(This is a very special letter to my cat – my love, my joy, my giant-hernia-producing-pain-in-the-butt, cat.)
Dear Boodie,
I saved you from sure extermination. That day I first saw you with your big red eye (that had been injured when a nail somehow got in there) and so tiny I could fit you in my hand. You stole my heart with your aloof and feral ways. I had to take you home and make you my own.
At first you were shy and would wait until I was half conscious on the couch before you would venture out and crawl up on my chest, where you would sleep, issuing forth your little snore. Fur soft as silk – a funny face with yellow eyes that said ‘I have no brain cells’ I quickly came to love you.
We had many adventures, and you learned how to be a dog from the old girl – who we finally had to put asleep. But we fared well for that year when it was just you and me. Then came the puppy, who you in the tradition of our family, taught to be a cat. To jump up on counters and perch on the back of sofas and chairs. To prefer eating from your cat box, rather than her dish. Oh sure, there was sibling rivalry but secretly, I knew you loved each other. As evidenced by the good morning kiss you give each other every morning. Followed by a barking and yeowling tussle.
But much as I love you my dear, overweight, obese and funny cat there are a few things we need to get straight:
1. When my eyelashes flutter at 4 a.m. I am not awake and getting ready to feed you, I am dreaming.
2. When the first fingers of sunlight filter through our guazy curtains, it is not time to feed you.
3. When I get up in the middle of the night to pee, it is not midnight snack time.
4. When I come home from work and I turn on my computer, it is not dinner time.
5. When I move, it is not feeding time.
6. When I speak, it is not lunch time.
7. When I turn on the shower it is not time to feed you.
8. Are you sensing a pattern here?
I know that you don’t like Roomie’s cats and therefore you refuse to leave our room, with all your hiding places and the doggie to protect you from the evil ones. But seriously, you need to go to Jenny Craig’s. You need to get a full length mirror and look, really look at yourself. It is time for some real tough love here. You are FAT. Yes, you are. You are F.A.T. fat. You must brave the great outdoors and chase some mice or lizards or spiders or whatever it is you like to chase. You must go out and kick some Roomie Cat butt and make a space for yourself in the yard, with it’s big trees and green grass and several patio chairs just right for napping in the sun.
You must, my cat, come to know that there is more to life than food.
Love,
Mom
Anita Rodgers Mystery Writer 
Oh dear, she is a little lumpy, isn’t she?! But quite adorable, and clearly much loved! Can’t you buy a kitty treadmill and ease her onto that??
x
Hey Simonne,
Lumpy – ah…yeah. 😆 I like the kitty treadmill idea – perhaps if I put her food at the end of the road it would get her to walk.
WC
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Hmm, maybe you could leash it and bring it out for a walk? Not sure if you can do that to a cat, but it’s for it’s own good. Anyways, why not slowly training your cat to get used to fixed meal times? All the best!!
Oh yeah, maybe you could put some healthy cat snack and hang it above your cat. Then your cat would just keep walking to get the snack? Who knows?
Hi Steffi!
Welcome. You know, I actually did try to get her to walk on a leash but she simply wasn’t having any of it – and being the big bruiser she is – I simply wasn’t strong enough to force her. Plus I feared I’d end up hanging her if I tried.
A snack on a fishing pole might work – but I’m too lazy to do that. 😆
WC
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I have a friend who would absolutely adore this. Primo. kim
LOL – the cat or the letter? 😉
WC
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This was a great one, WC! My cat has this insistent, grating meow that won’t stop until food is produced. If there is no food in the dish, he knocks it off the table. If he is fed properly, then there is the “I want out, I want back in. No, wait a minute, I want out again” meowing. Is it any wonder we don’t allow him in the house at night, unless it’s so cold he will freeze to death and die? Still, we love him. Isn’t that always the case?>
Hey Karen,
Yep, your cat must know my cat. I swear it’s a feline conspiracy. But yeah, I do love my kitty – I mean for cripes sakes, you gotta love a cat who traveled (twice mind you) cross country in the backseat of your car in a carrier the size of a shoe box and hardly complained at all. Doncha? 😆
WC
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Holy cow .. err .. uhh .. Cat! Whatta cat!
Yep, that cat that ate Cleveland. 😉
WC
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Hi WC,
Just so you will know, the same, more or less, goes for dogs as well. Oh, if your cat needs exercise, adopt a puppy.
the Grit
Hi Grit,
Too true. Although my doggie is very active and chases squirrels, cats, lizards, mice, spiders and birds. She loves to walk and I swear she can read my mind because whenever I just think of taking her for a walk she starts running around and hopping up and down and looking for her leash. Animals…gotta love em.
WC
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Both 🙂 this girl plays with the snakes she finds in her yard. Don’t ask? I don’t understand it either. LOL. kim
Now there’s a post in the making – or maybe a country song. She plays with snakes in her backyard. She plays and plays and it gets hard…. 😯 Okay…I won’t go there.
WC
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This is the cutest entry ever. i laughed at your list, so funny!
That cat is not fat, by the way, just an enthusiactic eater and, obviously, dearly loved.
Yep, she’s a good eater as my Ma used to say. I know that cuz when I was a kid I wasn’t a good eater and they used to have to bribe me to eat. I wish I had that problem today – then I wouldn’t look so much like my cat. Did I mention that her real name is Patches – but I switched to boodie when that was all I saw when I looked at her. 😆
WC
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LMFAO!!! Anyone who owns a cat will surely relate to this one…
That list could be read out to Archie….food food food…you’d swear we never fed him!!
Cheers, Kelly
I know, they all act as though they are skin and bones, starving little strays when in reality they are just eating machines – and God forbid you should get in between them and the food dish. Cripes, they’ll break your leg if you don’t move fast enough.
WC
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Ah….haven’t we all been here. My cat would eat nonstop if it could.
I think that is just the nature of cats, don’t you?
WC
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