Dead Dark

Once in the distant history of my church attendance at Hopewell, our minister RW imparted some sage advice to those who may think of dating. The point of this advice was to dispel unrealistic ideas about the girl/boy friend. He said the guy should go visit the girl when she has flour on her apron and maybe that the girl should visit the guy when he has grease on his coveralls.

I think it's great advice... only, I have a new version to propose. The guy/girl should visit the other while they are on the necropsy floor, a dead horse on the table, abdomen splayed open, guts layed out on the floor, the lungs and heart on a table, the head on another table. The girl/boy friend being visited is adorned in green clothing with a brown, full-length vinyl apron covering the majority of their front side. A significant quantity of partially dried blood is arrayed in long drips or even splashes down the front of the brown apron. The girl/boy friend's gloves are covered in blood, dried blood extends a couple inches up the arm above the glove, and the girl even sports a few drops of blood on her white covering which she would have been more intelligent to exchange for a black one. The girl/boyfriend may at that moment be wielding a long necropsy knife against some part of the anatomy, and the picture is complete.

***Yesterday the power went out as we were necropsying a dead horse and a puppy. Imagine the picture above augmented by a dark room. We were instructed to drop what we were doing and go outside - the necropsy technician didn't want us hacking on ourselves or falling on knives. He himself stated that he was quite skilled at cutting up horses in the dark, and after a while returned to the room to do so. (There were a couple weak emergency lights in the room, to be honest.) We waited for over an hour, out on the loading dock. The rendering truck came by to pick up some items, and we went inside to (in futile hope) escape the smell of the truck and see if we could finish up the puppy case by flashlight. This we were permitted to do, so KS and I held weak light sources as JH finished the puppy. It was reminiscent of camping and going to the outhouse in the dark, only in a very different environment. Sadly, one door was open to the outdoors and the rendering truck smell came wafting in for our enjoyment.
I only wish for a picture to share the sick humor of the experience.