Normally, the Nameless Cat gets two feedings of canned catfood a day. Some days it's Mixed Grill, other days it's Turkey Giblet Dinner or Salmon Parfait. The Nameless Cat doesn't seem to care. At least it hasn't yet filed a formal complaint.
Normally, the Nameless Cat sleeps in my office chair all day.
Normally, the Nameless Cat doesn't talk to me.
Once you've read something by Jasper Fforde, normalcy ceases to have much meaning.
I just finished reading something by Jasper Fforde; ergo, normalcy has ceased to have much meaning. Or at least it has ceased to operate on my trusty 'ol Titanium PowerBook. I shouldn't have I allowed Something Rotten to rest on its lid when I wasn't reading it. Some of the counter-normalcy must have soaked right through the lid into wherever counter-normalcy likes to go.
My first clue that normalcy had gone missing was the missing cat. I sat down to write about the business of Lizbeth Marvel and the Picture Board and how that got all tangled up with a meeting of the SOFIs. I'd gotten the whole thing written and was looking for a suitable quote when it occurred to me that I hadn't had to dislodge the Nameless Cat from my office chair.
My second clue about the disappearance of normalcy in my vicinity was the Nameless Cat saying "Get me off."
Said Yours Truly to the air of the office: "I beg your pardon?"
"The roof. Get me off the roof. I'm hungry."
Don't ask how I knew that the ghostly whisper was the Nameless Cat. Or why I dutifully trudged out the back door and looked up at the peak of the roof. All you need to know is this: there, seemingly cradled in the barest sliver of a moon was the Nameless Cat, looking down at me.
First, I tried Tough Love. I climb up the ladder to the roof and give it a stern eyeballing. "You got up there, you can just get yourself down. Take all the time you want, I don't care."
"Cats don't have a reverse gear," said the Nameless Cat in a tone that clearly implied that I should have known that already. "And be warned that if you somehow get the better of my good nature and I come close enough so you can grab me by the scruff of the neck, I promise to leave claw marks all over your arms...and possibly even that thing you call a nose. Safest thing for you would be to coax me with words."
"Words? You mean I should say something like 'Come on, Sweet Nameless; time to come down from the roof and have some nice Salmon Parfait. Or Mixed Grill, if you'd rather.' Or,'That great horned owl up there is thinking you look a lot like a full portion of Mottled Fur Stew'."
"Silly human. What makes you think I am as stupid as a dog or as timid as a mouse. Now you're pissing me off. I want words, I want them now...and not just any words. Yesterday at the Thrice Read Zine, I ate the cover of a dusty old thing called True Confessions; now I find I would like to eat an article about Deputy Chief Brenda Leigh Johnson wannabees. In fact, that post you just wrote would serve nicely."
"No way."
Piece of advice, Dear Reader. Never say "no way" to the Nameless Cat. It has Ways.
Next thing I know, the Nameless Cat is on the ground, nibbling with dainty abandon at a small mound of what look to be moist ones and zeroes next to the dumpster. If dainty abandon is entirely a contradiction in terms, feel free to substitute a more appropriate expression and let me know what it is.
So I climb back down the ladder and approach the Nameless Cat, who darts away. I toss a half-hearted curse after the Nameless Cat and go back to the Titanium and my post-in-progress.
Gone. The whole thing. Nothing on the TypePad screen but a blank post form. You would have liked that one, too. Sigh. I think I'm going to complain to Jasper Fforde. It's all his fault.
QUOTE OF THE DAY: "I like pigs. Dogs look up to us. Cats look down on us. Pigs treat us as equals." -- Winston Churchill
Go ahead, have a normal day.
