A Piano playing Cat? Big deal! Cat’s are natural born vocalists. Where’s the singing? Pffft…

Us cats practise our mewing all the time, not that we need to, we are very talented singers. But when the humans forget about us, we sometimes have to sing for our food or to be let outside. So if your owner isn’t giving you their undivided attention – like they should be – you can easily get your own back on them.

My personal favorite is to start mewing in the early hours of Saturday morning, or jump on their laptop and walk all over the keyboard while they try and play party poker or do their work. You are sure to be fed after that, or maybe just have a cushion thrown at you….

Do you have any idea how long it took me to get this place to smell just right? I’m talking gallons of ‘spray’ and endless amounts of claw scratching here! I even had to work around and overpowering pungent stink of ScapeGoat The Dog. Not an easy task by any means! Four years of hard labour down the drain!

Now I’ll have to start all over. It’s going to be even harder this time to put down a good base coat of spray now that I’ve been fixed. Takes twice as much to leave my mark now. The Apes had better keep my water bowl full in the new place because I’ve got a lot of work ahead of me.

Then they add insult to injury. They bring out the ‘Cat Carrier’ so that I can get ‘used to it’ being around for move day.

Listen you overgrown primates! I will NEVER get used to that thing! My first experience with it was CASTRATION! What? You’d think I’d forgotten about that? I know when that thing comes out, something is about to be taken from me. In this case, it’s going to be my home!

Oh, and by the way… If you don’t want us playing in the boxes, stop filling them with fun stuff like:

• Packing peanuts (Which really aren’t peanuts I found out. I puked snowballs for hours!)
• Bubble Wrap (Pop-ity Pop! Pop! Whoo Hoo!)
• Crinkly paper (You’re just teasing us with that one.)
• Your Stash (But it just smells sooo damned good!)
• Important papers and documents (Level of fun is directly proportional to how important the papers are.)

Once thing is for sure. If I don’t like the new place… join me next month for the commencement of ShredFest 2010 when they try to unpack all this stuff!

Apparently you’ve all fiddled with your clocks, turning this into only a 23 hour day. How is a Cat supposed get through such an adjustment? I have a set nap schedule which is now right down the toilet.

Now I have to figure out what I can live without today…

• Cancel one nap bringing the daily total down to 17 naps. (I’m tired just thinking about it)
• Cancel one trip to the Litterbox in favour of closer dumping grounds. (Shoes make great alternatives)
• Cancel one Tuna feeding. (Not happening!)
• Cancel one beating of ScapeGoat The Dog. (This is my only exercise!)
• Cancel one Snuggle with either the Big Hairless Ape or the Big Haired Wife. (But I need my snuggles!)

After some research into this problem I discovered that the clocks also GO BACK an hour in October. So what’s the point?

But it doesn’t end there either. Apparently every 4 years you add an entire day to make up for the shortcomings of the moronic mathematician who designed the calendar. Division was obviously not this guys strong point.

You Apes really need to start living day to day like us Cats. No adjustments required and each day is exactly like the day before. Just as nature intended.

• "Why do they call it getting fixed? Doesn’t the procedure really end up with ya being broken? Do you find yourself still attracted to broken female kitty?"

The day the v-e-t lobbed them off is the day my intelligence increased exponentially. (Go figure!) It did ‘fix’ me so I can concentrate better. Perhaps that’s what they mean by that term?

On the plus side, I no longer have to wear those kitty-condoms. Ever try to use one of those when all you have to work with is claws? Doesn’t work out too well. It’s like carrying a gallon of water in a pillow case.

Broken Female Kitties? I prefer them. Who wants a female with 82 kids? Imagine the litterbox!

After months of no computer access the Big Hairless Ape finally brought home a new desktop computer. As happy as I was to see this machine, I still felt the Big Hairless Ape needed to be punished for keeping me away for so long.

Since he was so proud of his shiny new Windows 7 machine, I decided to have a little fun.

The first morning the Big Hairless Ape sat down at his new computer he was greeted with the following system message:

"Windows 7 encountered a serious error and has installed Linux."

Yup! I wiped his hard drive and installed Linux. It was so much fun to sit in his chair while he paced around the room yelling at Technical Support.

"How the Hell does this happen?" he barked into the phone. After a short pause he yells, "No! Nobody here installed it! Windows did it itself!" Another pause. "I am NOT crazy!"

I had to crank up the purring a notch to hide my laughter. This is just too much fun to do only once, don’t you think?

Later that day the computer was replaced by the store. Once again the Big Hairless Ape beamed over his new machine. And, once again, he woke up the next day to a surprise.

"Windows 7 encountered a serious error and has installed MS-DOS"

This one had even better results. Not only was the phone call longer and louder, it cost him $55.00 to have Windows 7 reinstalled. Since the warranty doesn’t cover wiping and installing of alternative operating systems, there was a shop charge.

The rest of the week saw these:

"Windows 7 encountered a serious error and has installed OS/2"
"Windows 7 encountered a serious error and has installed AmigaDOS"

And my all-time favourite…

Long story short… That computer now sits in the basement where I sleep. The Big Hairless Ape gave up and bought another one leaving this one abandoned and forgotten. I wasn’t expecting a payoff with this prank, but I’ll take it! Now I have 24 hour internet access!

All I can say is… I’M BACK BABY!!

But who would I suck up to? The neighbourhood has very few quality choices. A fact I’ve discovered over the past few months.

Here are some of my initial failed choices:

• A Taxidermist – I just didn’t like the way he kept measuring and looking at me.
• A Crack-head – Damned near starved to death living with this idiot. Not to mention he sold his computer plus I was traded 3 times for more junk.
• A Pothead – Exact opposite to the Crack-head in regard to diet. Always plenty of nibblies around. I gained 5 lbs in a week living there. It didn’t work out too well, though. The 2nd hand pot smoke was causing me to sleep through half of my daily naps! I never did get to the computer there. I always seemed distracted for some reason.
• Crack-head again – Had to lose the weight I gained during my stay with the Pothead. Traded twice more.
• Several Nerds – This turned out to be the worst set of choices. Just try and pry a nerd off a computer! Can’t be done!
• Several People with Microsoft Vista OS – Hey! I wasn’t THAT desperate to get online! For a hasty exit I crapped on their carpet, effectively launching myself into ape-powered flight out the front door.
• Sisters at the corner – Yikes! Only one night there left me with the feeling they aren’t sisters at all!
• Brothers at other corner – What the Hell is wrong with you Apes?!

I was about to give up after that last one but I pushed on. That’s when I saw it through the window. A true relic of a computer with a monster monitor sitting on top. That puppy (pardon the expression) wasn’t going anywhere!

Time to work some magic. Pity is a great tool when seducing a new family. For added effect I returned to the Crack-head’s house and starved for an addional week. (You guessed it… more trading) As much as I hate burdock burrs, I strategically placed several over my body. A quick run through a puddle to dirty up the paws is always a nice touch too.

And, voilà! Poor homeless kitty.

Returning to the house, I hung around waiting for this primate family to come home. First home was the mother; a chatty, purky thing that never shuts up. But hey! Beggars can’t be choosers.

Trying to look as pethetically cute as possible, I immediately ran to her and started my figure-eight routine around her ancles. She was on her phone and announced to the caller that she’d just found a poor homeless Cat and she’d have to call back later. (Man… I am GOOD!)

After plenty of food, a bath and brushing, the evening finally wound down enough for Chatty to go to bed. Man this Ape can talk! She never shut up all night. Apparently there’s more to this brood I found out from the steady stream of verbal perkiness which should only come from cartoon characters. They’re away until next week, but I can only assume they’re all deaf or close to it.

One slight backfire though. Turns out she knows how to use a computer. She’s made up signs with pictures to try and find my owners. She’s going to post them all over the neighbourhood tomorrow. I’m only three blocks away from home, so I’m going to have to sneak back so the Big Hairless Ape doesn’t notice me missing.

Yup! Two families! And computer access. Now I just have to figure out how to pull it off. Going to need a schedule, me thinks.

• “ummm hey gorge. How do you feel about the.. the apes calling the female genitalia the same nickname as your beautiful species? Does this trouble or offend you and your kind? Hit me back.”

Thank you! Finally! Someone brings this to light!

I’ve often wondered about this myself. I’ve seen one of those female Ape things and I have to say they need to do whatever it takes to make that thing look attractive. Including giving it a cute name.

They also call their posterior an ‘ass’. Why they named it after a donkey is beyond me. 

On the other side of the coin you have male Apes calling theirs a ‘tool’. Why? Are they running around the house fixing things with it? Not really. The only practical use I’ve seen is it’s ability to make golden designs in the snow. If anything, they should refer to is as ‘my artist’.

I am just so glad that Apes wear clothing. If they didn’t I’d be doing a hell of a lot more sleeping and a lot less cuddling with them.

As far as being troubled or offended, everything you Apes do troubles and offends me. Why should this be any different?

As for the Apes, it did. The entire household came down with colds and let me tell you, this place is not pretty right now. I’m living in a sea of moist tissues (great toys, btw) and airborne viruses. Every one of my couches is currently housing a dripping Ape! And don’t even get me started on the smells around here since this began.

Cries of ‘Get me some soup’ and ‘Hot lemon would be nice’ have gone unanswered all day. Even The Wet One has returned to his previous levels of wetness.

ScapeGoat The Dog has made a great nurse by licking their faces clean periodically. He’s not much for taking a pulse, but he can wake an Ape in no time.

Me? Well, I’ve been waiting all damned day for at least one of them to give me some food. But if they aren’t willing to feed themselves then I figure I have little chance of seeing a meal myself.

I’ll go rummaging later to see what I can find. I may have to deploy ScapeGoat for blaming purposes, but I’ll get something to eat one way or another!

Imagine my surprise after getting all worked up for my usual 9-Lives to find the slop pictured to the left on my plate.

The damned stuff doesn’t even have a name. The tin is simply marked “Cat Food” on a bland yellow label. And let me tell you, the label isn’t the only bland thing about it. I’ve tasted better stuff stuck to my fur after a trip to the litter box!

So again, I must be creative in letting the Apes know how much I detest the stuff. Since the Apes were off Christmas shopping for the day, I had some time to work out my frustration.

First up was the Cat equivalent of finger painting. With paws covered with this crap, I took a good tour through the living room, making sure I hit all the white upholstery I could find. 

Second was to put a little mystery into the Ape’s lives. I got into the cupboard and removed the labels from these cans and also the labels from the Tuna. At least now I have a 50-50 chance of getting Tuna. I’ll feed the other stuff to ScapeGoat The Dog as he tends to eat first and taste later anyway.

I simply can’t wait for the Apes to make themselves a Tuna sandwich. We’ll see how much they like eating this crap!

The Apes came home after that and blamed ScapeGoat for the mess. Sometimes I just love him! (Not often though!)

Tonight while the Apes are sleeping I’m going to grab the mouse trap I saw in the cupboard and put in on the nightstand where the alarm clock now sits. Should make for an interesting morning.

Moral of this story: Don’t feed crap to Cats!!

I haven’t been able to post much lately as the Big Hairless Ape now takes the LapTop to work with him. Then he comes home and leaves it in that Travel Case. Today I got brave enough and figured out how the case opens.

Zippers! Only an Ape would come up with such a concept. I’ve been terrified of zippers since the day I saw the Big Hairless Ape’s mishap with one of these devices. Why would you put sharp inter-locking metal teeth so close to your genitals? Doesn’t make sense.

Anyway, I faced my fear and got the zippers on the case open. Back online!

After sifting through hundreds of junk emails (What the hell is up with you Apes and the Boner Pills?!!) I thought I should make a post here.

It’s been a while, so I’ll bring you up to speed in point form:

• The Big Hairless Ape is now bigger and more hairless.
• The Big Haired Wife continues to shellac layer upon layer of makeup to her face in a failed attempt to preserve her youth.
• The Wet One isn’t nearly as wet these days but still has his moments. His latest trick is to wipe is runny nose on my fur. I swear! It’d be worth the week outside in the snow just to give that brat a good swat!
• ScapeGoat the Dog is uglier than ever. We have an agreement to stay out of each other’s way. He sticks pretty close to the Big Haired Wife these days.
• The Hamster. Delicious!

I’ll leave you with a list of some of the more popular posts over the year and send out a BIG THANK YOU to everyone for stopping by.

• Day 1239: Fancy Feast My Ass! (The post that started it all)
• Day 1247: Cat Phrases – Explained
• Day 1322: Q & A Interlude #4 (Read this before Q&A #5)
• Day 1324: Q & A Interlude #5
• Day 1338: Security
• Day 1404: The Speed of Tuna
• Day 1437: Pond Reviews