Medication with a little something on the side

We were walking the dog along a trail in the Santa Monica Mountains when I suddenly spotted weapons of mass destruction spread out in a field. “It’s them!” I shouted, pointing. “It’s the WMD!” “Calm down, dear,” my wife said, “you’re frightening the dog. There’s nothing out there. It’s only your medication.”

As soon as she said that I realized the weapons were only tree stumps and boulders, and I went whistling on up the trail. The missiles and canisters I thought I saw were a hallucinatory side effect of an infection-fighting medicine called Cipro. If I keep taking it, I may end up seeing angels swimming in my martini. I might even be one.

I knew from warnings tacked onto the end of TV commercials for new drugs that side effects are not uncommon. They can range from dry mouth to death, accompanied by diarrhea, vomiting, fainting, drowsiness, screaming, crying and the sudden, unexplained singing of madrigals. But I didn’t know about hallucinations.

I read about Cipro in a book my wife, the inquisitive Cinelli, sent for called “Prescription Drugs for People Over 50.” I usually don’t read anything that is geared to people over 50 because I do not consider myself there yet. Cinelli is more realistic and says I am most definitely there, I’m just childlike in my attitudes.

When she received the drug book, she sat me down, gave me a cookie and began reading aloud about the dangers of taking Cipro, which is actually ciprofloxacin, a word that a lot of people from places like Oakland can’t pronounce, so it has been shortened to Cipro. “You can say see-pro,” she said. “See-pro,” I said. “Good.”

“Here are the side effects,” she continued: “ ‘hallucinations, swelling of the tongue or lips and a rash.’ I sometimes wonder,” she added thoughtfully, “how I’d be able to tell if you were hallucinating or just ranting.”

“Read on.”

“You’re also to avoid extreme sunlight, but I don’t think that’s a problem. You like night much better than you like day. You’re sort of batlike in that respect.”

I take another prescription drug called Zocor to control my cholesterol. It’s an antihyperlipidemic. I noticed a yellow sticker on the prescription bottle when I first started taking it. It warned, “Do not eat grapefruit or drink grapefruit juice at any time while taking this medication.”

I telephoned a pharmacist to ask why. He said it’s because an enzyme in grapefruit heightens the effects of the medicine and could cause muscle or kidney problems. I asked about apples. He said apples were OK.

“You actually asked if you could eat apples while taking Zocor?” Cinelli asked. “Did you ask about bananas and apricots too? How about kumquats?” “I don’t eat kumquats. I’m not even sure I know what a kumquat is.”

I met a doctor at a party not long ago who was an expert in cholesterol. When I told him I took Zocor three times a day, it startled him so much that he jerked away from me and spilled some of his scotch. “You’re only supposed to take it at bedtime,” he said. “Who told you to take it three times a day?” “My primary caregiver,” I said. The party doctor responded with a scornful grunt, unwilling to criticize a brother caregiver. “Good scotch,” he said, downing another one.

I saw my own doctor on a routine visit a week later and told him what the party doctor had said. I could tell by his expression that he wasn’t happy with the idea of my taking medical advice at a party.

“Just do what I tell you,” he said. I asked if it were true that Zocor worked better at night. Clearly, he was tired of the discussion.

“Take the full dosage,” he finally said, “and take it at night if you want. Take it lying down, sitting up, standing still or playing the harp. You happy now, Sammy I Am?”

“It says in the book,” Cinelli said, reading, “that the taking of Zocor can cause ‘taste disturbances’ too. But I guess for someone who puts ketchup on cottage cheese, that shouldn’t be too big a problem. But what could be a problem is this: ‘Do not drink alcohol while taking this medication.’ What about that, Elmer?” “I read somewhere that Churchill put ketchup on cottage cheese,” I said, “and he led England through the most destructive war in history. He also drank prodigious amounts of brandy.” “Yes,” she responded quickly, “but did he take Zocor?”

I ignored her gleam of triumph and went back to my old pill habits. I’m willing to avoid sunlight, grapefruit and the use of heavy equipment while popping my pills, but I’m not going to worry too much about hallucinations. Without them, I might have to give up writing a column.

Al Martinez’s column appears Mondays and Fridays. He’s at al.martinez@latimes.com.