you may seek him in the basement, you may look up in the air
Friday, 24 May 2013 12:17 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
freckles_and_doubtAnyone who's been within an approximate radius or downwind of me recently will know that we currently have a Tomcat Affliction in House Evil Landlord/Lawful Good Tenant, as I tend to rant about it a lot. He's a slinking, stinking, ginger-and-white thing who leads a cryptic life of crime mostly on the roof, but who has developed a truly annoying habit of arriving punctually in the back courtyard at our cats' mealtimes and whinging because we haven't put the food out yet so he can muscle in and steal it. My life as the hapless object of eternal student complaints makes me a wee bit testy with even our own cats getting all demanding, and it's bloody well not cricket from an illegal immigrant. Also, said Slinky/Stinky Tom goes through phases of wandering through the house in our absence and spraying in the EL's bedroom, presumably as a direct challenge for territorial dominance to the house's Alpha Male. (In other news, it's nice to have it unequivocally established that the EL actually is the Alpha Male, as Hobbit clearly labours under the adorable illusion that it's him). Further to Macavity the Mystery Cat's territorial operations, Todal has become all insecure and discombobulated, and has taken to peeing in the EL's bedroom at random intervals. It hasn't been all olfactory joy around our neck of the woods, I can tell you.
The Hidden Paw aspect of Macavity allows him to, among other things, levitate mysteriously onto the roof from a standing start at the food-bowls the instant you think about coming within a sixty-foot radius of the kitchen, so he's near impossible to catch. We are going to have to do something sneaky with traps, and possibly decoy Admiralty papers or a femme fatale Peke with a blackjack in her garter. But it's becoming untenable, and I fear there's a short, sad session with the SPCA in Macavity's criminal mastermind future.
So last night I dreamed that I actually caught the bugger, with my bare hands, and stuffed him into a catbox, where he sat and protested his innocence while pretending to be cute and fluffy. (Even in the dream I wasn't taken in, probably because of excessive training on Hobbit). The dream then precipitated me into an extended argument with no-one in particular as to whether it was better to take the wretched cat to the SPCA to be put down after no-one adopted him, or to take him directly to Graham The Gnomelike Vet, and have him put down without recourse to meaningless illusions of reprieve. At the end of the argument I turned around to discover that the Evil Landlord had snuck behind my back and furnished the catbox with carpets, a tasteful array of expensive sushi in high-end paper boxes, and a miniature television set, on which Macavity was now watching cartoons.
Clearly I am still Deeply Scarred by the Ounce experience. Ounce was also a stray who attempted a similar Macavity-style invasion, which we steadfastly resisted until the point where I went away on holiday for three weeks and came back to discover that the EL had caved and Ounce was now part of the family. (Ounce was himself scarred by the preliminary rejection and still bloody well runs away from me in a pointed fashion if I do anything threatening, like existing). But I'm wise to the EL's ways now. Wise, I say. Macavity has it coming, and at the first hint of sushi or cartoons I will have him into the Liesbeek in a sack with lead weights tied to his feet. Metaphorically speaking. Criminal masterminds and quisling Evil Landlords deserve no mercy.
The Hidden Paw aspect of Macavity allows him to, among other things, levitate mysteriously onto the roof from a standing start at the food-bowls the instant you think about coming within a sixty-foot radius of the kitchen, so he's near impossible to catch. We are going to have to do something sneaky with traps, and possibly decoy Admiralty papers or a femme fatale Peke with a blackjack in her garter. But it's becoming untenable, and I fear there's a short, sad session with the SPCA in Macavity's criminal mastermind future.
So last night I dreamed that I actually caught the bugger, with my bare hands, and stuffed him into a catbox, where he sat and protested his innocence while pretending to be cute and fluffy. (Even in the dream I wasn't taken in, probably because of excessive training on Hobbit). The dream then precipitated me into an extended argument with no-one in particular as to whether it was better to take the wretched cat to the SPCA to be put down after no-one adopted him, or to take him directly to Graham The Gnomelike Vet, and have him put down without recourse to meaningless illusions of reprieve. At the end of the argument I turned around to discover that the Evil Landlord had snuck behind my back and furnished the catbox with carpets, a tasteful array of expensive sushi in high-end paper boxes, and a miniature television set, on which Macavity was now watching cartoons.
Clearly I am still Deeply Scarred by the Ounce experience. Ounce was also a stray who attempted a similar Macavity-style invasion, which we steadfastly resisted until the point where I went away on holiday for three weeks and came back to discover that the EL had caved and Ounce was now part of the family. (Ounce was himself scarred by the preliminary rejection and still bloody well runs away from me in a pointed fashion if I do anything threatening, like existing). But I'm wise to the EL's ways now. Wise, I say. Macavity has it coming, and at the first hint of sushi or cartoons I will have him into the Liesbeek in a sack with lead weights tied to his feet. Metaphorically speaking. Criminal masterminds and quisling Evil Landlords deserve no mercy.
