Y’all, I Have Ruined My Cats (And My Bucket…)

Folks, it would be hard to make up all the crazy things that I do around here.  Things just seem to happen when I’m on watch.  Like last week, for example, I ruined the cats.

I’ve had a hectic few weeks.  I’ve been homeschooling, blogging, running kids here and there, preparing for our trip to Ireland, and on and on.  Well, I managed to run out of cat food.  I went out to feed them one morning as they waited on the deck, reached my hand into the bag with the scooper and came out empty handed.

I panicked for just a second, wondering how in the world I was going to be able to drop everything and head to the store for cat food when I remembered that we keep a stash of canned cat food for setting the possum trap when we need to.  Great!  Problem solved!

I went inside a grabbed a can of “poultry delight” popped the top and plopped the stinky mess into their bowl.  Tiger and Batman eyed the food for a moment before gingerly reaching out a tongue to lick it.  I went back in the house as they devoured the food.

So the next day comes along, I walk out onto the deck, and there are those blasted cats, looking to me for a meal.  DARN IT, I FORGOT TO GET CAT FOOD AGAIN!  So, in the house I go for “seafood delight” this time.

3 whole days this went on.  I kept forgetting to run out for cat food.  I could have asked Eric to grab some on his way home from work, but of course I forgot that too.  The cats were content, so I just didn’t think of it.

Finally I went to the feed store, as I needed food for all the rest of the animals too, so I also picked up a 20 lb. bag of cat food.  That ought to fix ’em, I thought.  I got home and filled the bowl to the brim.

The next 3 days went like this:  I walk onto the deck.  Batman yowls his ever loving head off as if I’ve never fed him in his life.  Tiger even gets into the action with a disapproving scowl every time I walk out.  The bowl stays full.  I worry that the bowl of food has gone stale, so I toss it into the yard, where the chickens happily devour it, and I fix a fresh bowl for the pampered “barn” cats.

Same, song, second verse, a little bit louder and a little bit worse.  Batman’s yowling increases.  He is acting like a cat who has never been fed.  Eric assures me that he’ll eat if he gets hungry enough.  Tiger goes out hunting, as is her usual habit anyway.

Finally, I go to the store and buy a new bag of cat food of a different brand and fill the bowl, still thinking that he will refuse to eat anything that isn’t canned.  Well, he tore into that bowl like he hadn’t eaten in days (which I suppose he hadn’t, but whose fault is that??) Apparently he just really hated the feed store food.

So now, when I feed him, I also throw a bowl full of the other food out into the yard.  The poultry think it is wonderful.  Too wonderful.  Now there are chickens and ducks and guineas hanging out outside the deck waiting to be fed cat food.  I hope they understand that I won’t continue to buy cat food for them once this is gone.

Anyway, so that’s how I ruined my cats.  I also ruined a bucket this weekend.  

We don’t have any form of recycling out here.  We have trash service once a week, and they won’t take anything that isn’t in the bin.  That leaves me with quite the overflow by week’s end, so the best way I’ve found to deal with it is to set aside all cardboard and papers and burn them in the fire pit every few weeks.  Usually it is a quick little chore, no big deal.  Sometimes we add logs to the fire and roast marshmallows.  You just never know.

So this Sunday it was time to burn the pile.  As I collect them, I contain the papers as much as possible in a big plastic tub; purple of course.  (Everything should be purple, right?)  Well, while I was burning, all of a sudden a gust of wind came up, it shifted the flames and made them leap much higher than I had meant for them to get.  Before I knew it, they had risen up and ignited the papers that were still in the bucket.  

My poor purple bucket.  May you rest in peace.  And no, I don’t really know how I’ll fit it in the trash bin next week.  I may have to bury the thing!

I hope y’all are having a more normal week than I am!  Have you set anything on fire?  Let’s hear it!