Reality Veterinarian

I am not really one to watch television.  There have been programs that I have been rather addicted to, but they have long since gone by the wayside to numerous reality t.v. programs.  For me, by the time I get home from the clinic, feed the cats and dogs, change out of my fur laden work clothes, cook and eat dinner, and do a few domestic chores, it is 8 or 9 pm before I am finally sitting down to relax.  If my husband, Bruce, has control of the remote, we are usually watching sports or something very manly like Sons of Guns, American Chopper or something with cars.  While I will watch baseball, a rare football game, generally, I am sitting on my side of the living room with knitting needles working on a project, not really paying attention to what is on t.v. If I get remote privelages, I rarely find anything worth watching, with exception of National Geo, the Discovery Channel and sometimes old re-run sit coms and old movies on TBS.  The majority of programs I have surfed through in search of entertainment include a plethora of reality shows: America's Got Talent, Soroity Life, Fraternity Life, The Bachelor, Dog the Bounty Hunter, Survivor and the list goes on and on .....and on and on.  The one thing I believe they all have in common is that not one of them really has alot to do with reality.  At least no reality that I know and I am relatively certain that my friends and neighbors do not share either.  To date, I have never heard of my neighbor experiencing a Survivor moment mowing their lawn, tending their garden and sharing life experiences with the children.  I haven't ever "Traded Places" with anyone and not sure that I want to.  These programs do however have lots of viewers and please accept my humblest of apologies if you are among one of the avid fans. 

I was thinking this evening (9 p.m.), watching the Royals vs. Detroit (and yes the Royals are losing), that maybe I can pitch my reality to one of the national programmers. "So You Think You Can be a Veterinarian"  (forgive the pun from So You Think You Can Dance).  We will start the program with being woke up by the ringing phone at 4 a.m. by someone asking you what time your clinic opens.  Your alarm clock goes off at 5:30 a.m., you jolt yourself awake with coffee and a shower, let the dogs out and are off to work by 7 a.m...Hospital rounds, dislodging the velcro cat from you left arm, you see your first patient of the day with a smile ... "Land Shark" your favorite Chihuahua patient already licking his lips with a smirky lip raising growl (which I am sure must mean Good morning to you Doc).  Your technician and you wrestle Land Shark to the ground to clip his toenails, while he thanks you by self expressing his anal glands on your lab coat (clothes change #1, and I start re-thinking why I put perfume on before work every day).  The day proceeds with a stream of patients with complaints of itching, vomiting, diarrhea, not eating for 2 hours, barking funny at the mailman and the ever popular pet eating foreign materials (tin foil, panty hose, cat litter, etc).  By the end of the day you smell like wet dog, cat urine, and anal glands(not really sure if I can still get a small hint of my Este Lauder).  You head for home, your husband kisses you from arms length because armpits stained from the cow manure of the cow you pregnancy checked late in the day is not his idea of romance.  Your dogs, always happy to see you, spend 10 minutes smelling your legs, trying to figure out just who you have been with all day and convinced they better be on their best behavior because you smell like another dog and figure they might be replaced (or better yet, may decide to mark their territory by urinating on your foot, so that in the future the next dog that approaches you will know the you are his owner!).  Now this is my REALITY.

I am not sure NBC will be interested and pretty sure I won't be offered millions so that I can retire.  I have forgotten one important aspect of the Reality Show....I may make fun of it, even sometimes grumble and growl about it....but always...I love it and wouldn't have it any other way.  I cannot wait to start another day, because mixed among all that pet hair and foul smells and cat claws and growlers, are the tail waggers, and the face lickers, along with their attached people that share their pets antics and their lives.  My lucky day.