Wednesday, April 18, 2012

Unlikely Couples






Today is somewhat of an "anniversary" for me an my husband.  Well, not April 18, exactly.  But it's a special day to be sure because this is the 24th annual TAX SEASON we've survived as a couple.  My husband is the brilliant CPA and works diligently every year to bring home the bacon, and I am the one who spends it. We've been together for almost 28 years if you include college and all our friends will tell you that we are probably an unlikely pair if first impressions mean anything.  He is quiet and reserved where I am talkative and outgoing.  He is dignified and sensible where I am silly and enjoy making a fool out of myself.  He is very steady and predictable, but I have mood swings that make me feel animated and excited one day, and emotional and weepy the next.  He is the Yin to my Yang.  We completely balance each other out.  You would think he would get frustrated having to deal with an unbalanced character like me (this is where a friend would say, "Oh, don't be ridiculous!") but my tendency to overreact when he will chill makes us such a good match.  We're like a chocolate and vanilla swirl ice cream cone. 

I have found that we aren't the only ones who are attracted to opposites.  I love to watch the Ellen Degeneres show and she plays her favorite videos of animals playing or snuggling together.  Quite often they are completely different species!  The absolute STRANGEST I've seen is the one in this blog with the cat and the dolphin.  Think about this when you watch it.  These are creatures that would NEVER encounter each other in their natural habitat.  Yet they are doing their best to embrace each other as if they are long-lost friends.  The cat is showing affection with head butts and face wiping and the dolphin eagerly comes back for more.  I also have to comment that this cat is quite comfortable on a boat which in itself is extraordinary because just getting my cats into a car requires crates or sedatives, maybe even both.

So how do we explain this strange attraction?  Is it chemistry?  Does the cat smell the dolphin and think, "Mmmm....fish breath?"  Does the dolphin smell the cat and think, "Here's an hors d'oeuvre I've never tried..."  I don't think so.  They don't look like they want to eat each others faces like some teenagers I see when they first experience a chemical attraction.

Is it me or is this an odd pair?
So we celebrate today, the first day tax season is over, because he has been working incredibly long hours for months.  And I know it could be a lot worse--there are wives whose husbands travel for a living, have on-call jobs and disappear at a moment's notice, or are deployed now protecting our country.  My hats off to you, ladies!!  But I chose a man who will come home every night, dog-tired, but he's there, grasping the remote control in his hand as he drifts off to sleep on the couch.  We like this time of year because we have to "reconnect" and this is just another way of saying I don't choose the reality shows anymore and he gets to catch up on all those "This Old House" episodes he recorded.  Ho hum.  It's okay.  Somewhere in that humdrum we find the balance again and will do the human version of the cat/dolphin greeting and life is good.

Monday, April 16, 2012

Chattering at Bugs



Oh Dear.  I must have left the window open again because there is that sound again...the chirping and tweeting.  It's coming from the screened porch.  You might suspect that a bird has flown INTO our porch, but the chirping I'm referring to is the bizarre sounds my cat is making staring outside at the activity in the yard.  Pepper is particularly fascinated this morning with a stink bug today, which is making its way across a screen on the inside of a window frame.  She can touch it but first she is giving it hell as she chatters away telling it exactly what she thinks of it taking its time moving so slowly across our home and her view.  Yesterday it was a cardinal.  She can go on for a long time in this crouch-pounce pose like she is poised to strike, staring at her pretend prey, and totally give herself away with this weak impression of a chipmunk or chattering squirrel.  I have to wonder if she is attempting to camouflage herself with that noise, as if she's not this enormous fluffy pretender, stuttering with staccato chirps as if she's another bird or bug?  Out of the five cats I've owned, only two have made this predatory...vocal assault...on visual stimulus.  I'm not sure what else to say.  It's not like the cat is pouncing on anything.  She's just sitting there.  Squawking. Her head is bobbing around and her eyes are all big and taking everything in, but it's kind of pathetic because a cat that chirps is a little...awkward.


So this is what the cat is thinking




I know this is a common behavior in cats.  The thing I'm not sure about is why they are communicating like this.  Is it irritation, excitement, or frustration? Is it a way of blending? A threat? Or is this just another one of those many cat languages that we will never adequately comprehend yet will exploit with our many cameras and iPhones?  It is too funny to ignore and so engaging.  I'm sure I'm not the only one who thinks so and I have YouTube to confirm this...see the end of my blog. Uh oh, she ate a stink bug.  Now her breath is going to stink more than usual.  My daughter thinks those insects smell like rotten bread.  What is she doing sniffing rotten bread?!?!


Who farted?


So Pepper has moved on from squawking to stalking and has caught one of her claws in our screen.  THIS really offends me because when she retracts her claw she takes a piece of screen which means there's another little weensy hole for more stinkbugs to enter through. Therefore, I have to come after her with the newspaper I was going to use on the bug. So the cycle works like this:  Stare.  Chatter.  Stalk.  Strike.  Stuck.  Be Struck.

I don't want to be a stink bug
Please don't think I abuse my rotten kitty.  I don't actually use force with the newspaper--it merely GRAZES her as I swipe the air in her general vicinity.   Then I turn it into a funnel to capture my stink bug population and transfer them to a new home.  Elsewhere.  I NEVER SMUSH THEM.  My husband puts them in a bucket with a tiny bit of bleach.  It's gross.  I usually just scatter them outside even though I know they will probably just return to my screen another time, but there's a tiny piece of me that worries about Karma and what if I come back in the next life as a stinky bug?  Deep, huh?  Ha ha.  If I come back as a stinky bug I probably deserve it.  SMUSH!!

Chattering Kitty
 Another Chirping Cat