Junker and Cat Trifecta

I’ve changed my mind about the junker. It turns out it’s not actually that easy to find, as David C. agreed, a bike that is functional and not completely painful to ride, but which also looks like a total piece of crap, the main benefit of the junker. (If you want a bike that looks just fine and probably is also 100 percent functional but your budget is limited and/or you want to support something good, visit Pedal Revolution.)

To lock my bike right now, I use a u-lock to secure the frame to what appears to me a permanent structure, and I loop a cable through the wheels on the theory that someone might cut a cable to get a whole bike, but might not go to the same trouble for just a wheel. However, I know people who have lost wheels doing this, and now that I know that I probably won’t be able to get a cab to stop for me, my bike frame and my one remaining wheel, I’m thinking it’s time to improve my security.

My wheels are currently quick-release, which is why I have to put the cables through them. I could make them not quick-release, but then I’d always have to have a wrench with me, and besides, bike thieves can carry wrenches, thinking here of the thief who used an Allen wrench to remove a bike seat of mine.

I did buy a set of fancy wheel fasteners that require a custom key for wheel installation or removal. However, they were so difficult to use that I myself found them burdensome, so I won’t name them here; I do use the third part of the set for attaching my seat. I guess what I’d better do is practice with those things and reinstall them. My wheels should be pretty well protected with those devices plus the cable. If I’m going to a questionable area, I can also bring just for that day a really massive u-lock I have and don’t usually use because I’m afraid it will cause my pannier to fail prematurely from the weight.

Today while I was riding to work a small white car suddenly swerved from the bus lane (tsk tsk) toward me. It gave me quite a fright. Then a police car came by and I realized why the driver of the white car had suddenly been inspired to exit her lane. At the light, I stopped by the car and waved, with a neutral expression on my face, and waited until the passenger rolled down the window a bit and then I said, as pleasantly as possible, “You really scared the crap out of me back there. Thanks for not killing me.” The driver apologized.

Last Friday I asked J. why acupuncture with him is so painful lately, when my first few sessions were pain-free. Years ago I saw another acupuncturist for quite some time, and she didn’t cause me as much pain in all sessions combined as J. does in one. He said we’re working on heat points, which are inherently unpleasant, but also that if a client is OK with it, he works more aggressively. I felt bad for saying “Jesus!” in a strained tone of voice during a particularly therapeutic moment, but I felt better when I found out that my friend who also sees him feels free to yell “Fuck!” at the top of her lungs.

Not sure where I left off on the saga of Thelonious, but she had been prescribed some antibiotics for her irritable bowel syndrome before I went to Michigan. I waited to start until I returned, as I didn’t want to ask Tom to deal with it. (I suppose you’re wondering what happened with the cat poop and the trash bag and all that. My dear friend did put the poop in the toilet; I had taken the precaution of removing the trash bag from the bathroom. He did not flush the toilet.)

I was hoping to find an amount of wet cat food that would be sufficient to conceal the taste of the medication but not be too much for her to eat. It turns out there is no such amount. It takes half a can of food to make the antibiotics reasonably palatable, but she can’t eat that much food in 12 hours, and she has to have a dose twice a day. She probably couldn’t eat that much food even if it didn’t have antibiotics in it.

In addition, switching to the wet food gave her awful diarrhea which has not abated. I spoke to her vet and he said to give her a smaller amount of the medication, so I’m doing that, in one quarter of a can of food, and that’s working reasonably well in that she will almost eat it all, though her symptom (gulping, which her doctor thinks is caused by nausea) remains the same, so probably it’s not working at all, actually.

A couple of days ago, I was in the bathroom while Thelonious came in, had a bout of diarrhea in her cat box, dribbled a bit of poop on the floor as she walked out of the bathroom, and then barfed right outside the bathroom door. I would never get annoyed with her for this—really, I feel awful for her—but I confess I may have let out a sigh after she barfed, the final event in the Cat Trifecta.