What's everyone doing for Memorial Day Weekend?

I'll tell you what I'm doing.

I'm going to visit Gusto. You know, that asshole to the left. His owners are going to be out of town for the weekend, so they asked me to come out and give him some company.

So I get the pleasure of riding in a cardboard box 40 miles, and trying in vain to hold on to my Purina. And once that fails, trying to keep my intestinal play-doh. And once that fails, trying to keep from rolling around in my own bodily fruits.



Once there, I'm sure Gusto and I will hiss at each other and take turns clobbering one another and biting ears.

Then the special treat; I get outdoors! A full five acre forest for me to roam, full of deadly racoons, wily squirrels, and hawks that swoop down out of the sky and hit you on the head with their talons.

So what is everyone else doing?

"She's Gone" by Hall and Oates

Hall and Oates had a hit song called "She's Gone," way back in the early 80's. The lyrics went something like this:

She's Gone, oh I, oh I
I better learn how to face it.
She's gone, oh I, oh I,
I'd pay the devil to replace her.
She's gone.

Yes, people, Stephanie is gone. She up and left me last week, for the bright lights of Los Angeles. On the way out the door she gave me some stale kitty treats and told me that she bet the kitties in LA were much more handsome, charming and groomed.

I can just see her there now. Probably her first stop once in California was the Hollywood pet store, and she walked up and down the aisle petting all the felines they had in stock. I bet one of them claimed shared lineage with Rob Lowe's Russian Blue, while another was the love child of Rob Reiner's English Long hair.

It's hard for a gutter kitty like myself to compete with the likes of that.

But I still think Stephane will come back to me someday. I may not have a pedigree, and no one ever hung a price tag of $40 next to my name (I was in the clearance section).

But I can love Stephanie better than all those other high-fallutin' kitties can. Not one of them would have the dedication to wake her up at 3am in the morning to scratch her face with their litter-encrusted paws, or rub their plaque-filled chompers over her hands to mark their territory.

But I would and have.

Stephanie, you'll come back to me.

Raise the roof

I believe one of the key reasons Stephanie and I get on so well is that we have a shared sense of contempt for cleanliness in our living quarters. I leave my fur on everything, scatter my food all over the floor before I eat it, and fling kitty litter on the ground when I'm voiding.

Stephanie does much the same thing, or at least the human counterpart. She leaves her dishes out for days at a time, along with numerous cans of half (or should I say a third) finished Diet Coke with Lime. She also believes that the place for clean and dirty laundry is on the floor.

So yesterday I see what looks to be food of some kind on the coffee table. I move my old gelatinous mass over there and put my front legs up on the table for a better look-see. Unbeknownst to me, the table had a bad leg that was causing it to tilt precariously. Before I could figure out if Stephanie had left me any KFC or bacon, my weight pushes the table down, sending all of its contents flying into the air! The back half almost whacked me in my cute adorable mug, but luckily I was too quick!

Anyways, for a second it seemed like it was raining candy wrappers, unpaid bills, and silverware. But don't forget about the three cans of Diet Coke sitting there! They all toppled, leaving a nice big brown stain about a foot long in radius on the carpet.

Stephanie was angry at me but deep down I knew she was just pretending. She really was proud of me.