Groggy, and still grasping for the last few minutes of blessed sleep, I try to reposition myself but find it difficult with two big cats sitting on my feet, hogging the foot of the bed. I kick my legs to shoo them off. The morning ritual of obnoxious kitty behavior has begun. I roll over to get a quick peek at the clock. It says 6:03, which is precisely 27 minutes before my alarm goes off. WTF!? I am NOT a happy camper when awoken before the alarm. I have a vague memory of previous cat kicking, so this has undoubtedly been going on for a while leading up to this moment. I shut my eyes tightly, trying to pretend it never happened. Two seconds later, George is back — walking up the bed toward my face. I launch him off the bed with my angry foot. Click-clack, click-clack. His snaggle claws sounds on the the hard wood floor, signaling that he’s back to torture me some more. This time, he takes up position on the side of the bed and starts clawing at the embroidered decorative bed pillows on the floor. I reach for the water squirter, and remember that I dumped it on him in a fit of rage yesterday. But I am resourceful, I sip a mouthfull from the bedside water glass, and spit it at him. He didn’t see that coming! Momentarily defeated, he runs off to lick his water wounds — only to return shortly with renewed ambition. He resorts to pathetic crying. (You see, he doesn’t have a meow as much as a feeble squeak.) Then Bella decides to chime in — and I pretty much HAVE to get up and feed them at this point. So this is the morning routine — 7 days a week. On the weekend it’s much more annoying, but all my efforts do nothing to thwart them. Sure, you’re probably thinking, “just lock them out.” A brilliant idea… in theory. That tactic is only met with loud whining and door clawing. Nothing helps except actually getting out of bed to feed their sorry asses.
It must be the new diet we’ve been trying to enforce. Bella could really stand to lose the weight because she’s been looking like a fat furry football. Basically, I feed George the same amount he’s always gotten, and give Bella a bit less. She’s always eating the food he leaves, so I figured it would all even out. Now they seem to be hungry all day long. A mere two hours after we feed them for dinner, they’re at our heels begging for hand-outs. Last night, as Mike and I were getting ready for bed, they started belly-aching to be fed. He turned to me, shook his head and said, “You know, it’s like living with four-legged, retarded midgets.” I cannot aggree more.
*No kitties were harmed in the kicking.
