396 First Street

Los Altos, California 94022

Veterinarian Always on Duty

Brennen McKenzie

School: University of Pennsylvania, 2001

Special Interests: soft-tissue surgery, evidence-based medicine, emergency and critical care

Pets: Gromit (a 13 year old shelter mutt, Pearl and Brownie our two rats, a tank full of fish, and a corn snake named Tesserae (Tess for short)

Prior to becoming a veterinarian, I worked teaching English composition, in numerous clerical jobs, on a fishing boat in Alaska, running a pet food store, in a baseball card factory, and as a waiter. I'm not one of the folks who read James Herriott and decided to be a vet as a child. I loved science and literature, but I chose science as the more satisfying lifestyle. I tried to be Jane Goodall and did a Master's Degree in primate behavior at CSU San Francisco, doing my thesis research with the chimpanzees at the San Francisco Zoo. After several years trying to make a living in primate behavior research, including running a breeding colony of rhesus monkeys on an island in South Carolina and doing behavioral therapy and enrichment work for captive primates in a research facility in Texas, I stumbled into veterinary medicine after about ten years later than most of my classmates. It has proven to be the ideal choice because it provides work that is interesting and has, I think, some real moral or social value, and yet it is an established profession in which I can make a living.

Outside of the veterinary world, I'm a voracious reader with particular fondness for science fiction, history, philosophy, and 15th - 18th century English literature. I love to travel, though I do less of it now that I have a daughter and a grownup job. Recent jaunts include climbing Mt. Kilimanjaro in Tanzania and running with the bulls in Pamplona, Spain. I scuba dive when I can (which is only every couple of years these days), love hiking, backpacking, and rollerblading and I'm working towards my blackbelt in Shaolin Kempo Karate. Being a father is, of course, my favorite and most time consuming after-hours activity (my daughter is 8). My wife has put up with me for 15 years now, for which I am grateful daily.

My personal website can be found at http://www.skeptvet.com

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