Our strange pastime

 On many people’s calendars, there are four seasons noted, spring, summer, fall and winter. There are also people out there who skew those seasons into things like football season, baseball season and chores around the house season, or winter and road construction season, etc. Well, we also have two seasons at our house. They are: “it’s warm enough for the cats to stay outside season” and “don’t you feel sorry for the cats, let’s just bring them inside for a few hours in the evening season”.

 

Apparently we have reached the second season of the year. The hubby is always willing to let this season slip, but I pretty much think that seasons should be split evenly, so that if we have only two of them, they should each be six months long. In hopes of warm weather arriving early next year, I am willing to begin the “let the cats in the house season”.

You have hopefully seen the movie “The Christmas Story”. Being as it is on TV every year from mid to late December, I hope that you have caught it. If not, go find it somewhere right now and watch it, coz it is great. In one of the scenes the dogs from next door break into the house and steal the Christmas turkey off of the kitchen table.

Picture if you will the Bumpus dogs careening through the front door and tromping through the house. That is exactly what it looks like in my house every cold-weather evening when we let Betty, Fred and Ches in the back door. The three cats are beside themselves with glee. They don’t know if they should first run down the basement stairs to see what food awaits them there or if they should stake their claim to a living room chair or the pillow on my bed. They scurry everywhere. The whole time Dino the dog and Alice the inside cat are wondering what the panic is all about. Then because Alice is so stupid, she goes outside by herself.

Eventually though they all settle in to several hours of peace and warmth. Then before they know it, it is time for round two.

I truly don’t know what my hubby and I do for entertainment during the warm months. TV? Read a book? Write a book? Don’t know, coz the most entertainment we have is rounding up the cats when it is bedtime and we deem it necessary for them to be eradicated to the great outdoors, or if they were smart, the snug garage.

Ches is the easiest to find, either because he truly likes to be out in the cold or because he hasn’t figured out what is happening when hubby and I start moving cautiously around the house, talking in whispers and using sign language. We used to be able to count on Betty to curl up on someone’s bed, but lately she has taken to the basement when it is time to go out.

Fred, dear Fred. Do any of you readers know Fred? If you do, please share your impressions. He is – something. Fred used to be an inside cat until he decided it was fun to do that thing which boy cats do which leaves a disgusting odor on your shoes and upholstery. So he got banished to the outdoors, where he still manages to leave that odor on my basement windows. Anyway, he has issues. So the nightly eradication of cats is where he truly shines, hiding in some of the darnedest places. We almost always find him though.

When people ask what hobbies the hubby and I have, we tell them cat eradication is our favorite. Very few people get it. But now at least you do