Wednesday, October 03, 2007

The Whiniest Kitten In All Of Puppetland

The cats are immensely stoked to be living somewhere with a yard. Sure, they had fun thundering up and down the the hallway of our Berkeley apartment, or tormenting the indoor-only cat two doors down, but an entire yard of smells, edibles, fascinating holes and bugs? No comparison.

Our routine is, I get up and feed them, then we read the paper and I drink coffee until it's light. Then I open the back door and they can come and go as they please until it's dark and they come in for dinner.

But there's a glitch; there always is. This particular glitch is called Big Red. Not only does he live next door, but he has a proprietary view of New Vitality Homeland's backyard, having once lived here himself. And he's huge! Little Vivani is terrified of him; even Orange Gina hisses when she sees him.

And he knows our routine. He waits right in the middle of the backyard, easily visible from the open back door.

The girls really like to go outside first thing. But Big Red! And I really like to read the paper. But Big Red! So Vivani has started following me around the house in the morning, whining and carrying on until I go outside with her and Gina. Five minutes, ten, that's fine. Just as long as I go out first and let Big Red know that Bigger Red is in her yard and it's time to clear out.

She really is the whiniest cat I have ever known.

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