Fun & Games with Skeezix

 

This is Skeezix. At rest, artified, and posing.

I’ve mentioned him before, but we’ve had a fun morning. More fun anyway than reading stories about the morally superior people among us who are busy celebrating the death of Lindsey Graham, laying in party favors for the upcoming death of Mitch McConnell, making up new scenarios about how the Israelis killed Charlie Kirk instead of the confessed shooter, and saying their daily prayers for the assassination of the President of the United States. Impressive focus but it gets old, you know. Too much of a good thing gets stale after a while.

Why I’ve wandered over here to talk about something less lofty than the violent deaths of my political enemies. Maybe that’s what this new network is really going to be about.

Another use for this site, now that the immediate danger of FB page hijacking has been quelled, is to serve as a get away from it all refuge, kind of like my old Deerhound Diary site. Which this post reminds me of pretty directly. It’s not about sighthounds and the iconic pug Eloise, but cats. Cats who have invaded our rural retreat courtesy of people who are at least above drowning the feral felines they wish to be rid of. There were a couple of Toms on the Orange side and a gray female of feisty mien, all of whom were smuggled in downstairs (where I am only a pass-through these days in Marge’s life); they settled in, the gray grew pregnant by-and-by, and now we are buried in cats, downstairs and upstairs.

Mama. She likes to roost on the back of the couch.

The one we call ‘Missy’ or ‘Mama’ depending in her mood had four good looking boys, Peter, Ben, Franklin (since adopted to Marge’s brother), and Terwilliger. Plus Skeezix, who was a walk-in.  Mama and the last two spend their time upstairs with us. I think Terwilliger and Skeezix have different names downstairs, but as long as they respond to what I call them I don’t care. Pretty sure I have a different name downstairs too.

Terwilliger is white with an orange saddle. He has two modes. Placidly dignified and screaming at the door, which he does to get in and get out of the 2nd floor family room.

Terwilliger. Catjacking Mama’s roost.

They all three want to be there, right behind where my wife sits reading up on doings in Hungary and Russia. Mostly, Mama wins out and is actually becoming gentler than she used to be. No doubt that she’s had her feral times before arriving here, and she still has unexpected bouts of the crazies, when she rockets from one end of the room to the other like a runaway missile. She’s very pawsy and can snag your hand or finger with ease, though she’s learned not to claw you but pull your appendage to her tongue and lick. Endearing.

Skeezix is not her boy. Why I gave him the name, which means orphan. He’s not as big as Terwilliger, but he’s the most orange of all the cats and he has that orange swagger and self confidence. He’s been known to push Mama off the top of the couch when he wants to be there. Usually, she defers and finds other thrones to settle on.

Tommy the terrier ignores all this maneuvering. He does try to steal their food when he can, but otherwise he snoozes through even the crazies. Until last night that is. 

I had nodded off at my keyboard and was violently awakened at 2:30 am by a tremendous crash. Tommy was as alarmed as I was. Skeezix had pulled a lamp off the coffee table, as well as a box full of old computer plugs obsolete remotes, and sunglasses no longer cool enough to wear. I had to turn on the lights to see what was going on. Skeezix was preparing some new attack on my book stack, which is when I barked the one word I’ve been able to reach him in addition to his name.

“No! No, dammit!”

He glided off the table and wandered away. I nodded off again, restored lamp still on, and slept for maybe another hour when I was awakened again, this time by Mama, who had exhausted her usual patience with Skeezix. He was in her place on the back of the couch and she wanted it back. Her quick paws were trying to land on Skeezix, who was lying mostly on his back, parrying her swipes at his head. 

That’s his best thing actually. Fighting on his back, like the early MMA star Boyce Gracie, happiest seeming vulnerable on the ground before wrapping you up in a vise that made you tap out instantly, of course, Skeezix does it all with head feints and quick-quick paws. I watched him land about four times on Mama’s cheeks, just to sow her he could keep it up all day. She relented and retreated to an old speaker behind where I was sitting. She was still watching him. She didn’t like it. Not one bit.

Something I never do. Involve myself in a cat fight. Once had an orange boy named Webster, many years ago, and he taught me how to spar in a paw-finger fight. I was in a mood myself, awakened for the second time by cat antics, not acceptable to a dog person like myself. I intervened on Mama’s behalf. We went at it for a full minute or so. He lay on his back, trying repeatedly for my jabbing finger and missing. He got to a half sitting position, his balance on couch back not ideal. I alternated between pokes at his face and pushes at his side, until he got whopper-jawed on the edge of space and I shoved him off onto the floor. He made a noise, not pleased, but didn’t jump back up.

I looked over at Mama. She had been watching intently. She cocked her head at me and a waved a finger indicating she should reclaim her spot. She seemed to be thinking about it. Somehow I lapsed back into a doze before she moved. When I woke again, about an hour later, some time after sun-up, she was sleeping regally on the back of the couch and Skeezix was nowhere to be found.

Then I saw him, sleeping on my wife’s old desk, rarely used anywhere. The morning light showed him stretched out with his head on a book. It looked like one of my books. I quietly grabbed my iPhone and sneaked up on him, but he lifted his head as I took my first picture.

One of my better books. What’s that on binding? Tape?

Of course I assumed he had decided to do some research on this human who had outboxed him. Wrong book, I thought. This would have been a better choice. Curious about strip that looked like tape, I tugged on it. He gave me room but didn’t leave the desk, just resettled himself when I’d identified it and smoothed it out.

It turned out to be a rare find. A 40-some year old 

manuscript page from a favorite story of mine.

Couldn’t resist. Let him go back to sleep on the book and I took a photo for posterity of the beat-up old page.

Then, you guessed it. Fell asleep again. I told you I keep the same kind of hours ‘That Man’ does. Everyone’s happy now. All’s well that ends well.

See you next time.