Back to work on a bad leg

Today was my long-awaited return to work, after three full days with my leg up on a cushion. I got the day off to a roaring start by waking up at 3:30 and getting out of bed at 5. This gave me plenty of time to sit in a chair before getting ready for work. After much consideration of bandages and pants styles, I chose to go with the bandaged wound and shorts. Several hours later, I took off for the familiar 7:12 train.

But first, I had to pack my bag. Normally, this is a rather elaborate affair, for I'll bring up to 50 pounds of swag on a particular day. Laptop, MP3 drive, iPaq, phone, a couple of hoagies in case the train gets stuck and my fellow passengers turn on each other in hunger. I'd also packed two small Ziplocs on Sunday night. One had some Pepto caplets and decongestants in case the medicine upset my stomach or made me start sneezing. The other contained three antibiotic capsules and nine acidophilus caplets. I'd left them on top of my bag overnight so that I wouldn't forget them. When I looked this morning, the antibiotic bag was gone. Simply gone. I reached into my laptop bag, and the miscellany bag was gnawed through, with nibbles taken out of the Pepto caplets.

Mice had found my stash.

We've had this problem before. Last time, the solution was to put the dog kibble in an anodized aluminum trashcan (which, come to think of it, is where most of the active ingredients of kibble are found in the first place). But this wasn't the first time that the mice have gone after my delicious, salty laptop bag, and this time they carried off my pills completely. No sign of the Ziploc around the chair, or under it, or anywhere mice might go to chew through three cephalexin capsules in an attempt to breed a race of disease-fighting, invulnerable supermice. With good stomachs, because they got the acidophilus too.

What's wrong with the agreement on which civilization's been based since the 1500s? If it's in the Ziploc, it's not yours, Squeaky.

So back to the train, I carried around my brand new, goofy cane. As it turned out, it became less vital as the day went on, because my leg just wasn't hurting enough to justify the plodding work involved in ostentatiously pushing off with the cane before every step. I managed to figure out a way to keep my leg up on the train, sort of, and it even let me off right in front of an escalator. For the first time in a long time, I took the subway uptown. Now I can remember why I stopped doing it a year ago - it really kind of sucks. It's hot, crowded, and angry.

The one thing that really knocked me over today was a shock discovery. The "Just Can't Get Enough: New Wave Hits of the 80s" version of "Let Me Go" was actually a fraud. It was some weird remix that removed the "though guilty of no crimes" line at the end. I assume they only paid $5 royalties to use this discarded version instead of the real one, but true connoisseurs know the difference with their eyes closed. An outrage. Shame on you, Rhino.