Cats: the gift that keeps on giving

[desperance]

I still haven't got used to the fact that my office floor is all clean and open and uncluttered.

Neither have the cats.

In my case, this not-usedness manifests in the fact that I still scuttle strangely crabwise to the door in the dark, trying to avoid treading on obstructions - boxes, bin-bags, heaps of paper, heaps of books - that are actually no longer there.

In the cats' case, it manifests in lying sprawled in curious new places not hitherto accessible.

Which gives me a very good reason for strange crabwise scuttling, because yup: there are indeed obstructions underfoot. Self-motivated movable obstructions, never in the same place twice. Noisy when trodden on...

Also:

354 / 509 (69.5%)

I worked all day for 44 pages. I cannot believe how slow this is. Maybe I'm just making it loads & loads better...?

Comments

[karenmiller.livejournal.com]

Absolutely you are. Never doubt it for an instant.

[triciasullivan.livejournal.com]

'trying to avoid treading on obstructions - boxes, bin-bags, heaps of paper, heaps of books - that are actually no longer there'
ROFL--oh, dear.

44 pages is a lot in a day. I mean, if you'd written 10 of them cold it would be a good day. Going over and editing 44 is very respectable.

[desperance.livejournal.com]

I really should've taken before and after photos; nobody will now believe just how much of a tip this room was, a week ago. Classic one-path-from-door-to-desk-but-you-have-to-edge-sideways stuff.

Now it's all open prairie and wide vista. I have agoraphobia indoors. Also, now that the mess is cleared away, I have ambitions to rearrange the furniture, fix the bookshelves securely to the walls, sort the papers... Y'know. Like that.

And once the book's away, I might even have the time. I came back at midnight and did another six pages, just to get to that magic 50. Which is still only half what I was hoping for, but hey...

[http://users.livejournal.com/la_marquise_de_/]

You are adding the French polish to the already beautiful hand-crafted work.
If there is one thing worse than helpful cats it's moving helpful cats. We have told you the story of Caspian, Rhani (a friend's cat) and the tabby stair carpet?

[desperance.livejournal.com]

You are adding the French polish to the already beautiful hand-crafted work.

More like hacking off the lumpy bits. Polishing comes later; this should be a cruder, swifter process. Swifter, damn it...!

And, no. Do tell?

[http://users.livejournal.com/la_marquise_de_/]

When I first got Caspian, I was house-sharing with a friend, J in a house which had a dark brown, speckled stair carpet on a narrow staircase which had two bends and no separate light and no window. J also had a cat -- Rhani -- a dark tortie tabby who was only just out of kitten age. Caspian and Rhani were bestest friends and spent all their time chasing each other, playing hide and seek and so on.
One of their favourite games went like this.
It is any time after twilight -- preferably very early morning. Caspian sits on one of the least well-lit stairs and lurks. A human gets up and blunders downstairs in the gloom. Halfway down, they just about make out the shape of a dark grey cat on the stair and step over than step... straight onto Rhani, who was the exact same shade as the carpet. Rhani shrieks, human tumbles down the stairs, other humans wake up complaining, cats get guilt offering of chicken, cats repeat the game...

[desperance.livejournal.com]

Hee. That's very good.

Me, I dursen't get up in the night. Barry is asleep by my left shoulder, making the most of these few hours when he needn't fear the reaper. The reaper (that would be Mac) is either asleep on my other side, or else under the duvet, or else in his bed in the bathroom. Whichever, my rising will disturb him; and once disturbed, sure as eggs is eggs, he will fall upon Barry and there will be tussles and screams and chasings, and it'll be an hour before Baz creeps back to bed again...

[http://users.livejournal.com/la_marquise_de_/]

We get clamped by Ish and Horus. Horus wants us to get up from 4 a.m. on. Ish wants us to keep still...