I'm up to my ears in cats !

Spider
( I actually prefer the spelling "Spyder", but she's already taken and I didn't
name her.
We're just waiting for her mom to quit nursing her..
so she can leave this place and go live elsewhere. Soon.)

We been framed ! Peace and Brother Bear

The 3 Mouseketeers. Bear, Spider and Peace

See the pure evil in their eyes?

This is my last weekend, or rather last 2 days off, before I start back to work on Monday and man... I was really looking forward to a sleep-in this morning. I was up late-ish (for me anyway) staying up until 11 or so, puttering around the kitchen, tidying up from the recent renovations, trying to find spots to put things etc. My wall organizer for example. It has slots for letters and bills, hooks to hang my keys on and a little clock that I refer to constantly. Do you think I can find a spot on the wall to put it? Nooo.. and the same goes for my phone. Do you think I even took any of that into consideration when I planned to cut a partial wall out and move the fridge over 6 feet? I'll figure something out, but in the meantime, I keep opening the right hand pantry door, looking for milk for my coffee... and it's such an ingrained habit, that I find myself letting my eyes skim over packets of spaghetti, canned tuna and cereal, wondering where in the heck my milk is. Oh yeah... it's in the fridge.. that's now on the other wall. Funnily enough, I haven't found myself opening the fridge to look for a can of cat food. I wonder why that is?

Anyway. I went to bed, hoping to sleep until at least 6:30 or 7 this morning and purposefully didn't have a drink after dinner last night so I would sleep all night. Not that kind of drink.. if you're thinking that I'm a boozy soozy.. the water kind. Post-menopausal, ya know? So... there I was, happily snoozing, and the stinkin' cat that sleeps under the covers with me and who is a wonderful toe-warmer, decides SHE wants to get up. Bat, bat, bat at my nose. "Wake up Mom, I gotta pee!" So I get up, open the door, let her out and crawl back into bed.

Now, I have 7 cats. 4 grown girls and three 9 week old kittens that belong to my only unneutered girl ( long story, but we'll get into that another time.) Because they're so active and aren't totally toilet trained, I always keep my door closed, so the little mousers don't crawl over my lovely doona cover and rip it to shreds with their tiny little needle-like claws. And poop in unexpected places as kittens are wont to do.

Sooo... when I went back to bed and blissfully straight back to sleep, I didn't notice that I hadn't totally closed the bedroom door. The next thing I know, I have 3 grown cats and 3 kittens on the bed, either attacking my hair and nose (the kittens) or meowing piteously (the big girls) for their breakfast. Arrgghh... okay okay... I'm awake. I'm awake ! So I stumble out to the kitchen, let the big girls out for their morning ablutions ( I love that word and never get to use it!) turn the kettle on, open the door looking for the milk, discover "oops, wrong door", close it and proceeded to lock 2 of the kittens in there. Wow... the racket ! You would have thought I was trying to murderize them or something ! Now my heart is racing a million miles an hour, and I just got out of bed. Sheeeeeesh, give me a break here !

It immediately hit me that what if I had locked them in the fridge itself? Thicker walls, insulated, all that. They could have DIED in there. I've got that "tingle" you get when something has really frightened you. You know, adrenaline. Adrenaline is coursing through my body, making my nerve-endings feel like they're on fire. So here I am, the kettle is boiling, I have one eye open, one eye shut, my heart is palpitating, I'm shivering in just my sleep shirt and I spy - with my one open eye - the clock that's on my wall organizer ( which is now a temporary kitchen table organizer) and it's 5:40 in the morning ! I hate cats. I really do.

I mean, just look at these kittens up there. Did you see 'em ? Are they horrible little creatures, or what?