(Header image: The form usually left with the rescued animals who are brought to the wildlife rescue centre. Today it stayed unused, other than the back side which I used for note taking.)
This blog reflects my personal experiences and opinions and does not represent or reflect those of DierenAmbulance Nederrijn.
I suppose I’m writing this up for the sake of completeness. As my cleverly crafted title states, there were no rescues at all this shift 🙁
- Pedalled in through the snow. Got there sweating. I really need to build up my condition! Parked my bike under the overkapping and left my warm woolly hat there; I’d wear my new company-issue hat on-duty.
- Would the snow cover signify a quiet shift because sick and injured animals are hard to find? Or will it be busy because kids will be outside playing in the snow (again)?
- The centralist who was there was going to stop centralising at the start of my shift and hoover the building then go home. This meant there’d be no centralist this shift and the task falls on me.
- I reverted to my old behaviour, becoming angry and passive aggressive. They told me the driver could answer the phone on loudspeaker. I was doubtful of the workability of this solution; the driver was one of my nemeses. I’d only agreed to work this shift with her because I thought I better push myself.
- The driver arrived and was open to the idea of helping with the centralist bit.
- The only ‘open’ rescue was a pigeon wounded from a cat attack. But the finder hadn’t put her into a box which meant we weren’t going to go and collect it (because by then it might have walked away).
- The driver called the finder who confirmed that by now the pigeon had indeed walked away. The rescue was officially closed. I remembered the duck non-rescue yesterday where we couldn’t find the duck, possibly partly because it might have walked off with his broken wing.
- There was also a story about a house that had been emptied after a police carried out a drugs raid. Emptied, except for some fish. Do the police deal with this, or the animal ambulance? If it was us, a phone call would come in.
- No calls came in at all! At first I was relieved, but after I while I wanted something to do animal-rescue-wise
- I’m proud of working at the animal ambulance! (Other than wearing my baggy ill-fitting trousers which make me look like a tramp, and my jumper that’s too small which makes me look like someone’s squeezed my chest and my fluids have dribbled down into my legs). I took off my conspicuous yellow hi-vis coat when we stopped off for a burger a while ago, but I was sure to keep it on during my cold bike ride in. I was freezing! Somehow I didn’t mind people seeing me cycle into work to save some animals.
But at one point in the shift a refuse collector chucked some rubbish into his noisy truck. He was in yellow, conspicuous hi-vis clothing. This is realy snobby of me, but then I felt embarrassed.
- The driver wondered whether it was worth sorting through some of the donated clothes, but thankfully we didn’t follow up with that idea because it’s really cold in that building.
- The driver is also on the magazine editing team, so we opened some files and had a look through. As it turned out, someone submitted some photos so we looked through those.
- Mostly we chatted. Even in English this is difficult sometimes for extended times; in Dutch it’s harder for obvious reasons, and me and this driver struggle a lot to understand each other. But somehow it worked – she was much more chatty than the last time I was with her, she had interesting things to say, and after a while I realised we were talking normally (albeit in Dutch! 😉 ) and we understood what each other was saying (for the most part!). This was a huge and unexpected win! 🙂
- I mentioned another driver had brought a game in to pass the time during the snowy season a few weeks ago when he didn’t expect many rescues. There happened to be a card game in the stationary cupboard so we played that!
- As it turned out, the co-driver / games partner came in with his wife and pet dog after delivering an ambulance. I asked for permission, and I got to stroke the playful dog a little bit which I enjoyed (I hope he did too!)+++++++++++++++++++++++++++9999999999999999999999325
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(The above notation is my cat tapping the keyboard whilst I have some cat TV on the laptop screen next to me! – which I’ve now switched off because an advert came on. Which idiot advertiser thinks cats are dumb enough to fall for advertising?)
- ^Translation of an incoming email. I saw the name badge on one of the “body warmers” had the old name, so just for the hell of it, I crossed it out and updated with the exciting new name.
- 45 minutes to go, and the driver thought she better check the petrol in the ambulance. The tank needs to be at least half full (or not more than half empty 😉 ) and she wanted to make sure it was OK for the following shift, even though we’d not used it. This conscientiousness surprised me! (as did her earlier comment – “I work for the animals and not the people or politics here” – which is a mighty good motto!
- The ambulance keys were nowhere to be found(!) so she headed over to the ambulance to see if they’d been left inside. Nope! The previous driver had taken them home with him! I wonder what would have happened if we had got a rescue to do!
- My woolly hat had picked up condensation which made it extremely cold to wear. No worries, I’d warm up on the way home!
- I cycled home in my yellow coat, hoping my wife would see and recognise me on her drive to her boxing.
- She didn’t see me. And I didn’t warm up either!
As mentioned earlier, I started looking for a new name for the external drivers. After receiving input and brainstorming extensively, it was decided to change it to “Animal Transport Driver.”
There are now also two body warmers in the canteen for the animal transport drivers to use. Wearing these body warmers makes them easier to recognize at a shelter; the badge proved insufficient.
End of Shift
So did I help any animals? No. But as well as thriving when I work towards a noble goal, I love a social atmosphere – and this was a surprisingly good step towards that!
When I got home I received a confirmation email that I’ve been accepted to take part in the Dierenlot training course on “Securing and transporting injured animals”. I was alerted to this course (indeed, the “Dierenlot Academy” by my astro-friend. He’s going too, and we’ll be travelling together. See how social this is?! 😉
My cat was outside (in the dark), so I called her in. I was over the moon when she responded! 🙂
All in all, a very different shift than what I expected, but the day turned out well in the end! 🙂
