Emu Egg

One of my coworkers found an unusual, large, dark green egg near our building today. After some online searching, we decided that it was an emu egg. Compare the photo to this one. The thought of an emu running around the UF campus is quite amusing. Some of my coworkers had the kind, but misguided, idea to "rescue" the egg and it briefly resided in one of our incubators. I tried to raise the point that "rescuing" this egg could yield a baby emu and then what would we do with it? Luckily, an expert was consulted who said that the egg was almost certainly dead, germ-ridden and could explode when warmed and should be discarded. We returned it to where we found it and concluded that someone else must have found it in a more remote (and probable) location, brought it to campus, and then discarded it when they got this same information. Who knows - maybe it's passed through several people already?

I had a wonderful time celebrating my nephew's first birthday with my family. There are photos here and a video here.

My female cat, Cassie, was diagnosed with asthma 7 years ago (it sounds ridiculous, I know). Though the condition has worsened over the years, it has been kept under control with oral medication. However, the pollen count here has been really bad this week and on Tuesday night Cassie had a severe asthma attack. I rushed her to the local animal emergency hospital and by the time we got there she was in very bad shape. They warned me that she probably wasn't going to make it. Luckily, she pulled through and was able to come home in less than 24 hours. It was a traumatic experience for both of us! For now she is on increased meds and has been instructed to "take it easy". Isn't that a cat's whole life? Taking it easy? Unfortuntately, this means I've had to delay the dog adoption for at least a week. The delay is disappointing, but I'm just glad that Cassie is still around. Hopefully I'll be able to bring Sheba (the dog) home next week.