it feels so good, i can feel it

ah, typical freneticness. freneticism?
work was fucking terrible this week. i am so tired of bouncing in with a smile only to be met by a gaggle of curmudgeony wenches. everyone there seems so unhappy with their lives, or at least their vocation- and i have stopped taking it personally, since they are like that with everyone. over half the people there are new, brand-new, "hey you" new, which adds to the frustration and discombobulated vibe. and then i saw that the schedule i had requested two months ago was assigned to someone whose FIRST DAY was sunday. and i decided, fuck it. i had applied yet again to UW two weeks ago (i have been courting their various facilities since february) and suddenly did not feel so guilty in doing so. and on monday i heard back from one of the positions... i emailed her back whilst at work, on the clock, "on a break", not really caring.
a nihilistic attitude is bad. i know better. yesterday i vowed to try better. i was suckered into transporting two fucking kittens to some rescue place in kirkland, which my coworkers seem to think is mere steps from seattle... and that was expanded to include a wild bird that someone had dropped off at the AEC- could i transport that to the wildlife transfer clinic in bellevue? "they're sister cities!" the receptionist/bleeding heart chirped. no, they actually are not, but whatever. so after my 12hr shift i loaded my car with the 2-wk-old, flea-anemic, please-don't-die-on-the-way-there kittens and a cardboard box containing a creature of indeterminate class. i referred to it as "the grackle." driving to the godforsaken east side at 11pm... i got lost, of course, ending up on a dark road buffered with horse-xing signs, getting increasingly pissed off. when i eventually dropped the cats off it was at a very nice split-level home of expected kirklandian means. the woman was perhaps 80 pounds with eye shadow up to her brows- bleached blonde, tight jeans, a musical voice. the place was immaculate, about 10 gorgeous cats circling me, no sign of hair or odor anyplace. the carpet was white, the pillows floral and carefully arranged, a polished chair artfully stacked with decorative stuffed animals in the corner. it was very surreal. her husband came wandering out, large and jovial, the sort of man i could picture fishing with my dad. they were both incredibly nice. i had a strange detached feeling whilst there: looking in on a completely different universe that i had never before known. these people, with their cats and generosity and awake-at-midnight-edness, have always existed. i just never knew.
afterwards i drove the restless grackle to the 24-hr clinic in bellevue, a rinky-dink operation with paneled walls and bright green carpet and a girl answering the door who looked no older than 20. she took the box to the treatment area while i pocketed boxes of nerds from the candy jar on the counter. they thought the bird was a baby swan. i rather doubt it, but perhaps there are orphaned cygnets wandering the bowels of tacoma that i am, again, simply oblivious to.
*
i am often oblivious to a hell of a lot.
*
oh! there was a penile amputation at work on monday. lab, "felix", chronic urolithiasis and cystitis, penis necrotic. the (male) doctor chopped off the whole fucking thing and redirected his urethra to an opening near his scrotum. this is a common surgery for cats but i'd never been privy to a dog one, especially a large breed. the penis was wrapped in a towel awaiting formalin when one of the other techs accidentally grabbed it. the penis fell out and smacked her arm. "holy shit!" she yelled,loud enough for everyone in the treatment room to hear. i was the one who
eventually got to package it.
again: once i stop and think about the details, life becomes almost too peculiar to really fathom. i shall consider my obliviousness not a character flaw but a survival mechanism.