There’s disgusting messes, and then there are messes that are so disgusting I’d rather move out of the house today than look at them and clean them up. Today I found just such a vile and disgusting mess at the wall underneath my kitchen worktable. Ronin has been stashing root vegetables again.

I try to remember to check all the time to see if he has pulled anything back there to play with, but it looks like I forgot to do that for a while. There were three potatoes, two onions, and a carrot. That’s my best guess on what these vegetables were when they were vegetables, because when I found them this afternoon, they were a puddle of goo crawling with tiny little maggots and stinking to high heaven. It was so gross, I went and put on disposable rubber gloves and a painter’s mask spritzed with my favorite scent (dirt, by the way). Even that didn’t really help, because I still had to look at it and clean it up.

I wasn’t even really investigating the hidden corners of the kitchen when I found it. I was sitting on the floor in front of my kitchen cart and organizing my vast tea collection to squeeze one more box of tea into the cart. That was when I noticed a faint odor and a few too many gnats. I pulled the cart out from under the table, and there is was in all it’s wretched glory. After I got my stomach muscles under control, the first thing I wanted to do was kill a cat … the very cat that was sitting right beside me on the floor trying to make off with my teabags. Lucky for the cat I decided to clean the mess up first. By the time I finished with that my stomach was far too queasy to go on a killing spree.

And what is the little bastard doing now? I can hear him in the kitchen messing around with the onions again. It’s one of those unauthorized cat activities he refuses to learn not to do, no matter what training or punishment technique I try. He is simply determined to play with any and all root vegetables I have in my root vegetable storage area. If I had somewhere else to store them, I would, but I don’t have anywhere else to put them. Therefore, he will always be getting into them, I will always be shooing him away, and from time to time I will disgusting messes under the kitchen worktable or behind the stove (his other favorite root vegetable hiding spot).

Of all the many easy things to grab, hide and play with in this house, why does the stupid cat have to have an obsession with root vegetables?!

I told Lin last night the cats had been too sweet and wonderful all day, and the next day was likely going to be a Bad Cat Day. I was right. As soon as the first rays of sunlight came over the horizon, the house was filled with the sounds of thundering kitty paws and cats getting into things … or trying to get into things, like the closet, for example.

Now that they have been locked out of the bedroom, their favorite place to partake in unauthorized cat activities, they have started in on the aggressive head licking. I anticipate in about fifteen minutes this will escalate into one of the two getting grumpy about the head licking and starting a noisy and rambunctious battle.

They just can’t be sweet and wonderful every day, can they?

The cats have been following me around all day today, each vying for attention. It’s been really cute, but it’s also been really distracting. I am apparently incapable of ignoring a cat being cute, particularly cat bellies being wiggle in my direction. It’s impossible to get anything done with all those cat bellies needing rubbing!

The cutest cat event just happened a while ago! I came into the den post dinner to finish reading a story about organic milk. I plopped my butt down in the chair, and my pillow felt lumpy. Really lumpy, as though I had caught a corner of it when I sat down and had folded it over on itself. Naturally, I lift my butt a bit, reach down and start straightening and fluffing the pillow. Funny thing was … it wasn’t a pillow. It was Myu. I’d sat right on her, and she didn’t say anything or even make an effort to wiggle out from under me. No, she even laid there and let me straighten and fluff her. As soon as I realized I was fluffing a cat, I completely removed my buttocks from the poor dear, and she huffed off to hide under Lin’s workbench. Currently, she is curled up in Lin’s chair.

Oddly enough, I had just remarked to Lin a couple of days ago that it was strange how she seemed to love sleeping in his desk chair and never slept in mine. I’d thought, seeing as she spends much of her day blocking my view of my monitor, rubbing her head on the arrow keys, and giving me an up-close view of her butt for hours on end as she sits on my desk and stares out the window, she’d simply sleep on the closest chair. Why would she go to the bother of walking all the way across the room (or desk) to lay in the chair of someone she rarely lets get close enough to pet her. They are currently in the stage of their relationship where she plops down in front of him, mews and wiggles accordingly, and then when he reaches down to pet her, she runs two feet away and repeats the process … all around the house. Myu and I went through that stage too.

It’s cute to see Lin going through the same annoying adventure in cat seduction. By “cat seduction” I do mean the seduction of a human by a cat. The proper word for the end result would be best described as human enslavement. At the point where the cat has a human following them around the house begging the cat to let them pet them, the cat has already won the war. Oh there will be other battles, but the cat knows the cat has won. Why bother fighting it? It’s easiest just to admit the cat(s) rules the house. I believe Lin will be coming to that conclusion as well too.

It’s not really that bad of a life, being a cat slave. I do what they want me to do, when they want me to do it, and in return, they lick my toes, rub their fur all over me, and put on shows of cuteness beyond belief. They will be the cutest things on the planet, just for me. All I had to do to received such a wonderful gift was submit my will to the will of the cats. So far, it’s been worth it. They are, in fact, incredibly adorable little creatures. Spoiled, arrogant, destructive and insane too, but incredibly adorable.

Anyway, now I know why she never sleeps in my chair. I never look where I am plopping my butt. After years of cat ownership, I have been trained to never sit down hard. I refused to budge on always having to look before sitting. Therefore, occasionally, a cat gets lightly sat upon. Cats should know better than to sleep soundly on a black chair in a dark room, especially if, say, the cat is black.

[pause]

I got distracted by a nature program in high definition and lost my train of thought. Probably for the best, seeing as what more needs to be said about cats at the moment. I’m off to the living room to watch dragonfly sex and eat ice cream.

Ronin and Myu live whatever kind of cat life they want with very little guidance by me. In other words, they are the rulers of the universe, and we are their mere mortal caretakers. They get away with things other cat owners would shudder to think about, and they pretty much do as they please.

If they want to sleep all day and all night, only rousing themselves to eat, drink, pee, and poo, that can do just that.

If they want to follow me around all day watching my every move and reminding me to take play breaks, they are more than welcome to do just that.

If they want to explore all day, they can do that too, with one rule: if I can hear the exploring, the exploring ends immediately and the desirous area of exploration will be off limits for the rest of the day. This rule has lead to one cat that doesn’t do much exploring and always gets caught within the first 60 seconds of trying and one cat that can climb a vertical and tall set of shelves to reach a ball of yarn or toy on the top shelf while I am one room away and awake and not get caught until the evidence is found, sometimes days later.

If they want to chase each other around the house like little panthers and do battle all day, for whatever reason, be it fun or anger, they are even free to do that. This particular activity has a few more rules. If I hear anything knocked over anywhere in the house, the “play” fighting has to stop immediately. If I hear any vocalizations that are not the sweet and adorable tones I expect to hear from such spoiled and adorable cats, the “play” fighting has to stop immediately. If the thumping of cat bodies on the hardwood floors reaches a volume equivalent to the sound of a 5 pound bag of flour dropped on the floor repeatedly, the “play” fighting has to stop immediately. No biting, and I don’t care who started it, if I see biting, whichever cat’s fangs are involved that cat is in trouble, and both cats are likely to suffer repercussions for having let it get that out of hand before employing one of the much safer fight-ending methods already mentioned. Also, the “play” fighting had best seem equitable, in that no one cat is being constantly pestered when not interested in wrestling. Both parties must be interested in chewing the head off the other, or fighting is not allowed.

The cats know these rules. They have been living with these rules since the day they entered our home. I used to be able to get all he way to a room and catch the rules infraction in progress. Now all I have to do is shriek “Cats!” harshly and take one step or get up from my chair. They stop what they are doing and scatter immediately to opposite sides of the room or house and take up positions implying that nothing at all was going on. So they do, in fact, know they are breaking rules and that repercussions may follow.

Even so, the repercussions only follow if the rule has been broken earlier in the day, there were other rules broken earlier in the day, or if any major rules had been broken within the last few days. So long as I only have sweet and adorable cats for the rest of the day and a few days following, they do get away with murder occasionally.

Then there are days like today, which started out as a day the cats wanted to spend sleeping in sunny spots around the house, ended with cats running around like hellions trying to kill each other no matter how many times I chased them down and gave them hell for it. I had to go so far as to employ the dreaded Water Bottle of Doom, and even that wasn’t quite getting through to them. This evening ended with me chasing Ronin around the house for 10 minutes trying to get my hands of him, 20 minutes of holding him on my lap, during which I expect no aggressive actions of any sort, Ronin hissing at me, and his subsequent exile to the bedroom for two hours while the rest of us enjoyed dinner and playtime. Yes, this has been a wild and woolly afternoon and evening with two cocky, spoiled, intelligent, rebellious little snots.

Things have been much improved since I released Ronin back into the household. They are in the living room right now licking each other’s head. Oh, I know they’d really rather be chewing on each other’s head, but they know better than to even push me at this point.

If I hear or see anything that isn’t two cats being quiet and non-active and making sweet little meows in my direction, I will lock them in the bathroom together until they stop making noise. It is the ultimate punishment in this household. They both hate it equally. I’ve only employed this technique three times in the last two years. The last time was a few months ago, and they seem to have figured out that as soon as they get quiet and calm down, they get to go about their busy cat lives. Peacefully and quietly, of course.

I imagine there is an ultimate punishment beyond being locked in the bathroom together, which would be employed should there be any further destructiveness or fighting taking place in the bathroom, but they have only pushed me that far once. At the age of 4 months, it’s really hard to stay angry at little kittens, and these two had a very high cuteness factor. So I just hissed, spitted, and yelled at them for a while and let them out of the bathroom. Maybe that worked, because the next two times they found themselves stuck in the bathroom togethehr, they spent all their energy whining to get out rather than beating each other up or destroying things.

Ronin and Myu better continue to be sweet, adorable, loving and non-rule-breaking cats for at least the next two days. They really, really pushed every boundary today, and they got busted every time. I want them to be so quiet for the rest of the night I do not know I have cats in the house with me, unless they would like to rubbed up against me, mew sweetly, and beg attention off of me. That would be good too. In fact, one of them is doing that right now, ans the other one is rolling around on the floor nearby grunting to get my attention. It looks like a ceasefire has been called.

Well, that ceasefire had better last a while, because I am not having any more of this cat insanity for a while.

A while ago my mom gave me a 12 game set that has chess, checkers, mancala, and all the usual old-fashioned board games (plus dominoes and cards). She’d found it at the thrift store for $1, and I’d been wanting some game pieces to destroy for a craft project, so I was really happy to have it. I just opened it today, and it’s brand new! All the pieces are still in the sealed bags, and the board is actual wood and pretty nice. Now, of course, I don’t want to use the game pieces for a craft project, so it looks like I have one more board game sitting around that will never get played.

In other household news, Ronin has been an insane cat all afternoon. It started with him having a temper tantrum all by himself in the hall. That then became attacking his sister brutally several times. I went through about 30 minutes of Holding Therapy with him, until he calmed down somewhat, but a minute after I let him go, he was back to tearing around the house being an asshole to his sister. He is now doing time in the bedroom. That’s not really enough punishment, since he likes being in the bedroom, but I don’t have anywhere else to put him until he chills out. I’m fairly certain that an hour or more in the bedroom, and he won’t like it as much anymore. And he will be in there for an hour or two. I want to make and eat dinner without having to deal with a cat losing his mind. I really don’t know what gets into him sometimes.

Also, my garden is looking much better since I sprayed them with the Epsom’s salt solution and began watering them 2-3 times a day instead of the one long watering session in the morning. The cucumbers continue to get new flower buds, and the blooms that are currently showing have begun attracting bees. Bees are a good thing, because I need them to pollinate the cucumbers, but I’m not especially happy about having to walk around in a small swarm of bees when I am tending the garden. I guess I’ll just have to get over it.

The only other thing worth mentioning is that we are having breakfast for dinner tonight. Lin is griping already, but not having gotten any grocery shopping done this week, we really are short on options. I personally don’t have a problem with eggs, sausage, and hash browns for dinner, but Lin is completely opposed. Well, unless he comes up with a different plan, it’s breakfast for dinner and he’ll just have to eat what’s put in front of him.

Today has been something of a wash of a day. I couldn’t sleep last night to save my life, so most of my day was spent sleeping or sleepwalking through the daily chores. No fun at all. Hope I get some sleep tonight, but I doubt it, owing to my now having totally screwed up my sleep cycle. I’m usually getting a little tired and sleepy by dinner, and I am not tired or sleepy at all right now. Ugh.

If the cats don’t simmer down and let me sleep, they will find themselves living in the laundry room or … outside. What the hell has gotten into these monsters?!

Just thought I’d gripe about that, since I am wide awake thanks to my precious spoiled beasts.

I made it all the way from my house to the feed store and back without having to stop at a single red light. This is an amazing occurrence. It just never happens. I attribute this to the fact everyone has begun to drive the speed limit, the one the lights are timed for, in an effort to save on gasoline. Whatever the actual reason I successfully drove through a dozen or so green lights one way and back again, it made for a quick trip to get cat food.

I was going to put off going to get it until Lin got home from work, because it’s hot outside and I am feeling very lazy, but there was about to be a full-on cat rebellion. Couldn’t I see they were wasting away before my very eyes?! Of course I brought the food in and dished it out, and they each took one bite each and went to have a nap. Yeah, those cats were just starving to death weren’t they?

The cats are continuing to behave strangely. Ronin not so much, but I don’t know what is up with Myu. She just did her usual early morning pathetic mewing, which leads to me calling her name and her running into whatever room I am in for some belly rubs. She came into the den, just like she does every morning at this time, mewing and being adorable, but then she saw Ronin laying behind my chair. Her ears went back flat, her eyes narrowed, she growled at him, and then she jumped all over him and started a fight! This wasn’t a play fight either!

Now she is tearing around the house like some sort of wild thing, and Ronin is sitting beside me with a confused look on his face. I’m with him. I don’t know what is up with her either.

I do have my suspicions that Ronin has been hogging the food lately, and it’s possible the poor dear is really quite hungry. I think I’ll go toss Ronin in the bedroom a while and give her some food all by herself. Seeing as the bowl, which should not be empty already, is quite empty.

These cats are just insane, and I am in no mood to deal with their particular forms on insanity today.