Because of the change in climate – the humidity makes everything feel hotter than it otherwise would feel – Tellulah and Oberon have been going through their own changes. Right now, they’re shedding fur, and a lot of it. They’ve also been eating a lot less than they used to, and they’re spending even more time napping. But, true to the life of a cat, they still get into mischief.
I’ve mentioned that we have a mozzie net that we sleep under. Well, first things first. For those of you not in the now, mozzie is slang for mosquito. So there, you’re informed and edumacated.
In Canada, of course no mozzie net is needed. Where mozzies are a problem, there are usually screens on the windows, but in Sri Lanka, that of course is a resounding . . . No. In Canada, with no mozzie net, Oberon and Tellulah were used to sleeping with me at their leisure. That is, they’d come, they’d go, theyd play in the middle of the night and come back and catch more zzzzs with me. Oberon usually slept at my feet like a dog, and Tellulah usually slept on my pillow right beside my head. Of course, when I rolled over, there was her butt, but at least she’s very fastidious about cleaning it.
Here, with yon mozzie net, they can’t come and go and sleep in our bed with us. Barrier.
Tellulah didn’t even try – she just found another place to sleep, and instead, she grabbed her affection from me during the day. Oberon, on the other hand, is a selfish, stubborn, pigheaded boy cat, dumber than a mud fence, so of course he still wants in.
The first week or so, I let him in, but then I’d also have to let him out as well. He’d try walking into the mozzie net, expecting it would just give him up, but you and I know it don’t work that way, even if atoms are 99.999% empty space, or maybe it’s only 99.99%. Whatever. You get my point anyway.
So I’d end up waking up to Oberon fighting his way out, and unsuccessfully to boot. Eventually, I just stopped letting him in. I think it was Fahim’s voice that did it for me. "You know you’re just going to have to let him out again, right?" "You know he’ll just claw the net, right?" Yeah, yeah, Fahim, I get your point. I liked my cats sleeping with me, but I guess it’s okay, cuz now I have an even larger warm body to snuggle with. That’s what it’s all about, isn’t it? A warm body.
I kid.
I stopped letting Oberon in. But Oberon, being stubborn, still fights with the net – from the outside. He grabs ahold of it and, well, he’s clawed holes in it. I’m not impressed, especially since I’m the one who knows how to use a needle and thread.
Oberon tries to claw his way in during the middle of the night when Fahim and I are supposed to be sleeping. Well, Fahim actually is asleep, whereas I kinda wander in and out of sleep at a leisurely tourist kind of pace. Sometimes, when I’m in that sort of awake state, I catch Oberon clawing at the net. OUT comes the water sprayer and phthth Oberon takes a soaking. And yet he still hasn’t given up.
That boy needs some serious retraining. Either we send him to boot camp, or I get a Super Soaker.
