What Was I Thinking

No, no, nevermind me. It's something that will seem funny in about a half of an hour. I am in the throes of writing papers for this degree, and since nearing bedtime, want to avoid caffeine in anything or I won't sleep. Yesterday I had trod the aisles of a health food store Only Because the pet store wanted four bucks for less than a tablespoon of winter wheat in a bag of potting soil. Cats love grass, and mine have been a little oogy-foogy lately with stomach toss-ups-- if it starts with one, it usually runs through the lot of them. A helpful thing to do is plant wheat grass which can be found for maybe 70 cents a pound at the grocery. Put it in brightly colored packaging with a happy cat cartoon on the front, and you can charge four bucks and up. Not in my world. I trot over to the health food store in the next block and find two pounds of the stuff much more reasonably priced.

While looking and listening to fascinating ideas held by organic nutritionists ("There's a raw food Thanksgiving at Merge")(blech), I see a box of catnip tea. Yippee! I love catnip tea, and used to make catnip jelly for my toast. It comes home with me, I plant the wheat kernels, and get busy on this paper. Now it is tonight, and I want to wind down but also am dying Dy-ing for a cookie, which I haven't any on purpose. The solution is tea, and at this time of the evening, non-caffeinated is necessary, perfect for breaking out the catnip tea while working on the laptop.

I brew a cup, scalding hot in a favorite mug, and head back to the desk where I am working. Tap tap tap away on the keyboard, and there's a tail, a big swish tail coming to visit, how nice. Kai leaps onto the desk. Another tail comes by, and Steve Pickles is on the desk also. A third tail enters, and crazy-crashes into a nearby box; Snowbelle has arrived. They are undulating back and forth, stepping on keys, and if a meow could be a bark, this is it. They are barking short meows, and it becomes so clear as Kai loops a paw towards the hot catnip tea. She tries to stick her face in it, and I have a problem in that I cannot have my tea sit quietly as the desk is crowded with three agitated cats.

They know where I keep the real stuff, so we traipse out to the cupboard and all the cats including the two who weren't part of the pillage get a dose of catnip leaf, gathered earlier in the year. I am not paying pet store prices for something I can pick for free. I bribe them with their drug of choice and gallop back to the laptop for a peaceful two minutes. Yet the aroma from the tea still attracts them after they have downed their portions, but it is a much less frantic plea except for Kai, whose paw is putting great effort into snagging what is rightfully mine. At least to my way of thinking. When combining writing a master's project with writhing tails batting one's face and paws running figure-eights atop the Mac, it is easy to lose it. No door to shut them out, no shelf to stow the hot tea; I could only drink it quickly and be done with it. I will have to hide the soggy tea bag in the refrigerator, or face consequential late-night rowdyism with the wet bag dragged out of the garbage and torn apart maybe in my bed, their favorite place to hide things. Whee.

I'm calmer now. Maybe the catnip kicked in. Time to feed the fish and turn off lights and laptops. I am hitting la hay. Everyone has had their fun, beat each other up, and are now washing their dainty selves. It is cold outside, and all of us want blankets to make us happy. Another day has come and gone. Poof. Wah. Tired.

Bless your hearts, what else could we want? Fun, a fight, and then a snooze. Sounds like a few family gatherings on my mother's side. Tuck under then, pull the kivvers up to your chin. Frost is on the pumpkin, rambling vines sink to earth, the last of the harvest is brought to the barns. Old Earth is getting ready to sleep, we can too. Good night, good night, quiet tails.