Scotch the Cat, “The Exorcist”, and the Island of Misfit Toys

  Okay, what happened was…

  I woke up. That’s all I did.

  I was napping in one of my secret places, behind the purple couch with the too-big pillows that smell like me because, well, I can’t leave stuff alone. I like it back there. You have to squeeze a little bit to get in there, but it’s worth it, because then there’s a place just my size. I can lay there and peek and see stuff, but nobody can see me. My daddies will call one of my names and walk around looking for me but they don’t know where I be and it’s fun.

  They try to tease me, though, my daddies. They go to the Pan Tree and open the door and make one of the Treat Bags make noise. When I was little and more simple, I would hear that noise and run to them very fast, because it meant I would get little bits of something special in my bowl. I like bits of special. But after years of simple I figured out that sometimes the noise was a trick. My daddies were not putting something in my bowl. They wanted to get me.

  I don’t wanna be got. I don’t wanna be anything where I can’t jump down and run somewhere else. My daddies don’t understand that I am very important and I don’t have time for being got. I have things to do. Important stuff I need to do now, not later when they lay down on the big bed with the come-for-tour that I like to scratch and they are not caring if I break stuff or not. Don’t get me! Unless I say.

  Because being got is bad. My daddies are going to do something I don’t want them to do. Sometimes they want to take little round white things and shove them in my place where the food goes. My throwed. I don’t like that. That’s not a treat. Why are they shoving it? I don’t want it. And one of the daddies knows how to squeeze on part of my face where my mouth just falls open, I can’t help it. Then bam, not-treat in my throwed. I will scratch him later for bamming.

  And sometimes they want to stop fleece. I don’t know fleece. My daddies say fleece is bad and they don’t want fleece on me. But what is fleece? They don’t say that part, just stop fleece. So they get me, because I didn’t think right, and I got got. And one daddy holds me and the other daddy puts cold yuck on my back. The part of my back that I can’t lick or scratch, by my head. That’s mean. Daddies are mean about fleece. I can’t get yuck off! Even if I run and hide and be mad.

  But the baddest got thing? The clip hers. I think my daddies love me but then I get got and one of the daddies has the clip hers. And then I don’t know about love. I only know I want to be away from clip hers. One of the daddies makes me be still and the other daddy puts the clip hers on my scratch-toes and he CUTS THEM! My daddies cut me! They cut my toes! It is terrible and bad.

  And I try to stop them. Because I know they might have demons and maybe they don’t understand. I know about demons. Sometimes the daddies leave the Tea Vee on when they go to those places I can’t go and they come back with bags of stuff that I can sniff. And one time the Tea Vee had a long show called “The Ex Or Sips”  about a girl named Lend the Bear who spit up lots of hairballs and killed people who wore black and white clothes and made them fall down stairs and stuff. She was loud and mean but other people in the show said she did it because of demons.

  So my daddies have demons. And that makes them want to cut me. But it’s still just me that has hair balls, so maybe that movie didn’t tell me everything.

  I forgot what I was trying to tell you.

  Oh, the cutting and the clip hers. So when my daddies and the demons try to cut me, I fight. I fight hard, because I don’t like it when big people make me do things I don’t want to do. I squirm and I wiggle and I howl like Lend the Bear, like my daddies are trying to kill me. I don’t know if they are or not but I don’t want to find out. This makes the daddies say strong words and they are not happy, but Scotch is not happy either because they might be killing me. Why do they not understand that I’m not happy?

  I’m sad now. I don’t know if I want to talk anymore. Daddies should not hurt kitties with clip hers. Bad.

  Oh, look. A leaf just fell in the yard. I want to kill it. Or maybe I want to check my bowl to see if there’s something new. Or sleep. I like sleeping.  And stretching after sleeping. Do you like tuna? I like tuna. Bunches. And bugs can be yummy.

   I forgot again why I’m here. Oh yeah. I was talking about the picture that goes with this story. I don’t like that picture. And I think it’s Lie Bell that one of my daddies took it. It makes me look mean and maybe did something bad to my toys that look hurt. They are only a little hurt, not bad hurt. And they only got hurt because they made me mad. Don’t make me mad, don’t get hurt. Gold In rule. But maybe I should tell why I mad and then had to hurt.

  I was behind the purple couch, just laying. I already did all my important morning stuff and checked and sniffed all the things that need checked and sniffed. So it was time for a brake, because I’m in the Kitty Union and we have work-hers rights. So I was braking, and maybe snoozing a little because I’m good at that. And then one of the daddies was done with his get-ready stuff and it was time for him to say bye and drive away in his car to that place he goes to make money.

  I don’t really like this part. Because I was all settled and comfy and didn’t want to do things that make me look cute. But that daddy has to play with me for a little before he drives to the money place. I don’t know why. I know he’s going to come back. And I’m not going anywhere, because they don’t let me go anywhere, because I am End Door Kitty who gets told no-no when I try to run outside and touch grass. (I still try, but always no-no and door slamming.) So daddy was trying to play and I didn’t want to because I was braking. He called my name lots.

  I pretended I didn’t hear him. (Braking!)

  He called more. I was starting to think I didn’t like this daddy. Let me lay and not do anything! Go make the money and bring me back a treat bag. Not hard, just do. He called more. I thought maybe I call my Union Stew Herd and file a grieve ants, but I didn’t know where my sell phone be. (Maybe in big water bowl where daddies sit. The bat room?) I like to throw stuff in big water bowl, so maybe sell phone got throwed. I forget stuff. I’m simple but I’m pretty.

  I finally got tired of daddy calling so I got up and peeked around the purple couch. Daddy saw me and grabbed me and raised me in the air and made baby talk. I don’t like to be in the air. I have told my daddies “No Air!” all the time. One daddy understands, and no air. Other daddy not understand, and air happens. So Air Daddy was doing the air thing and I had to remind him about no air. When he didn’t listen, I squirmed and tried to kill him with my claws.

  He didn’t like that.

  Good. He put me down on my special place. It’s a desk that other daddy got from Pear One. But my daddies don’t do desk stuff with it. They put nice soft floors on the top so I can lay down and watch out the window and wait for leaves to fall so I can think about killing them. And that was okay, because it’s my me-only place and I can think about being the King Kitty of the world. But then Air Daddy found one of my old toys and put it down beside me.

  I don’t like that old toy. I liked it a long time ago when I was little and didn’t know that if I just wait, there will be new toys coming. I played with it a lot when I was stupid, because it was red and it was a crab and I like seafood and it was easy for my claws to grab it and throw it everywhere or maybe put it in one of my water bowls and wait for one of the daddies to find it and make funny faces because I drowned my crab. I like it better when my daddies don’t understand my plans. Because I get more treats that way.

  Anyway, daddy threw yucky crab on my special throne and then kissed me on the head. My head that I had just cleaned with one of my front paws and now it was dirty again. Why do they not understand about clean spots? Don’t touch! It takes a long time to make things clean. So I was in a bad mood and I was glad Air Daddy left for the way-far place because I needed to call my lawyer. And then sleep.

  But I didn’t get to do anything of my important stuff, because other daddy came out of the Off Hiss room and wanted to know what I was doing. Why checking on me when Air Daddy just did? You have sell phones. Text and leave me alone! But I tried to be sweet because maybe treat time, you never know. I just sat there and tried to look hungry.

  But no treat. Other daddy saw ugly crab toy and thought I was playing with it. (I not!) And he thought I needed other toys. (No, please.) And he found the mouse toy and flopped it on my throne. I don’t like the mouse toy, almost more than crab. Mouse toy don’t work right. When you pick up, no sound. When you throw on ground, it make noise. Why that? It should scream when I pick up, not throw down. Stupid bad toy.

  So now I had two not-want things on my throne. Life is very hard. I tried to tell daddy that this was not working for me, that toys should be in trash and treats should be in mouth. But he not listen. He thought I was singing or something and wanted to take a picture. He stupid sometimes. He ran to get cam-raw. I wanted him to fall down and leave me alone until time for attention. I’m busy and popular on Cat Book. Two thousand furrers!

  But he came back. Bad daddy! And he had cam-raw, and shoving it at my face and talking to me pretty but he really didn’t mean it. He just want me to look at cam-raw. I don’t want to look at cam-raw, but only so many places to look, with ugly crab and stupid mouse in my house. So I finally look at daddy and he burn my eyes with cam-raw fire. More reason to call lawyer.

  And then he show me picture. I look all mad, because I BE mad, with not-want toys on my soft royal floor that is MINE. And I get madder because I know this daddy is the one who makes clog posts about me and not talk to my agent before he do. Not right. But I can’t stop it, daddy goes clogging without asking me if okay. My daddies need training, Clog Daddy AND Air Daddy. Please click on Pet-Pal link to donate for my cause to train daddies better. It’s flax deductible! Send lots of money. Money good.

Love,

Scotch

P.S. to Clog Daddy: Why are there dead plants outside my royal window? King Kitties don’t want to see that. More lawyer reasons. I call now.

10 Reasons Why Attending a Mandatory Staff Meeting with Your VP Will Suck the Life Out of You

1. You have to show up for work on time.

For some diabolic reason, they always schedule these torture sessions first thing in the morning. There’s absolutely no legitimate reason for this, because no one, I don’t care who you are, functions their best before 10am. At that time of day, I’m still struggling with basic things like consciousness and breathing. I’m certainly not going to pay any attention to “new visions for the company” or marketing pushes involving cute, furry animals and a singing ping pong ball.

And really, your VP couldn’t care less if you are there or not. She has no idea who you are and probably never will, since she’s going to take the first decent retirement package that comes along and then go live some place where they have dolphins. She’s just here because it’s one of her quarterly objectives if she wants that damn bonus. She will not shed a tear if your seat is empty.

Your direct manager, on the other hand, will take your life if you don’t make an appearance. So you have to initiate drastic measures to ensure that you are on time, like getting up early, not allowing yourself to harvest anything in Farmville, and forgoing the ecstasy of the local Starbucks. Because if there’s going to be a wreck on the highway, it’s going to be on this critical day, and you need the extra time to take an alternate route through a part of town where people get shot for wearing the wrong bandana.


2. They never pick an appropriately-sized conference room.

I really don’t understand this. It’s not like they don’t have any idea how many people will be attending. We have an entire organization devoted to counting things like paper clips and bar tabs, so surely some fool with a forecasting program on his nerdy little PC can project the turnout. How can this be hard?

But no, it always works out one of two ways. There’s the overkill approach, where you find yourself standing in a vast auditorium along with only two other people, your footsteps echoing throughout the cavern as you wait for the other people that are never going to show. Your natural instinct to sit in the back of the room is tempered by the fact that the last row of seats appears to be located in Kansas.

So the three of you huddle together in one of the mid-range rows, complete strangers five minutes ago but now united in solidarity against the ordeal to come. Of course, when you get the big room package, you also get the touchy, feely VP who insists that everybody join him on the front row, where you can join hands and pray for the stock price to recover. God is my co-trader.

On the flip side of the room game, we have the scenario where 212 people are crammed into a space the size of a utility closet, fighting over the one chair that isn’t broken and unable to find a single place where the VP isn’t actually breathing on you. Within the hour, the body heat in the room will cause you to snap and wipe out an entire department using a plastic bagel knife.

3. You will sit near someone you hate.

This never fails. You can try your best to surround yourself with friends or acquaintances that you can at least tolerate, but eventually someone you despise will slip through the gauntlet and plop down beside you. This usually happens at the very last second, as the irritating VP is approaching the podium, so you won’t have any time to make an escape.

Of course, if you’re on the bonus plan, this person you detest will have no clue how much you can’t stand them. So they try to act like you’re the tight sorority sisters that you will never be. They will tell you all about their latest surgeries, display pictures of their ugly grandchildren, and inquire into the latest stats on your sex life, all within 5 minutes of sitting down. It’s perfectly okay to take your copy of the agenda and suffocate this person.

4. Your chair is a prop from “The Exorcist”.

Naturally, your chair will look completely innocent when you first make your selection. In fact, it will even seem to be completely comfy and relaxing as the session begins. But once you have been lulled into a false sense of safety and non-humiliation, the deviltry begins.

First, the seat of the chair will suddenly plummet to the ground, causing your knees to be banging against your ears, looking like Rae Dawn Chong in “Quest for Fire”. When you attempt to rectify this situation, pulling on random levers beneath the seat, you will suddenly catapult upwards, suffering whiplash and letting out a terrified wail of fear and confusion. Finally, the back of the chair will flip down, sending you toppling backwards to your death and causing your uncontrolled, lethal feet to kick the head of the person in front of you. And yes, everyone will focus their rescue efforts on the person you just beaned, while you lay bleeding behind your chair, ass in the air.

5. You can’t see the preso on the screen.

Granted, we’re not as young as we used to be, no longer able to dance all night at the bars and then drive directly to work with no after-effects. Things on our bodies are now decaying or just dropping off entirely. But still, it’s not really our fault that the idiot who is displaying the presentation on the screen has apparently never used the focus setting. Everything is blurry, and nobody but the people in the first row can read a thing. For all you know, you’re looking at a menu for Chinese take-out.

So you have to wing it, listening carefully and straining to decipher even one of the images, because you sure as hell don’t want to be the first one who complains about the quality of the VP’s dog and pony show. No sir. You will never get a promotion the rest of your life. You just sit there, nodding your head from time to time, and praying to the religious deity of your choosing that nobody calls on you to answer a question of any kind. If things become ominous and you feel direct verbal contact with the VP is approaching, quickly reach down and jerk on one of the chair levers. Hopefully it’s one that will quickly put you in a non-responsive coma.

6. They try to belittle you with fancy buzzwords.

I’d like to be the person who sits around and comes up with the latest catchwords of the day. Seems like a really good gig, because there’s obviously no thought or effort behind the choosing. It’s just whatever sounds catchy and hip, and you’re allowed to completely change the traditional meaning of the word if you see fit. Today’s word is “precious”, which supposedly means the facets of our company that are most important. I’m guessing the VP hasn’t seen the movie or been around Mo’Nique when she’s in a bad mood.

7. You will have a coughing fit during the one interesting part of the program.

You know this is going to happen, so you might as well prepare for the shame. You can quietly sit through two hours of monotonous crap that no one cares about, but the very second that the VP utters something like “and on the compensation side of things”, your throat will dry up like an 80-year-old hooker, dust will billow out your ears, and you will start choking on pure air. If you’re really lucky, your hacking will be the especially pretty kind that involves mucus.

Sadly, because everyone is basically self-centered these days, even if you try to discreetly leave the room, you will fail miserably. People in your row will only grudgingly get out of your way, so you spend considerable time clawing toward the aisle and gasping for air. Eventually you will collapse on your stomach, wriggling toward the exit, only to have your head stomped on by the VP as she retrieves a laser pointer from her Gucci briefcase.

8. The awards presentation goes on forever.

They stopped including actual bonus checks with these recognition awards years ago, so no one really cares about getting one. (Who wants another lousy piece of paper or a cheap-ass trophy when the light bill is due? You want to make me feel appreciated? Give me something I can cash.) Making the awards distribution process even more slug-like is the current corporate “trend” to reward everybody, even if you have to make something up, so the company can claim they are diverse and all-loving, and thereby receive a higher ranking from the Human Rights Campaign.

Things start out okay, with the first few recipients getting generous applause and hearty handshakes from the VP. After 100 names have been read, and we’re down to awarding the cleaning staff a certificate for creative toilet-paper-stacking, the thrill is completely gone. Hardly anyone is clapping, half the audience is dozing, and the VP is shoving people across the stage like somebody just spotted the Po-Po pulling up outside the crack house.

9. No one in the audience EVER has a valid question.

There are only two kinds of people who ask questions at things like this. We have the life-long brown-nosers who will do anything to get noticed, even if it includes public nudity or transactions involving firstborn children. They will ask the most inane queries, somehow managing to blow smoke up their own butt yet still giving the impression that they would lovingly drop to their knees and wash the VP’s feet with their hair, given the chance. The sucking-up noises can be heard by orbiting satellites.

Then we have the renegades, the people who dare to ask the “questions you’re not supposed to ask”, like why the hell are you laying everybody off and yet expecting us to double the output? You know, tiny little issues such as that. Of course, the VP, because she’s been fully trained in double-talk during all those fancy, high-level, closed-door meetings where they determine the fate of the planet, professionally avoids giving a direct answer. Then she quietly whispers instructions into her hidden Bluetooth microphone to have the renegade arrested when no one else is looking. And she will handle the subsequent “interrogation” personally. Jackie Bauer in da house.

10. Stupid, lazy people will not get out of your way when it’s time to leave.

Here’s a news flash, folks: When the VP says we’re done, then we’re done. Get your ass up and walk out the door. Don’t sit there like you can’t remember how to do this. Don’t rearrange your purse. Don’t talk to your neighbor about the excitement of winning an award that everybody got. And under no circumstances should you just stand there and paw at yourself, trying to readjust foundation garments that have slid out of place. You should only do that in the privacy of your own home. Or never.

And as for you brown-nosers? Now’s your chance for some quality time with the power person of your dreams. Don’t hold up the line while you stand there meekly, hoping to receive an invitation to the royal court. March right over there and do what you do best. Pucker up and go for it.

But she still won’t remember your name in the morning…