April 25: Apparently, the human is having vivd and disturbing dreams. Today, she explained that in the event of a zombie attack, my job is to "create a diversion." I already have a plan in place for a zombie attack; it does not involve the rescue of mentally disturbed humans who are late with breakfast.
April 26: More meteorological excess last night tempted the human to sleep past my breakfast time. She discovered that she still has plenty of bandaids, and that my breakfast is not to be delayed for thunderstorms.
Update from Spike the Other Cat: very scary storm. I cried and cried and peed in the hallway. Mommy yelled but then I got snuggles.
Update from Natalie the Human: Both of these cats are damned drama queens. I miss my students. They may occasionally complain, but they never pee on my stuff.
April 27: The human slept on and off most of the day murmuring listlessly about "barometric changes" and "sinuses." While this means I regained control of my territory AND had a warm place to sit throughout the day, experience has shown that she and Spike will do something embarrassing and energetic at 3am tonight.
April 28: The human has been working on the cat warming machine all day, but she has also been sneezing, loudly, the entire time. I have three times attempted to make her desist by placing a gentle paw across her face, but this has not improved the situation. More aggressive methods will need to be enacted if things do not improve, as her "allergies" are disrupting the peace of the household.
April 29: The human rescued Spike from a very small spider today, which had provoked him into huddling in the corner and crying. Instead of killing the invader, however, the human placed it outside the domicile, explaining that "spiders serve an important ecological niche as they are necessary for the creation of new superheroes." Had I been quicker, I would have killed it dead.
April 30: After taking out the trash (again, with the stupid "Danger Zone" song), the human put herself in "time out" for tracking mud across the floor that she had just mopped. She also instructed herself to leave wet shoes on the front porch, "or heads will roll!" I miss the cleaning lady; she does not sing or shout at herself.
May 1: Today I was a bit bored, so I entertained myself by hiding between the shower curtain and the shower curtain liner until the human walked near enough for me to tap her on the foot. Her screams were gratifying.
May 2: The human spent many hours typing on the cat warming device today, muttering about grading. Her only pause was a bizarre rant on the topic of "why it's always the starboard coupling, answer me that that? I know you can't; it has to be a design flaw--so much for 24th century engineering." I took her lapse into madness as an opportunity to steal the cheese off of her sandwich.
May 3: The human left the domicile today! Unfortunately, within 30 minutes, she came back.
May 4: Today the human was punished by the fates for not sharing her chicken with me, as she spilled a 1000-piece jigsaw puzzle on the dining room floor. Note: humans are pretty disgusting when they cry.
May 5: Another hailstorm, another overly dramatic breakdown on Spike's part.
May 6: The human attempted to bond with us today by discussing the best food to be found in the Detroit airport as well as a gathering place called "Bilbo's Pizza." I do not know what either of these has to do with medieval studies, but I do know that I am not receiving my customary Five Days of Intense Spoiling by the Neighbors which I look forward to each May. I am VERY unhappy.
May 7: Today the human complained that she didn't have any wine "bad enough" for the traditional wine hour. Honestly, this pandemic has clearly given her brain damage.
May 8: The human, whose cleaning skills are rather weak in the best of times, attempted to dance with a mop last night while cleaning the floor of Spike's vomit. Naturally, she crashed in an undignified heap. After much overly dramatic shouting, she spent most of today in Spike's chair with her right rear paw elevated and encased in a bag of frozen peas. Worse yet, when she does bother to move, she does so with the assistance of two long sticks, one of which came close to crushing my tail!
May 9: The human left the frozen peas on a stool within reach of Spike for ten minutes. I spent the afternoon in the front bedroom out of range of both the rolling peas and the swearing.
May 10: The human seemed lonely today, so I made sure that I sat on at least one of her body parts at all times, including when she was using the bathroom. In spite of this affection, my dinner was 22 minutes late.
May 11: Today, when I was trying to groom myself in peace, I was subjected to a rant from the human on the theme of "Why Starting a Sentence in an Essay with the Phrase, 'I Don't Mean to Be Offensive, But...' Should Result in a Grade of -2000." I do not care about student essays, but my human earned a D- today for lack of dignity alone.
May 13, 8am: I did not update yesterday because the human was boring.
May 13: By Bast's holy tail, what is Frozen 2, and why is it on continual loop?!
May 14: I have finally established that the front bedroom is Mine every afternoon--no humans, no orange cats--Mine alone. I need a few hours of solitude each day to preserve my sanity.
May 15: Someone sent the human Star Wars socks. The human attempted to see how they would look on ME, a decision she will regret at her leisure.
May 16: The human spent several hours this afternoon wearing a blue head covering and watching something she called "classic baseball." Then she sighed deeply and took a long nap, allowing me to do my nails in peace.
May 17: The human went outside today to "do battle with invasive species," and Spike ran out onto the front porch. After much drama, he ran back in, carrying a mouse he had caught. Instead of killing it, however, he released it into the house. Eventually, I had to bestir myself from my afternoon nap to kill it myself and deposit it in the human's slipper. Neither the human nor Spike expressed any appreciation, of course.
May 18: When the human took out the recycling today, she let a fly into the house. While I used the bug to contemplate the brevity of existence and the relative nature of time and space, Spike broke a glass, pulled down the bedroom curtains, and killed something called an "ipad mini." The fly left the domicile unmolested when the human brought in the mail. It's been over a decade, and I still do not understand why this household needed a second cat.
