I got Phurball a little catnip ball at the grocery store.
As soon as I gave it to him, I realized I would have done better to just get him some catnip. He wasn’t so much playing with the thing as he was trying to rip it open to get at the weed.
After about five minutes, he came over to me and meowed plaintively.
I tore open the ball so he could get the catnip.
Now he’s got the munchies.
It’s strange. I am the one in our family who deals with the city’s Parks and Recreation department. I sign the kids up for summer camps and swim lessons, I take the occasional evening class, I buy the seasonal passes and sign the checks. Yet every piece of correspondence they send to our house is addressed to my husband, who has never dealt with them at all. I can only assume it’s because our water bill is in his name, so that’s how the city bureaucrats have us labelled.
My cat is absolutely nuts for processed cheese food product. Not real-type cheese, but the fluorescent orange stuff that squirts out of a can or comes in a pouch to put on your macaroni. When I make macaroni and cheese for the kids, he’s right there by their chairs, purring expectantly. I don’t remember him liking it in his younger days. I wonder if this is an example of how old folks develop strange tastes. He certainly has gotten demanding in his old age.
People have begun asking me, as they do every year, if I’m “ready for Christmas.” How does one answer this? Usually I just respond with a weak, “Guess so,” for I have no idea what criteria they are using for readiness, and my own holiday-related goals do not need to be completed by the first week of December.
To the gentleman who leaned on his horn: that flashing light on the back of my car is called a “turn signal.” In many places, including the state of North Carolina, this flashing light is used to indicate to the surrounding traffic that the vehicle is slowing for a turn. Had you known this, perhaps you would not have felt so personally affronted that my vehicle’s deceleration was causing you to take your foot off the accelerator for a fraction of a second. If, on the other hand, you were already aware of these things, feel free to shove that horn up your ass.
I usually buy Purina One cat food, because it has the Senior Protection Formula and my cat is a senior.
A few weeks ago my mom gave me coupons for Friskies cat food. I’m not religious about what I feed my cat; the next time I went to the grocery store I got some Friskies. There was still a third of a bag of Purina, so I stuck the Friskies underneath it, and refilled his bowl with Purina.
With four people dipping in and out of the pantry all day, its door is often left ajar. The next morning I found the Purina bag shoved aside and several holes ripped in the Friskies bag. Apparently Phurball really likes Friskies.
But there’s no reason for him not to finish off a bag of perfectly good cat food when there are cats going hungry all over the country. (Okay, I’m a mom and it carries over.) I made sure to keep the pantry door closed so he couldn’t get into the Friskies, and would have to eat what was in his bowl.
He didn’t.
Several days went by.
He’d have a bite when he got really hungry, but not much. I decided that once the Purina was used up I would switch to Friskies brand, since he obviously likes it better. But first he had to finish off the old bag. My mate, as always, found my discussions with the cat amusing:
“Meow!”
“No, you eat what’s in your bowl.”
“Maaoooooow!”
“That is perfectly good food in your bowl. Eat that and then I’ll give you the other kind.”
“Mrrrp?”
“No, this is not for you, this is for me.”
And so on.
One night one of us forgot to shut the pantry, and I went into the kitchen to find Phurball tucking in to the Friskies bag. I shooed him out and shut the door. “Eat what’s in your bowl,” I instructed.
People who tell you only dogs can look pitiful have not spent time with cats. Phurball didn’t say anything, but he sat by the pantry door, looking at me with such forlorn resignation that I couldn’t stand it. Sighing, I dumped out the food in his bowl, gave it a quick rinse in the sink, and filled it with the Friskies. After all, he’s an old man and it’s not good for him to be skipping meals.
Shut up.