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For reasons that are still unclear to me, Mr. Right-Click worked out some kind of undisclosed trade deal with an acclaimed painter to create a representation of our goddamn cat-coons.
Only in Los Angeles would this happen, people. Only in Los Angeles, and only with a dirty rotten cat lover for a husband.
Listen: I don’t want this to become a blog about cats, nor do I want to beat you over the head with overwrought literary metaphors.
Oh who the hell am I kidding? I love overwrought literary metaphors — how often do I get a chance to work in references to The Aeneid? And cats are good for traffic, apparently. So suck it up, people. Cats are big news around here lately. I don’t like it any more than you do, BELIEVE ME.
So what we decided, after Mr. Right-Click (aka Aeneas) went ahead and decided to found Kitty Rome, was that I would set about building my own version of Cat Carthage, and then we would see which one the cats liked better, and that would be the one that stayed in our bedroom. This was an emergency situation, so I realized that I would have to get started on a solution immediately. I think you know where this story is going.
That’s right: the San Fernando Valley.
I had kind of a vague idea of what I was going to do. It involved building a staircase and dyeing sisal rope and, eventually, fashioning some kind of perch high upon the wall on which the cats could sit. I planned to situate all of this stuff behind the door in the bedroom so that I didn’t have to look at it as often, even though it is decidedly better looking than the hideous monstrosity that Mr. Right-Click had ordered from KittyMansions.com.
Initially, things were looking pretty good. I added a second flight of steps, and the cats were taking to the Carthage structure pretty well. It looked like perhaps we could forget about the whole Rome nightmare after all, even before it had arrived. I still had several things left to do on my plans for Carthage, but if they liked it this much already, then I didn’t have much to worry about, it seemed.
Then Kitty Rome arrived. In pieces. In three separate boxes. And one thing you should know about Mr. Right-Click is that he doesn’t put shit together. I’m not really sure if it’s because he cannot put shit together or if it’s because he just won’t put shit together. I just know he doesn’t do it. So basically, Kitty Rome sat around for a few days, and there was some “handyman” who was supposed to come to put it together, but said handyman never showed up because apparently, even though we are in the midst of a recession and everyone needs money, handymen and handywomen are just too busy these days to come to my house and construct cat empires.
So after a few days of stubbornly walking past the pile of cat stuff that wasn’t mine piled on the ground, I did what all obsessive compulsive people do, when faced with a pile of crap on their bedroom floor that they know they aren’t allowed to throw away: I started constructing the goddamn thing myself. Yes: I participated in my own destruction, and felt I was powerless to avoid doing so. What is worse is that the bastard cats sat and watched me from their hideous trailer park cat perches the whole time, and if they could have eaten grapes and had serfs fanning them, I’m sure they would have, but I was busy building for them, so they napped on and off instead.
It seems like now would be as good a time to underscore that, much as you should never trust a ho, you should never trust a cat. If you want a loyal friend, get a dog. A cat will cut you just to see what your blood tastes like. I’m not exaggerating for effect: Edie actually did this to me, last night, as I was putting together this godawful thing for her. Right in the middle of it, she reached over and clawed me and then licked her lips. Here’s the scratch:
And here’s her smug face afterwards:
This is what my bedroom wall looks like now:
Even Mr. Right-Click — Catneas himself — said, last night, as we were going to sleep, “Wow, that thing looks . . . bad.”
But let me assure you: this is not over. If I have to douse Cat Carthage in some kind of kitty crack to get them to take to it, make no mistake: I’m not above that. These damn cats will get their “enrichment” from Ikea and like it! Not over, I say!
Not everybody knows that, before we were married, Mr. Right-Click’s online moniker was The Dirty Rotten Cat Lover. This is because my husband is a dirty rotten cat lover and if you know a dirty rotten cat lover, then I don’t care what they’ve told you: they are just not like the rest of us.
I’m a dog lover — I make no bones about it: cats are fine, but I prefer dogs. You know where you stand with dogs. Cats make you work for it, and frankly, I don’t have time for that crap. Their food stinks, they are all weird about water (sometimes they like it, and then other times they get all Wicked Witch of the East about it), and at any moment they might just decide to open up one of your veins with a claw and there really isn’t anything you can do about it (except hope that they don’t). Don’t get me started on trying to make the bed with the cats around. Fuck that. Plus, every single one of the cats I’ve known has had some bizarre quirk that just doesn’t make any sense whatsoever. Like my old cat, Ryan, would react to eating Nacho Cheese Doritos as if they contained crystal methamphetamine. What’s that about?
At present, we only have cats at the Right-Click household because: 1) Mr. Right-Click is a dirty rotten cat lover; and 2) one day my Golden Retriever, Sidney, tried to bite off Mini’s face. So now Sidney and her unresolved food aggression live at my mom’s house and we have two cats that are the size of goddamn raccoons, Edie and Wubbzy/Chum-Chum/Moishe, who live with us and who take the stinkiest raccoon-sized poops I’ve ever encountered in my life. There are two litter boxes in my house and I’m constantly scooping them out, sweeping up around the poop boxes, and disinfecting the general areas with Clorox wipes (not a paid placement). Then, the second that I’m finished with this disgusting and infuriating twice to thrice daily procedure, one or the other of them will get into the box I’ve just cleaned, and rechristen it with their raccoon-sized poops. And the cycle continues. There’s a whole lot more that goes into the whole poop saga with the cats but I’ve never been much for scatological humor so suffice to say that I’m leaving a lot out here and this is but one-tenth of the drama that Maine Coon poop has caused around the Right-Click household of late. (You’re welcome.)
The latest saga with the cats is that we have to get another goddamn butt fugly cat tree. Because the one we have is a festival of fug that has lived through (counting on fingers) three cats before these two clowns showed up, and since these cats are so big, every time they climb up it’s possible they are going to break it. I’ve always hated this cat tree but Mr. Right-Click has had it from long before we met, so I’ve never been successful at getting rid of it. Now that we are talking about getting another one, it’s my contention that we should at least endeavor to get something tasteful instead of yet another carpeted monstrosity. And before you ask, not having a cat tree in one’s house, when you are a dirty rotten cat lover, is not an option. I spent the morning looking for options, or combinations of options, that are not horribly objectionable to have in my bedroom. Below is what I presented to Mr. Right-Click.
None of which Mr. Right-Click finds suitably “enriching” for the cats. This is what he wants to put in the bedroom.
Which is like, three times as ugly as what we have now, and twice as big. But wait, maybe if you see the video, you’ll be able to appreciate it.
He claims that he “acquiesced” on the choice of what kind of cat we were going to get this time (he wanted a breed that is only like one generation away from the wild — he wanted a half tiger cat, basically, internet!) but he’s not going to choose form over function on something this [cough.] important.
Internet, it’s not that I’m not painfully aware that this is a first world problem. It’s just that . . . they are fucking CATS.
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Sure, I eventually met my husband, Mr. Right-Click, through online dating. But not before I had dated nearly one hundred of Los Angeles' least suitable bachelors. Laugh along in my Online Dating Chronicles.
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Sometimes I take the melodrama of my life and twist and turn it until it looks almost charming. I do this because I want you to like me:
Cigarettes & Green Felt: This is about the time I figured out that adults were mostly full of shit.
Assburger: It's not just a disorder on the autism spectrum: it's also one of your relatives!
On Truth: Sometimes somebody will say something and it hurts your feelings. And then you will write a story about it and your aunt will call it "phenomenal." Everyone else will try to pretend like it never happened.
The Sheer And Unmitigated Power of Bob Mould: Sometimes you spend your formative years obsessed by an unrequited teenage crush, and then one day you realize that person is now an orthopedic surgeon who lives in your neighborhood. It kinda sucks when that happens.
Ben From Madera: For one Halloween, Ben dressed up like a bee, like that kid in the Blind Melon video. That's how I will always remember him.
Mr. Right-Click
He is my best friend, even if he uses a PC. And the fact that sometimes he will pretend to be a "Pancake Pirate" is only part of the reason. Arrrr!
Mini
His cutie-pie percentile group is off the charts.
Spinning
If you think this is just about exercise, then you have underestimated how wildly inappropriate people can be when they undergo physical pain in a group setting.
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