rabbit update

Oslo has been upgraded! He is now allowed to do controlled exploration around the house, and can army crawl all over. He didn't accept any acupuncture in his feet and flinched for all the ones in his back. He moves his feet together and is very strong.

Also he doesn't seem to be pooping on himself any more, which is a huge plus from our point of view - and really, his too. Rabbits don't like to be smelly.

Yay the bun!

Thoughts of a paralyzed rabbit

I wonder what it is like being paralyzed. I like to think of it as if your bottom half has fallen asleep and no matter how much you try you cant wake it up. I wonder if Oslo even knows his legs are not working or did he just wake up and realize the walking had become extremely hard for some reason. Either way he doesn't seem to understand physical therapy. I mean for a human, we can rationalize paralysis, realize we have to work to get rid of it and force ourselves to use our legs. A rabbit can do none of these things and therefore all work to get the legs working again has to come from us.

Margaret is exceptionally good at this. Waking up at all hours, going out to see him, comforting my melancholy about the situation, etc. My one comfort is it brings be closer to Oslo. I can learn about his anatomy and bunny hood. This is a good venture into being a bunny owner. I suppose that if I continue to own them for the rest of my life this was bound to happen and now I know what to do. So I guess its not a complete loss but I am sorry for the little guy.

We should start to see significant improvement in 2 or so weeks. So we are hopeful. In the mean time we get to play with him 6 times a day and feed him all the delicious things from our pantry. If this is going to be it for him at least he is going out with a belly full of apples and bok choy.

fun and not fun

I went to Estes Park today and did a lot of singing. We sound good! It was a beautiful day and everyone brought lots of good food and was very friendly. Fun!

Right before lunch Eric called me. Oslo Buns couldn't move his back legs. Not fun. I had left the car far away in Fort Collins where I met my ride to Estes Park. Ditto not fun.

Turns out one of Oslo's disks collapsed in his spine. We don't know why. He can pee and poop just fine, and has sensitivity all the way to his toes, but the inflammation around the collapsed disk means that his nerves are compressed and not signaling properly. He has to go to acupuncture therapy a couple times a week and we have to do physical therapy with him every few hours. The place Eric took him said they have seen rabbits completely recover from similar in kind but worse in degree injuries. After the first acupuncture treatment today he could wiggle his big toes!

He is a very sad looking rabbit right now. He loves to hop away from people and charging and rearranging things on the floor and now he cannot do these things. If we are petting him too much (he thinks there is such a thing) and wants to get away he cannot. All his rabbity instincts are not functional. Also he had diarrhea for a while so his butt is quite filthy!

Oh Oslo. I am so sad this happened and so glad we can help you get better! Soon you will again be terrorizing our minds!

Not to be out done.

Margaret has some really great posts but this is good to.

Some deep thoughts.

1) Eric proposed this thought experiment recently. Is there any condition under which you would assent to 50% of the population dying? That means that you personally have a 50% chance of dying. I say no. But then he proposed, what if the person becomes transmogrified into another living thing, like a tree or a blade of grass or a marmoset or some other endangered organism? Then I think I would say yes. a) overpopulation is the cause of most of the world's problems. b) everything would still be alive! C) I don't think either me or Eric or any of my family would be the ones affected. Even though statistically that's not true.

2) We got the tandem bike back! Dani is moving back to Spain, for real, for good (unless his grant application in Minnesota or whatever comes through) so we bought it from him. Unfortunately for me Chantal took back the seat she bought so it is no longer nearly as squishy and suspensionable as it was. Bumps are quite painful. Eric doesn't know my pain at all, he is no Bill Clinton.

3) I have made great scientific progress this week. I discovered that our SDS solution (sodium dodecyl sulfate, a common ionic detergent found in toothpaste and shampoos and also useful for dissociating ionically bonded proteins) is bad. How does it go bad? I have no idea. Instead of making the solution more basic, as it should, it made the solution acidic. This may be why I have not seen the results I expected when I treated my fluorescent proteins with this SDS. I got some today from Eric's lab and it did not precipitate out and it made the solution (slightly) more basic. So maybe everything will work out just fine. When it does I will let you know and there will be pictures galore on here don't you fear.

4) Kirsten let me have some of her alpaca+gold glitter roving to spin tonight. It spins so much nicer than Dennis hair + wool! I feel like a real good spinner now, even though my spinning wheel is old and I don't take care of it properly.

5) My preliminary exams are on Monday November 7th. This is very important because it is before Thanksgiving i.e. I can enjoy my Thanksgiving break for the first time in three years. Also it is important because it means I will be freaking out more and more before then. Fortunately I have siblings I can visit afterwards so I have something to look forward to. Namely, southwest has cheap flights through tomorrow so I will go visit Annie in San Francisco immediately afterwards and greatly enjoy myself. Also, I am about to learn more about esoteric subjects than I ever knew before, so get ready world! I will lay it on you with abandon!

6) Listeria virus has recently been found in Colorado-grown canteloupe. No canteloupe is now available in Colorado. I know the mechanism by which Listeria operates: normally the virulence genes are not expressed, because the RNA forms a stem-loop structure which the ribosome cannot bypass, so no protein gets transcribed. However, at body temperatures, the RNA stem-loop structure is melted, which is to say the hydrogen bonds between base-pairs are no longer maintained, so the RNA becomes straight and the ribosome can transcribe the virulence genes. This is the first fact I learned in the RNA biology class I took last fall and I still think it is super-cool. The Listeria virus does not become virulent until it is inside an endotherm. And RNA structure is responsible!

7) I think about the fact that I have MS every single day. I don't like it. I can't tell whether I'm tired or my myelin sheathing isn't conducting properly and it makes a difference in how I act which one is responsible. But I go swimming. The pool is cool, it is impossible to get overheated, and I get nice and excercised. Yay goggles! Then I get in the hot tub, it does feel good on my muscles, but when I get out I can't see straight! Am I tired or is are the electrons not moving properly? I cannot trust my body any more! Instead I assume the most helpful hypothesis: my brain IS tired, I MUST take a nap, and then I DO feel better. I recommend that everyone, healthy or not, take naps regularly. It definitely mitigates decision fatigue. Do you love naps or hate them?

Have you lost interest in muffins?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BHcH-pFbCWQ&feature=related

No...No you haven't.

Sometimes, I look to the internet to entertain me, and then I realize there is nothing there for me at all.

A bust.

The weather is finally fit for normal humans again, so Eric is a little sad. He may need to bring the long undies back next week.

We tried to play an awesome rock n roll show yesterday in Pat's front yard for Tour de Fat. We made the mistake of making noise before the parade started, and got shut down by the police because of "several" noise complaints from "three blocks away". People showed up anyway to hang out and drink beer. Paul blew his horn at the passers-by. I dressed as a fairy princess and was quite pleased with the outfit, which included false eyelashes and a tiara.

The police came a second time because all the partiers had left their bikes on the sidewalk, "blocking traffic". Hmph.

We played a show inside anyway, and we did not play our best but our friends were kind and said we did well.

Then everyone made their way downtown to where the festival was taking place. This was very close to my idea of hell: drunk people in costumes very close to each other in the bright sunlight with loud noises coming from stages all around. And everything was expensive, and there were long lines... I just don't get it, they all seemed to really enjoy this experience. Eric and I convinced Dane and Paul and Eric's parents to go somewhere else, to sit down and enjoy a beer.

We walked to Armadillo's and waited too too long for drinks and for food - but both were excellent when they did arrive. It didn't even look like there was any other table in there. We filled our fill on chips and salsa, that's for sure.

And we rolled our way home and Eric remembered to tell me that he'd invited all the people from Pat's house over to our house for the after-party. I said alright, whatever, I'm taking a nap regardless. And we both slept for many hours, and woke up to find that everyone Eric had invited had forgotten he'd invited them, because they were not at our house, nor had they called anyone. Fine.

I hope we can put together another show before Dani goes but it seems like playing in our backyard won't go over too well - maybe we can get a permit? Maybe we can not play at 9am on a Saturday?

In other news, my experiments are half-working. I was going to go to work this weekend to try getting them completely working but then, really, it's Labor Day weekend and what am I if not a worker? I only got paid for half of August, also, so I feel owed something like a vacation. So I'm not working. Hah!

Finally, swimming technology has really come a long way. I got new goggles for swimming laps and they are amazing! Comfy, leak-proof, fog-proof, UVA-UVB resistant! I should wear them everywhere! But seriously, I want a pair for the house to use while chopping onions.

Pocky