I Killed the Cat

That's something I've always wanted to say. Fact is, I have said it before, even though there are no dead cats lying about by my hand. However, my primal urges of senseless, murderous rampage are fulfilled quite often and much more easily. (On a daily basis) There are plenty of spiders and other small defenseless insects that I consider open game...

I wish I could say that ridding my world of invading hoards of spiders and such is a seasonal thing. But with the Waving Alien offices located in the dark recesses of a remodeled basement, we share our space with a multitude of creatures. Dogs, cats, spiders, ants, camel crickets... you name it. It probably doesn't help that we use a wood stove in the winter. I would imagine that is where the vast majority of six, eight and twenty legged creatures migrate from.

Once those creatures decide they are going to infest the firewood we purchase to heat the office with in the winter, they are basically down to two choices. Being burned alive, or to be relentlessly hunted down and brutally murdered by me. Why it gives me such great pleasure to end a spiders life is beyond me. Actually, I think I know why. I just know they crawl on me at night while I am sleeping. It is vengeance on my part, pure and simple.

I'll bet you're wondering about the dogs and cats, eh? Well, if you ask me, animals that are able to kill other animals -- like dogs killing cats, or cats killing mice or rabbits, or cats killing dogs...(Don't laugh! We have seven cats, if they all ganged up on one of the dogs, I wouldn't bet against them!) -- should live outside like the animals that they are. Unfortunately, I am not the boss around here. I only think I am.

So we have one of those little pet flaps in our basement door that the dogs can cavort in and out of at their leisure. And we have one cat that doesn't get along with any of the other animals, so it is safely ensconced within the WA office complex itself. The dogs are on the other side of the dandy little swinging gate I built to separate our work area. (Only one of them has figured out how to work the gate, our black Lab. She sneaks in and eats the cat food. (And the cat shit from the litter box.)

We should only have one cat. She is a female, and has been fixed. But a stray cat showed up and it was a male. Then another stray cat showed up and it was a female. We would have had it fixed, but it was kind of wild, you know how females are, right? Anyway, the stray male impregnated the stray female and the rest is history. Did you know a female cat can get pregnant the day after it has her litter? Neither did we...

You know, I like animals. Not insects though, just cats and dogs and such. But I think three dogs and eight cats (yes, it is eight, I miscounted before) are a bit much. It's kind of overwhelming when you buy about a hundred pounds of cat and dog food every other week. I know damn well that's more pounds of food than I eat in two weeks.

At least spiders and flies don't eat much. And the small spiders really aren't much bother. It's the big ones that chase the cat that kind of scare me. I have to make sure I have a weapon with a long handle when I go after those suckers. The worse part is cleaning up the mess. I mean hell, you don't think I just give them a little tap on the head to stun them and then flush them down the toilet, do you? Hell no! They are unrecognizable when I get through with them. Picture a nice juicy grape after an elephant does the 'Twist' on it and you'll get the idea...

Actually, a cat would be hard to kill unless you happened to have a gun around or something equally as effective. Not that I've ever tried to kill a cat or anything like that. But I did try to remove one from the premises before, and it was difficult to say the least.

This happened years ago and this particular cat was a little wild too. I knew that cat didn't like me. (I didn't like it after all, so why should it have liked me?) I forget why, but I decided I would evict this evil cat once and for all. I was even well prepared. I put on a heavy winter jacket even thought it was the dead of summer. I also put on a super heavy pair of gloves. Now these weren't ordinary normal heavy gloves. These babies were asbestos lined gloves for taking hot pottery out of a kiln after you baked the clay. They had at least a quarter inch of leather on the outside. They were actually more like mittens because they only had a separate hole for your thumb and all your fingers slipped into the big middle section.

So, here I am, chasing this evil cat around the house in ninety-degree heat with a winter parka and the equivalent of welder's gloves on. After I chased it for about a half-hour to no avail, I decided I was smarter than that. I got a hotdog out of the fridge and taunted it until it came out from underneath the piano, and then I pounced! Ok, so the cat obviously couldn't bite me through the gloves, but believe it or not, it bit down so hard that it bruised my thumb underneath my thumbnail.

I couldn't believe it. I was so shocked that I screamed like a girl. I held the hissing vile thing at arms length and made a beeline for the door, just barely able to contain the struggling beast long enough to give it the boot.

Now that I think about it, I doubt a human could survive against eight cats if they were determined enough to assassinate you. Nice cats, pretty cats... I guess I'll let them live... for now.