The Story I Didn't Pre-Read · 1:39am Dec 23rd, 2015
Just recently, Georg offered me the opportunity to pre-read his new Christmas story, Hearth Warming's Trappings.
I didn't have a chance over the weekend. I had to work twelve hours straight on Sunday, about an hour commute from my home. The plan was, Monday night I would get on it. Document open and all that jazz (it had been since Saturday).
Why, you ask?
Admiral Biscuit: Best case is I read it tomorrow evening. Worst case is I have to deal with another feral cat falling through my ceiling.
Georg: Ok, you can NOT make that statement without explaining it (presumably in your blog where all of us can point and HA-ha!) (snerk!)
So, without further ado, here's the story.
I got home Sunday night and noticed some of the ceiling tiles had fallen down. It was late and I didn't want to deal with it, so I just went to bed.
Monday morning when I woke up, I heard a kitten meowing for his mommy. That's not entirely unusual, there's a feral cat who sometimes hides her kittens under my front porch. I went over to the window to get a look . . . no kitten, and the sound was coming from behind me.
Flip on the kitchen lights, and I see a little fluffy fuzzball run for cover in the laundry room. Right next to the hole in my ceiling.
Couldn't deal with it then, since I had to get to work, so I closed as many doors as I could to limit his range of movement. Texted a friend who captures and tames ferals (she's going to be a crazy cat lady some day) to get a livetrap.
She can have one for me Tuesday morning (which was today).
I don't want to wait, so I decide to see if I can catch the little guy some other way, figuring he's not too smart, and he might be pretty hungry by now. I found him in the living room, huddled up in a corner, but before I could grab him, he took off to the kitchen, and he was a lot quicker than I expected.
I thought he'd gotten behind the stove. There's an open spot behind the cabinets, and if he was there, I was just going to have to wait for him to come out . . . or do some quick demo (never did like the kitchen cabinets). Then I had a brilliant idea: YouTube.
Specifically, a video of a crying kitten. Figured that might get him to open his big mouth.
It worked. Kitten started meowing, and I found it huddled in a corner by the fridge. I grabbed hold of his scruff and was just pondering what to do next when I discovered that scruffing might work well on a domesticated kitty, one that's fearing for its life isn't so compliant. Also since cats don't have bones, they can still claw you when they're scruffed.
From that point on, the game of cat and mouse human ranged through the living room. He eventually made a tactical error, and I got him and evicted him from the house.
I presume his mother found him—he was headed in the right direction.
In all that chasing kitten around, I didn't have time to fix the hole in the ceiling. I probably ought to do that.
I take it from this that you didn't like your Hearth's Warming gift, then.
3637330
It was too claw-y.
Similar story, different scene. We had a Grade A milk barn when I was growing up. Slate walls over 2x4 studs (easier to clean) with a little gas stove at one end of a 3-stall milking facility. (three cows in a row, one starting, one going, one finishing, over and over until they're all done, but I digress)
Cleaning up after the milking is done. I hear a cat meowing. Look everywhere. No cat. Darned cold outside. We don't leave the cats inside, because they're cats, and it's a Grade A facility. Meow. Meow. No cat. Go back to the house.
Next evening. Same issue. Everything is done, clean, the stove is heating away to keep the barn from freezing. No cat, but I can still hear it meow. Over by the stove, for some reason. (No, don't think that.)
Next evening, cat is wailing up a storm. We figure out the noise is coming from *behind* the stove. While trying to keep warm in the attic of the barn, one of the idiot cats had slid down the empty space between the 2x4 studs and the wall panels and was stuck. We had to bash a hole in the wall to get it out (because just letting it die would be horrible).
And yeah, fix the hole, would be worse for a full size feral tom to show up.
Reminds me of the bat I had in my room this summer.
3637390
Distinctly recommended, yeah. Cat scratches get infected really easily, even just from pet cats. Feral cats, probably dirty and/or possibly even with the remains of some rodent or another on their claws, can only be worse.
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3637416
Well the good news on that is the only finger that it got good enough to draw blood is the one that's already missing an end. So it wouldn't be that big a loss if the rest of it fell off (although I'd have to further modify my method of touch-typing).
3637410
A bat would be so much worse. At least this cat wasn't a very good climber (although if he'd been good enough, he could have made it back through the hole in the ceiling and it wouldn't have been a problem at all).
I just wanted to let you know that your pain and suffer has filled me with mirth. :D
So... what you're saying is... you have a cat infestation?
3637509
Yes.
3637472
If I catch another kitten, I'll mail it to you and we can share in the mirth.
*points* HA-ha!
3637518
Schroedinger's wildcat, interesting variation on the classic. May or may not contain conspicuous amounts of pain.
3637652
Ha ha!
3637410
Ah yes, I remember when the attic of our house got a bat infestation. Stinkiest damn rodents ever. The Embassy maintenance crew came by and chased them out and hosed the place out, got guano all over the driveway during the one stretch where it decides to not rain for a week. Pew.
3638052 Luckily, mine wasn't an infestation, just a single scared bat that flew into my bedroom through my open door. Eventually, we managed to catch it and toss it out the window (of course, we had to disassemble the window first, but whatever). We don't know how it got into the house, but I never saw it again, so I figure it learned its lesson.
Oh you better watch out,
You better not cry,
You better not pout,
I'm telling you why:
Santa Claws is coming to town. . . .
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