And the, my real start with the zoo world was I walked into the Oklahoma City Zoo and into the reptile gardens with a bag full of snakes, actually a pillowcase full of snakes, that I’d collected and met Bob Jenny, who was curator of reptiles there. And then ultimate Julian, ultimately Julian Frazier, who was the director there. And so then I spent, you know, a number of years working with Bob Jenny volunteering. I couldn’t, you know, couldn’t afford to work at the zoo. They didn’t pay enough money, but, but I spent a number of years working with Bob Jenny and going on collecting trips and, and, you know, in talking with Julian, it was interesting in that, you know, when I finally made the, kind of the switch from herpetology, because that was where I was really headed, was originally thought I’d get a degree in herpetology and, you know, become another Bob Jenny. And, and I made the switch to, from herpetology to veterinarian medicine, primarily because in talking with Julian, I decided that I really would like to have some kind of a say in policy and how the zoo was run, and maybe it’d be fun or, you know, better to be a zoo director somewhere down the line. So I went into veterinary medicine strictly with the intent of becoming a zoo director, which is kind of ironic because Julian hated veterinarians. His philosophy was the only time he called a veterinarian in is when the animal is down and you’re sure he’s going to die ’cause that way you’ve got somebody to blame it on.
