Notes from the Edge – 03-30-2024
Happy Saturday!
Fred: If you read by blogs, you know my cat Fred turned out not to be a Fred at all. About the time she discovered the neighborhood tomcat I should have known, but I thought they were just friends. You know, two toms. But, no, she’s about as pregnant as a cat can get, almost as wide as long. And, I said that last week and she just keeps getting bigger. It’s sort of like the little flat popcorn bag in the Microwave. Pop … pop .. pop .pop pop Pop POP! And I can’t believe how big she is. So, I placed her on Maternity leave. I expect a litter of Puppies. Yes Puppies, she’s certainly big enough and I’m not a cat person anyway. Which brings me to pets…
I have this constant Cat / Dog thing. I think of Cats as Female and Dogs as Males. I thought that was common. A no brainer. But I mentioned it the other day and somebody looked at me like I was crazy. So, I guess not everybody looks at it the same… Or that guy was weird, and he may have been. But, pets…
Dogs and Begging… Cats and Begging…
Dogs beg and rarely will they turn down what they have begged for. The dog could care less. I have seen a dog eat potato chips, cheese curd, pudding, green beans, toast and I once owned a Dog, Sammy, and she ate mice. Yes. Whole.
Cats? Yes, on the mouse, but the cat will only eat parts of the mouse and you will have to clean up the rest, or, like my Fred, they will bring the dead or alive mouse to you. Fred likes to bring them to me alive. I guess that’s Fred’s way of making sure I get my exercise chasing the damn mouse/squirrel/bird through the house. But the rest? No. A cat will not eat any of the rest of it. But that does not mean the cat won’t beg for it anyway. Mine does. And every time I give her some, and every time she turns her nose up and walks away.
Dogs appreciate snacks, Cats feel you owe them. If a cat had a lawyer? You would never speak to the cat. If a dog had a lawyer, he’d be having a conversation like this with the lawyer… “I don’t know, Bob. They’re pretty good people and if I sued them, they might not give me anymore peanut butter sandwich bites and I like peanut butter sandwich bites and I… I… Excuse me Bob, I’ll be right back…” Zoom, the dog is off and into the office where I just happen to be eating a peanut butter sandwich. And that only makes sense. Dogs are all about sniffing scents out of the air. They sniff everything, all of the time. Chairs, Fire Hydrants, Butts, Crotches, Car tires, everything they do is about smell. If you’re eating a peanut butter sandwich in the attic, balanced on the window ledge with the heat of the house rushing past you and carrying the smell away they would know about it… It would go something like this…
There you are, hanging out the window, eating your peanut butter sandwich. No dog. And then suddenly, far away, the phone rings. You think nothing of it but a few moments later the attic door bumps open and up the stairs trots your dog (Feel free to substitute Skippy or Lassie or Rover here), Bear. He trots up and does that sideways twisting his head thing that is so, well, dog like. “Hey,” he says, (If dogs could talk) “That was Brownie from two blocks over, you know, Mrs. Johnson’s dog. I pooped on her lawn last week and you went ballistic?” He just looks goofy while you nod. “Yeah, well Brownie says you’re up here hanging out the window eating peanut butter sandwiches…. Huh, I said to Brownie… What do you know about that.”
“I saved you a bite,” you say and toss him half the sandwich. And he eats it whole. No swallowing… No choking. No chewing. Jaws open. Jaws close (Except sometimes with Peanut Butter when it sticks to the roof of their mouth.) and the half sandwich is gone. I’d like to see a cat do that.
Instead, Fred sits there and begs with dignity. She doesn’t want to appear to be needy. Bear (My last dog who has passed) could care less about dignity. If you go around sniffing butts all day as a form of greeting, then dignity is a pretty large gray area. If you look at Fred she looks away like, “I thought I saw a mouse…” or “I’m only here because I love you…” Nevertheless, she begs, and she expects a payoff and it better not be peanut butter. I often try to present my side of it, “All I have is peanut butter, Fred. You’re wasting your time.” She looks like, “Well there’s a kitchen full of Bologna and Sliced Ham.” (Her favorite foods). And of course, I’m not going out there just to get her a damned piece of Bologna No. So, I go out to get a damn glass of juice, she follows, and then, somehow, she hypnotizes me and I’m opening the Ham package to get her some…
Cats and dogs. They don’t mix, most of the time anyway, and people who are cat people are not usually dog people and vice versa. I am a dog person and really, someone should break the news to Fred because Fred thinks I’m a cat person.
Someday… In a perfect world… I will once again possess a dog… And the world will be perfect… And we’ll stand on the porch at dusk and watch the sun go down… Geez… It’ll be great… Just me and my dog…
Of course I’ll have to start with a puppy… And It’ll probably poop all over the house… And knowing my luck it’ll make friends with a cat… A pregnant cat… A pregnant cat that I thought was a boy cat… and then the whole vicious cycle will start all over again…
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