Waiting for the Medicine Call

That sounds a bit like the title of a fantasy novel, but really it's just my way of saying that I put a call in to the Multispeciality Clinic, to the nephrology nurse whom I saw when they thought there might be something wrong with my kidneys, to see if she has any more free samples of two of the drugs I'm taking. I found the newer and more expensive one on a Canadian website for a not impossible price, and that's good, because I am pretty sure she hasn't got any more of it squirrelled away. For some reason the clinic has a huge supply of the other one, which is an extended-release form of a beta blocker. I hope they still have it. Canadian pharmacies don't sell it, and the extended-release aspect makes it a new drug and hence expensive. I guess I could go back to a regular beta blocker. The one I was taking was old and cheap. On the other hand, my blood pressure was 110 over 74 this morning and I would rather like to keep it that way. I used to be able to feel the old beta blocker kicking in and wearing off, and both sensations were unpleasant.

Picking up my narrative of Tuesday night, strictly for my own amusement: I settled down to read Vol. IV of Liavek, and Eric to painstakingly work his way through an extremely dense essay in historiography. He came out of the kitchen at one point saying, "I know what this is! This is epistemology! No wonder I'm having such a hard time with it!" The bits he read me were remarkable. The writing was actually not bad as writing, but it was terrifically dense and full of abstruse terminology very closely packed in complex sentences. Mostly when something makes my head go round, it has faulty grammar or a bad rhythm. This was just the content. Yipes.

Eric got to bed rather late, apologizing. We were both very sleepy, but ended up having a conversation about religious faction and other things, and in the end didn't get to sleep until something like five in the morning.

At ten-thirty I asked Eric if he still wanted to get out of the house by noon, or should I stop pestering him, and he said, "Neither." I tried various methods of getting him to get up, which was difficult because I didn't want him to, and anyway Toliman had crept in between us and was lying partly upsidedown, purring. Eventually I said that I would get up and make coffee, and that did it. Not because I make bad coffee, but because he feared his kitchen would be mean to me.

He entertained me during breakfast with some of the training stuff he's doing, about vocabulary, and we got quite giggly. Eventually I got dressed and left. He looked so overwhelmed that I half wondered if he were mad at me, but ascertained later that he wasn't, just overwhelmed. He's having a hard time with a lot of stuff and there isn't very much I can do.

I went downtown and picked up my prescription for the ACE inhibitor. I was completely out, having, when I left the original request for refills, failed to tell them which pharmacy they should call it in to, and having had to realize this and rectify it. So I shook a pill out of the bottle right away. Instead of being flat and yellow, it was chunky and green. I went back to the window and got a pharmacist to look at it. "Oh, yeah, we changed the brand," he said. "Didn't they put a note on it?" "Well, yeah, but all my medication always has those notes." "Oh, we only put those on medications where we've changed brands in the past six months." I guess the other changes were too subtle for me to have noticed.

I took the pill, still feeling wary, but while it for some reason had a kick I'm not accustomed to, possibly because I took it two hours late, it didn't do anything untoward.

I stopped at Target and was unable to decide on terribly complex things like new underwear and socks or whether to buy some of their nice cheap men's cotton T-shirts, so I executed a few small commissions for Raphael and came home on the bus.

David had gone shooting with Joel and happily told me all about it; we also discussed money some more, and computer upgrades, and what the cats were up to.

I tried to feed Chumley. He is now suspected of having an allergy, and is supposed to eat protein he has never had before. Lydy got him Rabbit and Green Pea. He doesn't like it. Fester does. I mixed some of the stinky food I got when he wouldn't eat at all in with it, but he still didn't want any. I shut him in the media room with it so Fester wouldn't get it all. An hour later I checked on him. He was lying on the daybed looking confused, and the untouched plate was on the floor. I brought it to him. He ate about two-thirds of it. Fester came in and supervised, but didn't try to steal any food. Lydy was hoping to get the kangaroo instead of the rabbit, but I'm not sure how that's going.

Chumley may be eating the dry-food version of the rabbit when we aren't looking, as he seems quite lively.

Pamela

Flurries

Raphael appeared suddenly in my peripheral vision with the remark, "Remember it's vet day." Or "cat day," can't remember. When we did that huge expotition with all three of zir cats, so as not to have to do it again, they failed to give Minou his vaccinations. Then the post office, as is its regrettable habit, stuck the postcard from the Kitty Klinic reminding Raphael that Minou was due for his shots into a catalog that I just happened to decide to look at rather than recycling unopened. Oy.

There was still a carrier in the library after the Great Expotition. I put it in the cat sitting room, and finding Raphael occupied by a work crisis at the worst possible moment, went into my bedroom, scooped the sleeping Minou up off my pillow, and inserted him into the carrier before he really woke up. He had a lot to say about that.

The appointment went fine, we weren't late and it didn't take long, but I felt discombobulated when we got home and forgot to go for my walk. Eric called much earlier than he usually does, sounding discouraged. We had a nice conversation anyway. Then I realized that it still wasn't quite dark, so I bolted outside and went for my walk anyway. No actual snowflakes yet, but a damp brisk wind and the smell of snow. The sky was gray and I'd missed any sunset color there might have been. The city light from downtown was doing a good imitation of sunrise in the north, though. Lovely pinks. I discovered that a house I walk past all the time has very fine stained-glass in four of its windows, and achieved as well numerous glimpses into the interiors of other houses. I don't really want to see any people when I do this; I like looking at the woodwork and the floors and the colors the walls are painted and whether there are any cats about.

I'm still reading Liavek IV, and realized while talking to Eric that I will need to reread "The Illusionist" as well as the five original volumes. Oh, the horror, I have to reread a John M. Ford story about the theater.

Now I remember why I thought of buying underwear at Target. If I don't do laundry, I won't have any tomorrow. Oh, well, at least I remembered to order the detergent with the groceries.

My cat is stretched out on the bare metal radiator, blissed.

Pamela