Caterwaulking the Halls

This is "Day 5" of the "We Work For Cheese" website's non-contest contest for February...today's prompt is "You better put out".  Please check out the other blogs while you are there as we are all slowly losing our minds trying to fulfill this mission we undertook.

Yes, this could have gotten a lot more sexual with that prompt that should have prompted me to go that way...but it's late and people only read the first eight posts anyway, so I'm going to talk about my cats. Everyone likes a cat story, right?

Right.  Here goes...

We have a couple chatty cats...we're talking cats that walk around meowing something the entire day. I don't know what they're saying, but they are pretty damned determined to get their point across. In fact, I think they're probably wondering, since we're the ones with the opposable thumbs, that we should be the ones who should know what they want, yet we walk around asking them, "What do you want?" -- like they're supposed to just break out in human-speak any second.

Yes, humans are a stupid race.

Well, don't believe everything you've read about cats sleeping 23 hours a day and only being nocturnal. Since we (my son and I) are up at nite and asleep during the day - we know they are up at all hours...and talking. And, cats, especially chatty ones, will wait until you are three minutes into a full sleep and then walk up and down the hallway meowing up a storm.

And they don't shut up...seriously...they don't.

You figure to yourself, "They're going to get bored eventually and jump up on the cat tower and fall asleep...they are going to get bored and stop it any minute...they are going to get the hint and just go away...any second...any second now..."

But they don't. Cats are not only curious, but tenacious as well.

So, the routine around here before we crawl off to bed in the wee hours of the morning (when everyone else is getting up), goes something like this:

Son (to me): "Seriously, if they start meowing up and down the hallway, I'm going to throw them out. They can stay out there."

Me (to my son): "I can't toss them out...it's cold out there. They can't stay outside - they'll freeze...I'm keeping them in."

Son (back to me): "You better put out Pablo...all he does is cry...and he comes into my room and pees."

Me (back to son): "Then close your door."

Son (back to me): "I can't close my door...Binky won't be able to go out to use the litter box. I'm going to bed. Make sure you throw Pablo out."

Me (to son): "Well, I'm not tossing him out...it's too cold. He's sleeping in the cat thingy now anyway. I'm going to bed as soon as the Ambien kicks in."

(Segue to my son sleeping in his room with the door cracked a tad...and me attempting to doze off with a tube sock shoved in the door jamb as the cats can open it up otherwise. I have a couple cats that insist on purring for about an hour when they jump on the bed...and while purring is indeed a nice sound...purring at the decibel level of a small jet aircraft on take-off -- while you are trying to sleep, is not. So, my door is held tight by ugly ingenuity [not unlike my cat-proof faucet baggie fix] while I peacefully slumber.)

Pablo: "Meow...(pause)...meow.  Meooooowwww. Mrrrrrrrow...(pause)... rrrrrrrrr... rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrow. Mrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrow...rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrooooooow...meeeeeeeeeeeeeowwwww... (pause) ...rrrrrrrrrrroooooooow...mrrrrrrrrrrrrrrowwwww. Mrrrrrrrroooow.  Mew....mrrrrrrrrrrrow...mwowwwwww. Rrrrrrrewwwww...meowwwwww..."

Me and my son (to each other - three minutes after my Ambien kicks in...and an hour after my son has been sleeping): "Can you throw that damned cat out already??"

(Pablo...wanting to go outside before the mewfest later on tonite. Yes, those are scratch marks on the door frame.  Lovely, aren't they?  They lend an air of rustic ambiance to the room, don't you think?)