Thank goodness for sulfa drugs*.

The cat is coming home...I was given to believe that today was the decision day, depending on the results of blood and urine tests, the cat would either be coming home, or would be Going Home (in the Rainbow Bridge sense). Yeah, my concentration today was not at its best. (I actually deal better with the certainty of something bad than with the uncertainty. The whole Schroedinger's Box feeling of the day was not pleasant.)

Well, her white cell count has gone down, her BUN and creatinine are lower (not low, but then this is a cat on kidney medication to begin with). And she's eating. And she's wanting attention. She's not totally out of the woods - she has a week plus of antibiotics, plus a potassium supplement, plus the vet wants to do a couple days of subcutaneous rehydration just to get her "back" to where she should be.

But her iv port has been removed and she's been signed out of the vet's.

I know I'm going to have to be prepared for her going at some point, but I'm glad it's not just yet.

(*Also, my mom's taken 'em many times for various infections. She's allergic to almost every antibiotic out there but can take the sulfas)

****

A while back I predicted I would come to hate practicing the Hanon pieces. Well, not actually. I find I'm just compulsive enough - and I'm also the kind of person who's soothed by repetition - that once I figure out the basic pattern, I kind of like playing them. Just running up and down the octaves doing whatever pattern has been established. So when I don't know what else to play during practice time, or when I don't feel quite up to the "interpretation" that some pieces require, I play that. I get good at them, maybe I spend more time on them than I should, but I figure they're a good workout for the hands.

And I do go back and re-practice the ones I've already completed. I so cannot do them with the metronome marking of 108 (what Hanon recommended you work up to) but I can do them considerably faster than 60 (his "starting" metronome marking).  Hanon claimed that if you worked on them for an hour a day, you could become a virtuoso by the time you had completed all 60. Well, I don't quite devote that much time (maybe 20 to 40 minutes a day) to them, but then again, I doubt I will ever become a virtuoso. (And I never will if I don't learn to conquer the stage-fright thing). And I don't really need to be one. I don't fantasize about a second, later-in-life career as a concert pianist. (Well, okay, I sometimes daydream about it, but that's not the same as thinking it would actually be possible or plausible or even, in reality, something I would want: for one thing, there would be far too much travel involved).

***

And this is scary. The murder mentioned was committed in the apartment complex right next door to the building where I teach and have my office. Yes, I realize, it was a "domestic," but still. I think I will be far more inclined to take work HOME with me rather than staying over late in the future - and trying to do any work (e.g., research) that requires me to be over there during the day from now on.

Also, the apartment complex in question has been open for only about six months, so I'm not so sure I'd give the comment, "There's never anything like this that happens here - it's a great place," a great deal of credence. 


Between this and the vandalism last week (someone creating a disturbance by breaking windows so he could try to burgle a house one street over from the building), it's getting kind of scary over there. We're a bit away from main campus, so the campus police don't always get up to patrol our place as often. (I hope they change their pattern, at least for a while). I teach a class that lets out at 7 pm on Tuesdays in the fall; I think I will make sure to be walking out at the same time as my (male) co-teacher or with a group of the students.