Friday, July 4, 2008

The Problem Child

I'm not ready to assess how I am doing with the girls' absence, but it seems I have not been left entirely child-free.

There's the cat, you know.

This is not my cat. She belongs to the Tornadoes. I submitted to Fourth Grader's pleas for a kitten when she was still Third Grader. Not because I thought it would be super to have a cat around again, mind you, but because I had seen one too many country mice scurrying across my kitchen floor. The mice had grown so bold, in fact, that they didn't even scurry anymore; they just sauntered out from under the cellar door, looked around, and washed themselves.

We didn't so much adopt a kitten as hire one.

She fulfilled her duties, I will give her that. In eighteen months I have only seen two and a half mice. The second whole mouse was about an hour ago. I'll come back to that...

In addition to being vigilant, the cat has turned out to be a pleasant addition to the family: cute and dainty and peaceful. And quite loving.

Yeah.

Eye-opener #1: The comment by the lovely lady who cleans my house. "Your cat really doesn't like to be touched, does she?" Excuse me? Well, you see her twice a month. She's not familiar enough with you, that's all.

Eye-opener #2: Yesterday morning's vaccination appointment at the vet's office. Where I became aware of the note on her chart. The note that must have been written last summer when we boarded her for a few days.

The note that says: "Caution: Explodes and lunges."

Meaning the cat. Explodes. And lunges.

This explains why the vet's assistant chose to don giant yellow oven mitts and twist the cat into a half-nelson so the vet could do her job. Apparently, she's difficult. But only for other people.

Yeah.

About that mouse. I saw it when I came in from doing yard work, just sitting there on the basement floor, taking its little bath. So I raced upstairs and fetched the Mousekiller - napping on Fourth Grader's bed - and carried her to her prey.

And what did she do? I'll tell you what she didn't do:

She did not explode. She did not lunge.

She smelled it. Then she flopped down on her side. And she curled up with it. And the mouse? Didn't have a problem with that.

She is so not my cat. And I touched a mouse - ew.

I have to do everything around here...

3 comments:

sarah said...

If I could stop laughing I might be able to come up with something witty to say, but I've got nothing.

That is hysterical!!

Anonymous said...

I once borrowed a cat to handle a mouse problem. She handled it by making the mouse her new playtoy... She caught it, carried it around the apartment in her mouth, let it go, caught it again... this went on until I had to step in and kill that dang mouse myself. Then, I had to fire the cat!

Anonymous said...

My friend has a Cat that is scared shitless of mice. If it sees or smells a mouse, it runs and hides as far away as possible.