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At first I was just going to take a long road trip this week, like maybe three or four thousand miles. I'd have to get new tires, but that wouldn't take too long. There's a cap on the back, so all I need is that folding Swedish cot from the storage unit, a big water container, and a couple of plastic bins for food and clothes. After I have the crankcase filled with nice, fresh synthetic oil and maybe install a new set of plugs, the 300 cubic inch straight six will run like nobody's business.

First I'd have to see if the auto adapter I bought for the iBook works on the semi-new TiBook I expect UPS to drop off any day now, and I guess I'd need an AirPort card. Here and there between the coasts there must be a few places I could grab some bandwidth, right? I read not too long ago about McDonalds' plan to install high-speed wireless in a few locations. Picture me sitting in the pickup truck beside the golden arches, pulling the latest Mac news off the Internet ... Hmm. Egad, well, don't picture that! Something tells me I could do better outside a motel with an unsecured WLAN, or inside one.

The reason I was going to do this was three-fold: first, I'm having no luck at all finding a suitable place to rent in a town with more rentals than Ft. Worth has Baptists. Go figure. Second, my life has entered a stage of quasi-therapeutic pandemonium, and I thought a long road trip with an intravenous vodka feed and a suitcase full of bad things would be the perfect mood-enhancing strategem, besides making me wildly popular at rest stops and cute little town parks along the way. Third, by the time most of you read this, Steve Jobs will have unveiled the most insanely great Mac hardware to come down the pike in years, which means nothing I say in this GRACK! will be of any consequence whatsoever.

As everyone has gathered by now, I finally decided to bag the road trip, at least until I can get the ol' F-150 in shape and get my passport renewed (in case I decide to make a run for the border). Instead, I hereby present for your reading pleasure a true tale about tangled kitties and the grace of God. If you read this all the way through to the end, you'll be rewarded with an analogy of stunning directness that will leave you speechless and your eyes brimming with tears. It's fresh, too. I heard this just a few days ago from a friend named Wiz, who won't mind my using his real (?) name because you won't believe the rest of the story anyway, although you should. Everybody comfortable and ready to proceed? Here we go, right after the break:

Wiz and wife Kika own a big, fuzzy, three-legged cat named "Lucky." Lucky gets along just fine with three legs, never complains or gets depressed thinking about how disadvantaged he is. At least I don't think so. But this isn't just about him, it's about his momma and siblings.

As some of you know, first-time kittycat mothers sometimes mess up. In this case the feline maternal instincts were reduced to "OW! What the hell is going on?!" -- with the unpleasant result that a wet, dirty pile of kittens, thoroughly tangled up in uneaten umbilical cords, awaited my friend when he was finally able to respond to his wife's anguished telephone call about the ongoing cat disaster.

I should probably spare you further graphic description of the state the poor little beasts were in, but you really need to know: soft newborn kitty-bones wrapped and bent in various configurations meant that the survivors ended up de-limbed to one degree or another. ("Lucky" ended up with three good legs, hence the name.) One kitten lost both hind legs but was otherwise as normal as a kitten could be. According to Wiz, it would pull itself across the rug and up onto their leather sofa with its front paws and never ask why.

In Taos, the preferred method of finding homes for kittens and puppies is to put them in a box and take them to Wal-Mart. No, really. On any given Saturday, you're likely to encounter someone standing outside the entrance with pets to give away. Once my neighbors' kittens were weaned, they decided to do the same. To hear him tell it, Wiz thought Kika was out of her mind trying this with a litter of cripples, but amazingly, it worked: one by one, each of the maimed animals either found a home or were snapped up by itinerant vivisectionists. All except one, that is, a certain cat with no hind legs.

Kika waited and waited. Finally, late in the day, a large RV pulled into the parking lot. The woman who emerged walked straight up to her and fell in love with the two-legged cat: "Oh, it's just PERFECT!" she gushed. As it turned out, the woman was a traveling veterinarian who followed the rodeo circuit tending to the horses and bulls. She also loved cats, but every time she opened her RV door in a new rodeo town, the animal would run off and get lost. A cat with no hind legs would never run away, she reasoned, and that was that. As far as I know, the two of them are still happily on the road together.

There now, aren't you glad you read the whole thing? And here's the analogy:

As I write this, it's Sunday afternoon in the Land of Enchantment. Out in California, Steve Jobs is playing with the new Macs he's going to introduce tomorrow (Monday, June 23). From all the signals I've been able to filter out of the ether, it seems to me that whatever he shows off on Monday is going to make your current Mac feel like a cat with no hind legs! It'll still be cuddly and purr, though, so be nice ...

And it will never, ever leave the Winnebago.

Senior Applelinks editor and columnist John H. Farr invites your emails.

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