you have been waiting for; the stuff you can read in those pages. Well that’s easy enough; you can read anything from new animal care techniques to how to handle the families that come in and out of your office every day. You can find information on trending new diseases and treatments to helping Fluffy get through her checkup (http://catvets.com/). It is even available online, so if you don’t want to waste a lot of paper or if you perhaps do not like mail, you can subscribe online (http://www.dvm360.com/) and read it there too. Something you can only find online, videos to which they probably have as many as YouTube, well maybe not, but still quite a few; and just to keep your mind sharp they have quizzes to keep you on your toes. Not to mention the links to other sources similar to the magazine are all listed at the top for you to explore and enjoy. Everything you need to run your business and your career are all in on well written and convenient place.

    One article I remember very well, talked about dogs in the sporting industry and how to prevent and treat sports injuries in canines. It was a useful article with information from the different injuries that can occur from foot pad to Achilles tendon injuries and the way that it is diagnosed and treated. This article had it all, written by Wendy Baltzer a common writer with a DVM, PhD, and Diplomat of the American College of Veterinary Surgeons, and currently working at Oregon State University, she has written many articles on the different sports injuries in veterinary medicine and specializes in this field of study. Another article that I find as a fascinating topic is an article by Dr. Jennifer L. Garcia, a internal medicine consultant located in Houston Texas that often writes for Veterinary Medicine about new drugs on the market and how they are affecting animals and your practice,where she talks about antibiotics and their resistance and mutations; a short article that talks about the Mutant Prevention Concentration test also known as the MPC, used to test the liklihood of an antimicrobial organism being resistant to drugs. She attended one of those boring seminars where Dr. Joseph M. Blondeau outlined this method in his presentation “Antibiotics and Antimicrobial Resistance.” She talks about what it is, how it works and what it means for all of us in the veterinary field; she also touches on ways to prevent resistant antimicrobial organisms in your clinic.