Right after Christmas, Amazon delivered a huge catnip fish to Thatch. He thought it was funny but he had no idea what it was because he’s never seen a fish before. So, I had to get Annabelle off the computer to show him. She always says she’s googling something she needs to know, but whenever my back is turned, she adds things to my Amazon shopping cart.
So, while Thatch watched fishies swim about on Youtube, I lectured Annabelle about the gaudy kitty jewelry she kept putting in my shopping cart. When I’m out of the apartment I can’t control her time on the computer. I’m happy I keep my debit card close at all times or she would bankrupt me.
While she sulked, Thatch and I played with the catnip fish, which he smelled and batted about. It’s bigger than he is so I think he’s happier chasing Ping-Pong balls. Now that she’s added movies to my Netflix queue, tonight’s discussion will be why I think she’s too young to watch Sex Kittens Go To College.
When Annabelle’s tail hangs out of the cat tree, Thatch thinks he’s funny when he bites it. He does this quite often, so she paid him back by sneaking up the cat tree to bite his. She and I thought it was funny but he cried.
Well, Thatch, I said to him. Now you know how she feels when you do that to her.
Then I told her that she needed to rise above her petty urges and be nicer to her little brother, but moral lessons go right over these kitties’ heads. I could be talking Esperanto to them for all the good it does.
I made her apologize, which she did grudgingly, and then they both sulked until I gave Annabelle the CD remote and she played a few things to cheer them. As soon as Thatch started singing “Memory” with her, I knew we were fine for the day.
Lately, they have begun sleeping on my discarded clothing. If I come in and take off my shirt, lay it on the bed, and wander about the apartment in my undershirt, I will find one of them sleeping on it. Last night, Annabelle and Thatch both took turns sleeping in the seat of my pants after I tossed them over the foot of the bed.
I asked them, what if I slept in your clothes?
Annabelle gave me this look like, how dumb are you? She then went back to pushing letters and magazines off the table to the floor. Thatch put down his catnip fish and giggled.
We don’t wear clothes, he told me.
Annabelle stopped pushing the jar of kitty treats to the ledge to give him a thoroughly disgusted look; she’s one smart cookie who prefers the devious to the obvious. I could see she was ready to make some nasty remark to Thatch and make him cry.
Be nice to your little brother, I said, or he won’t sing with you any more.
She’s lucky I didn’t snap and suggest she lose a couple of ounces. I think she’s putting on weight. The next visit to the vet, I will ask.
She really likes singing with him. Ever since we all watched The Sound of Music, she’s been hinting for me to adopt five more babies so she can form the Catt Family Singers and perform “So Long, Farewell” at parties. I refused to take her hints seriously until I found her order for the business cards on my Amazon shopping cart and quietly deleted it.
I suggested we all have a treat. They had Purina Party Mix. I had some orange juice. And vodka.
Several nights ago, I got out of bed for a glass of water. It was around 2:00, and when I turned on the kitchen light, a swarm of roaches ran about the sink and stove top. I had occasionally seen one in the bathroom or in the sink, but I had no idea that we had a major problem. When I mentioned it to the kitties, Annabelle said it was because her singing with Thatch is attracting them. I told her it was because of the messes they make.
She’s actually delighted by the problem because roaches are one of her favorite snacks. I occasionally find her lying in the kitchen sink or bathtub waiting for one to show up. She says they’re tastier than flies, and now Thatch wants to learn to catch them.
The other night Annabelle was playing in the bathtub. When she’s not sleeping in it, she likes to drop all the bottles of shampoo and moistener, along with my razor, into the tub and knock them about. To my surprise, Thatch, who’s never jumped onto the tub before, leaped into the tub with her, and the two of them did a mean impression of me taking a bath. You’d think they were the new Abbott and Costello.
I was tempted to fill the tub with water and laugh at their panicky scramble out, but I love them too much. I told them I was really lucky to have such talented and witty babies. That made Annabelle so happy that she started doing her little polka step she does when she head butts my hand. Thatch joined in, and I had two kitties dancing the polka around me.
I gave them a treat and tried to explain to Annabelle why I thought The Cat and the Canary might be too scary for Thatch to watch. She’s begun a Netflix queue of cat and kitty films she wants to watch.
The other morning, while I was cleaning the litter, Annabelle played cat and mouse with a roach that had wandered into the bathtub. I kept telling her to just eat it, and all I got from her were angry looks before she went back to playing with it. Thatch came in to watch, and the two of us started cheering, eat it! Eat it!
Well, she got over-confident and let it crawl out of the tub and cross the bathroom floor before it vanished into a crack in the tiles. So, there she sat, staring at the spot where the roach disappeared before desperately checking the area over and over, positive she’d find it. Thatch thought that was the funniest thing since their impersonation of me vathing, and he rolled all over the floor in fits of laughter. They are not speaking at the moment, since she has little sense of humor about herself, so I thought I might cheer her up by asking her to help me make the bed and tidy up.
It was a disaster. I had to fire her. All she really wants to do when I’m making the bed is lie in the middle of it and ride while I push the bed away from the wall, roll about in the blankets while I’m trying to straighten them up, or lie on the pillows while I’m trying to put them back in place.
While I was out yesterday with Thatch to see the vet, Annabelle played the CD of West Side Story. So, when I came in, I had to apologize to the neighbors for the noise, tell her the show’s plot, and play the CD again for Thatch. Now she wants to see the film. After the third replay, they started singing “Tonight,” which has replaced “Memory,” so we all have things to be grateful for. The first thing I had to do this morning, after I fed them, was to play “The Rumble.”
When I was reluctant – it’s awfully noisy for the neighbors at 7:30am – Annabelle climbed up on the dresser and started knocking things onto the floor; Thatch cried and said I just wanted to spoil his fun. When Annabelle’s tantrum pushed a book off the shelf that nearly hit Thatch, I got the remote and played “The Rumble.”
Staring each other down, they crouched at opposite ends of the room, then they danced to the cat tree and the battle began. They wrestled around and that was it. They thought this was the best ballet ever, and we had to redo it. Several times.
The choreography was poor, but I applauded and said I had the cleverest children in Manhattan. Then the birds landed on the fire escape for their breakfast and West Side Story was forgotten for the moment.
Later in the afternoon, Annabelle reminded me that she wanted to watch the movie. As soon as the 6:30 CBS news ended, I put the DVD into the player, and we settled in. Whether she knows the song or not, she sings along, and when we got to the balcony scene, she and Thatch were thrilled to sing along to “Tonight.” They were so excited talking about the song that they missed the following scene of dialogue. When the movie ended, I had to fetch tissues for two kitties to blow their noses and wipe their eyes.
They ran off to play, and I got ready for bed, setting my eye drops, allergy pills, and glass of water on my nightstand. I settled in and began a new mystery. As I was reading, I realized that I had no idea where Thatch and Annabelle were. Had they sneaked out when I went to the corner market? Were they roaming the apartment halls? She’s awfully fast. The other morning, just before the door to the hall closed, she was out the door and up the stairs to the fourth floor before I could stop her.
The sound of a falling kitty dish told me they were in the kitchen so I went in to check. Annabelle was in the sink playing cat and mouse with a roach. Thatch sat on the stove watching her tease it. We watched her toss that roach around the sink like virtuoso violinist tossing out scales and arpeggios; she almost lost it down the drain a couple of times before she let it climb to the top of the sink. Then in one swift motion she suddenly popped the roach into her mouth.
After she had chewed it up and swallowed it, she said to Thatch, This is my favorite maneuver, but it’s fun to pick them off the shower curtain just like you pick flies off a screened window.
I’m learning so much! Thatch enthused to me.
Let’s check out the shower curtain, Annabelle said to him, and they ran off to the bathroom. I returned to my mystery. Not long after that I heard the bathroom door creak.
Daddy? It was Annabelle. Don’t wait up for us.
She and Thatch wore their pith helmets, and Thatch carried a small flashlight.
It’s the Great Roach Hunt, he told me.
Just don’t eat too many and make yourself sick, I said.
Then she told Thatch to hold the flashlight steady, and the mighty hunters leaped the barrier of the large bag of Meow Mix dry food and vanished behind the refrigerator.
©2018, Larry Moore
Annabelle & Thatch 