JOIN USHumour: The feline has the floor
People around me call me Squeaky. What an atrocious name for a good-natured cat like me! What kind of a name is it? Do I squeak like a rat? Please spare me; I meow, period. The humans that I live with are a bunch of crazy folks. They gave silly names to my siblings: MokshaGundam, Holmes and SJ. And to cap it all, they called my mom ‘Mommy’: just goes to show that their imagination is limited. I remember, they watched a movie called The Gods Must be Crazy. I can make a realistic film titled ‘These Humans Must be Crazy’. I have more than enough content to fill up a three-hour film with their idiosyncrasies.
Well, I’m sure you know cats are experts in the field of slumber. We have different forms of sleep: we take a quick nap (the famous catnap), we go into a deep slumber, we snooze, we have a lie-down, and sometimes, we simply sit down and shut our eyes taking on a Zen-like appearance. Our siestas are not restricted to afternoons; mid-morning, early evenings are also a good time to catch up on our sleep. After all, we need to get our 18 hours of sleep every day. That’s how we have been designed by the Almighty.
But what do our human friends have to say about this? They gush to every Tom, Dick and Harry that I do nothing the whole day except eat and sleep! And every time I try to sleep, they come along to ‘pet’ me, disrupting my sleep pattern. I tell you, these people have no basic sense. They think I am like a dog... love to be petted. Gosh, wonder when they will learn. The so-called ‘evolved race’ certainly needs to learn a thing or two. The other day, I caught a rat with difficulty. It is getting harder by the day; there are zone restrictions that I have to consider before I hunt down a rat.
As you know, we cats are territorial. We love our space and protect it fiercely from other felines. I can catch any rat that moves in my territory, but once it steps into the neighbouring site, I have no control over it. And these pesky little fellows are getting wilier; they cross borders and escape into enemy territory.
Given this situation, it’s not easy to hunt one down. But the other day, much to my happiness, I succeeded in pinning one fellow down. In a moment of misplaced gratitude for the human who usually feeds me, I thought I would give him my prize catch and so I left the dead rat on his front step. You would think he would be grateful and thank me profusely. But instead, he got upset and abused me. And worse, he scooped up the gift and threw it into the garbage can, making ugly faces all the while. Just thinking about this maddens me no end.
And talking about feeding... I have to beg for food every day. I have to meow loudly by incorporating different sounds to seek their attention. I then have to rub my body across their legs. For some insane reason, they seem to enjoy this, and I pretend that I do, too. Only after a few minutes of this will they pick up the packet of cat food to drop the food into my plate. My begging ordeal does not end there. I also have to make those dumb-heads understand that along with cat food, they need to serve a cup of fresh water. That needs another round of meowing, rubbing legs and repeated trips to the bathroom to show them that I want water. Phew! And they think a cat’s life is easy.
These days, my waking moments are spent in prayer. I pray to the Lord that He puts some sense into humans. Amen.