Original Research

A story about Wikipedia in the most recent issue of the New Yorker says the site prohibits original research so as not to end up with reams of material on people’s pets.

After the dismal experience of giving Thelonious her first pill this time around, I decided to try the various pill-giving techniques I’d seen and read about online, and thought I’d dispense immediately with the ridiculous one shown in the video where the guy put his hand under his cat’s jaw and the cat’s mouth popped open for easy pill insertion.

So, on day two, I sat on my bed with Thelonious and petted her and spoke to her soothingly. I didn’t wrap her in the towel. I put my hand under her jaw and lifted her head. Her lips parted just slightly, I inserted the tip of the pill shooter, and—ping!—the pill shot down her throat. She didn’t even have to swallow. The whole thing (after the petting) took five seconds and was completely free of trauma. I couldn’t believe it. The same thing happened on day three. On day four, she was pawing at my hand a bit, but the pill still went down with relative ease.

She hasn’t vomited in days, her diarrhea hasn’t returned, and the Prednisone seems to have greatly improved her appetite. In fact, she looks much better after just a few days.

However, it’s a powerful drug with lots of potential side effects, and I am concerned about her taking it. I’m a little worried that it’s making her feel strange, that she’s thinking, “Goodness, I just don’t feel like myself lately.” When I see Dr. Press next, I’ll ask if we can try tapering off after awhile.

Friday evening, I got a call from my friend Amy, who has just moved to Bend, Oregon. We had a good long chat.

On Saturday I went to a couple of fabric stores in the Mission and to Freewheel, where I bought two more Jandd grocery bag panniers, which are really excellent. I’m going to put the two new ones in my closet and in ten years when I need them, I’ll have them, unlike what usually happens, which is that I can’t find a good replacement for the item that has fallen apart and I’m kicking myself for not getting another when I realized how excellent it was.

That’s what happened with my Nashbar Townies, which are similar bags that I used for years for grocery shopping. Then one of them finally gave way, and I ordered several more only to find that the quality had declined to the point that the bag could not be used for grocery shopping. It was way too flimsy, though it’s OK for day-to-day transporting of a backpack.

I then bought a Jandd grocery bag pannier that was extremely sturdy, but whose outer edge tended to droop down, making it so you couldn’t fill a brown paper grocery bag all the way to the top. The bag would get sort of cut in the middle—it developed an hourglass figure—and whatever was in the top half was in danger of falling out.

The latest incarnation of the Jandd grocery bag pannier solves that problem. The only itsy-bitsy thing it lacks is a Velcro loop near the top to put around a portion of the rack that the bag is attached to. With such a fastener, if you accidentally kick the bottom of the pannier while riding, you can’t dislodge it from where it's hooked on.

On Saturday evening, I watched three movies, one with Tom: Mr. & Mrs. Smith; The Prize Winner of Defiance, Ohio; and Blast from the Past. I wanted to see the latter because it has Christopher Walken in it, but my favorite of the three was The Prize Winner of Defiance, Ohio. What an extraordinary person and mother Evelyn Terry was, at least as portrayed in the movie. It was also visually pleasing and a reminder of the sexism of the 1960s—even the milkman feels free to lecture this mother of ten.

There was a very funny thing about playing Scrabble on my new favorite radio show, Prairie Home Companion, on Sunday, where a bad guy says, “Oh, looky here, I just happened to get seven letters that spell ‘zeppelin’: z-e-p-p-l-i-n.” The Garrison Keillor character challenges that, but it turns out “zepplin” is indeed in the bad guy’s dictionary. The bad guy gets nearly 200 points and G. Keillor loses his turn.

Then the bad guy says, “Oh, looky here, I just happened to get seven letters that spell ‘Cuisinart’: k-w-z-n-a-r-t,” and adds with satisfaction, “That’s good playin’.”

Sunday afternoon I made green split peas and buckwheat, and washed and chopped veggies for the coming week, and roasted potatoes and made a vegan version of Rice Krispies Treats, with Earth Balance instead of butter, Suzanne’s Ricemellow Creme instead of marshmallows (marshmallows contain gelatin, which is made of melted cow’s feet, or something equally disgusting), and Erewhon Crispy Brown Rice Cereal instead of you know what. The result was quite satisfactory—the initial impact on the tongue is just right, though the vegan version is a bit more crumbly than the cow-killing version, so the chewing experience is a bit different.