Anesthetizing a horse can be somewhat exciting, mainly because it involves a horse going to sleep suddenly and laying down. There's a way to do it so it mostly happens without incident:
1. Sedate the horse, rinse out his mouth.
2. Position the horse against a padded wall.
3. Rope on the head, rope on the tail. These ropes go through rings in the wall.
4. Anesthesia injects the valium and the ketamine.
5. Someone raises the horse's head.
6. Person on the head rope sits on the rope, holds the tension as the horse gently slides down the wall into a "sitting" position.
7. Person on the tail rope pulls as the horse sits.
8. Flop the horse over, anesthesia intubates, etc.
So we're anesthetizing a horse for colic surgery, and I'm on the head rope. The anesthesia resident turns to me, and we have this conversation:
Resident: "Do you know what you're doing on the head rope?"
Me: "Yes."
Resident: "Well, you have to tell me exactly what you're going to do. You know, students will tell you that they know what they're doing when they actually have no idea."
Me: "You're going to induce him and raise his head. I'm going to sit on this rope and hold the tension while he slides down the wall."
Resident: "Oh...okay, you DO know."