Under most circumstances, I really do love the adrenaline rush. I particularly like it after I've been for a walk, and I know that I've had a good workout and feel the adrenaline pumping through my body. It can give me an extra boost for most of the day if I do my walk in the morning, which I've started trying to do.

On the other hand, the bad kind of adrenaline can ruin your whole day. I discovered this the other morning first-hand. It was one of our usual mornings: Andy was taking Trinity out front for the ritual wave hello to the garbage men while I was busy cleaning up cat pee upstairs. While Andy and Trinity were out front, Pixel, our oldest and largest cat, snuck out from under the fence in the empty lot next door. His plan was to skulk along the wall in front of our house, and sneak into the yard of our other neighbor, Juan, and ultimately make his way back into our "compound" probably by climbing some trees at Juan's and coming over the wall into our backyard. Seeing that Andy and Trinity were in his path threw him off kilter, and instead of his usual route, he ran out into the street in front of the house.

I have often complained to anyone who will listen about how this town thinks of our street as a highway, because it is one of the very few streets in town that doesn't have any speed bumps. That means it's the equivalent of the autobahn as far as the Mexicans are concerned. So Pixel runs out into the traffic, under a moving car, out from under it between the front and back wheels into the oncoming lane, across the street to the other side of the road, and then zipped all the way back through the oncoming cars in both directions and darted under the gate at Juan's house, unscathed. If he were a dog, he surely would have been hit, at least once.

In the meantime, Andy is screaming "STOP" and waving at the passing cars trying to save our idiot pet. I'm not sure what Trinity was doing. I, of course, was having a heart attack. All I heard was Andy screaming. I flew down the stairs to the front of the house, and I don't even remember how I managed it without falling, because I assumed that it was Trinity running around in the rush-hour traffic. By the time I got to the front door, I heard Andy saying "Trinity, stay right there," so I realized she wasn't the reason he was screaming, but by then the adrenaline had kicked in. I swept Trinity up in my arms, and held her probably a bit too tight, as I ran through the front gate to our terrace. My arms were shaking, and I was on the verge of tears. Andy reported back what had happened, and went in search of Pixel.

Pixel showed up again about 10 minutes later. He was visibly shaken after his little ordeal. Andy and I were even more so. It took ages before I stopped shaking, and Andy seemed to be in a similar condition. I was already on antibiotics for an intestinal infection, but that day ended up being the worst day of that particular illness, and I'm sure it was from all of that negative adrenaline surging through my body. Over a week later I'm still heaving huge sighs of relief that Trinity is okay, and also that Pixel is okay. Just thinking about it gets my blood pumping again. In fact, I'd better stop thinking about it right now, or I might not be able to go to sleep tonight!