Today's Chilling Thought

Hey ho - rather an exhausting day at work today. High points included consulting the urban dictionary (online) for some definitions of Newfie slang, quick supper with Coreen, & a grand old hug from the man. The low point? Wellllll... it all started a little while ago, when a mystery cat started leaving not-so-mysterious deposits in the upstairs hallway. Before Pat & I could implement our cunning plan of beating ALL the cats, we discovered it was Buzz. The discovery led to an early morning chase, a beating, and a most remorseful-seeming cat.

However. Remorse and fresh bread must have the same shelf life - ie: a week or so at room temperature if you're lucky.

This morning, I awoke to hear the scritch, scritch of cat claws on the wall. I knew what this was immediately. It was Buzz trying to cover up his erm, sins. Now, my reaction speaks highly of my secret-spy skills - I stealthily got out of bed, crept to the door, & burst out, full of ire. Yes, it was indeed Buzz. Caught in the act. Red-handed, so to speak. I scruffed him, & started dragging him back to his fresh pile of dirt. Buzz freaked out (like any criminal) & bolted. "All right you smug bastard", says I, "it's on". I put on Pat's big long sweatshirt (Pat was out of town overnight) - to avoid getting my arms shredded. I then spent a happy spent 20 minutes (no exaggerating) chasing the cat up & down the stairs, around & around, back & forth, to & fro. Thankfully, I had the foresight to lock the basement door, so he couldn't disappear. Ever noticed it's harder to catch an errant animal when you're alone? And please note, when I say "happy", I mean "increasingly angry". Buzz was so freaked out by his guilt & the insane harpy throwing National Geographic magazines at him that he eventually made that fatal tactical error - dash into the upstairs bathroom. Ha.

Well, from there, the sordid tale proceeds the way one would expect - yell, spank, etc, etc. Exit stage left, finally calm down from cat-chase induced adrenaline 3 hours later.

The problem, as I was mulling this afternoon, is that I can't figure out WHAT Buzz is trying to communicate or WHY. It feels like I'm keeping a small, furry terrorist prisoner, while gratuitously ignoring his religous needs &/or basic physical requirements... I could make him little orange jumpers or something, to really complete the scene.

And then I thought to myself: "Please, oh heavenly father or mother or flying spaghetti monster or karma or whatever... let this never be an issue with the kid. I'm ready to deal with a lot of things, I think, but the thought of a politically motivated surreptitiously pooping hominid on my hands is simply too much. Plus I don't think you're supposed to beat children with National Geographics either."