Incoherent Scribblings

Just This Once

If you have ever wondered how a childless couple would function as a parental unit, take a moment and look at how they handle the discipline of their pets. From this simple exercise, I have learned that A. and I would be complete failures as parents and so it is better for all involved if we stay childless.

Take, if you will, the recent behavior of Mouse. As I have mentioned before, Mouse is an attitude with a tail and lately she has been very demanding about being in the kitchen. Now in our house, the kitchen has a door and this door is closed 98% of the time because I do not want the cats in the kitchen. I could say there are a multitude of reasons why the cats don’t need to be in the kitchen (and there are), but the truth is I am lazy and don’t always clean up the kitchen after dinner.

In the past, Mouse didn’t care all that much about the kitchen. Sure, she might wander in there now and again when I was in there to see what I was doing… especially if I was making something that would result in her getting a treat, but over all, she wasn’t really interested in it. However, lately she has been fascinated with this room where the humans do mysterious things involving pleasant aromas.

I suppose it is technically my fault: After all, over the summer I left the door open a little more often so that the kitchen could air out and she was free to roam in and out as she pleased. I suppose that now that the door is closed again she doesn’t understand why she can’t go in there to investigate things once a day.

Now instead of wandering in and out of the kitchen on a whim, she sits outside the closed kitchen door waiting for me to walk by so that she can let out a meow demanding that I open the door at once… and when I don’t, she paws at it. When I am in the kitchen preparing dinner without her, she cries incessantly and occasionally jumps at the door reminding me that I have forgotten someone out in the lonely hallway.

I have become pretty successful at ignoring her cries and keeping her out of the kitchen, but as soon as A. walks through the door she races in right behind him. I tell him that I don’t want her in the kitchen while we are eating and he gives me that husband-nod that tells me he has heard me but hasn’t listened to a word I have said. So we sit and I attempt to eat my dinner while Mouse paws me (never A.) trying to make her case for the table scraps that I don’t give her.

Finally, A. started to get fed up with her behavior in the kitchen. (When she realized I wasn’t going to give her any scraps, she started pawing at him for them.) A. declared that Mouse was being a pain in the ass and from now on she wouldn’t be allowed in the kitchen while we were eating… until she started pitifully meowing outside the door during dinner.

I was the disciplinarian. I said she couldn’t come in. I told A. that if we let her come in when she started crying outside the door that she would never learn that she wasn’t wanted in the kitchen. I said we should just let her cry until she was hoarse.

And as I said all this, A. got up, opened the door, and said, “Oh, well… just this once.”

Hunger Coma

It is nearly 11 pm and Scooter lies on his perch beside my computer table. If you glance over at him, he appears to be too weak to move. I, however, am not swayed by his appearance. He is a healthy 15 pound kitty who is performing his nightly ritual: Here we call it the “hunger coma.”

My cats are fed in the evenings between 10 and 11 pm. They are fed at this time so that they do not find that they are suddenly starving at 3:00 am and then proceed to wake me up to tell me all about it.

They are so used to this schedule that every night about 9:30, whether their bowls are empty or not, they start the Hunger Coma Ritual:

First they sit right beside or in front of me (all three in a row) and stare at me with big eyes. By now I am pretty good at ignoring this, but it doesn’t prevent them from doing it anyway.

After they have stared at me for about a half an hour, they pretend that they aren’t interested in what I might offer anymore and ignore me… until I get up. I might just be walking across the room to replace a book on a shelf, but as soon as I move they jump up and run in the direction of the food bowl. They seem to say, “Here, in case you have forgotten, let me remind you where the food bowl is.” We play this game for another half an hour. Whenever I move ever so slightly, they run to the food bowl and when they realize I am not coming to feed them, they return to sit in front of me again.

Finally, it is as if all of their stamina has been drained away by this cat and mouse game. They lie on the nearest piece of furniture or stretch out on the carpet and assume a position that might remind one of a dead rabbit or a beached whale. Though they may remind one of a completely incapacitated creature, their eyes remained fixed upon me, pleading with me to feed them before they surely starve to death.

At this point they have officially entered into hunger-coma-mode. Luckily for them though, by this time it is usually time for me to get ready for bed and so I take their bowls into the kitchen and (finally!) fill them up.

And these poor starving creatures that only minutes before didn’t even appear to have the strength to move suddenly materialize before my eyes like magic.