Dude, where's my cat?

We've had a lot of pets at our house. We've had a dog named, of course, Denver, whose sole mission in life seemed to be to run that far. A cat named Chelsea who ran the place for 19 years. A gecko named Yoshi that lasted till I left the kids with a babysitter for the first time, then made his escape to parts unknown.

We currently have two dogs, two cats, a guinea pig, and a horse. The horse is not housed here, but dd stables him at a barn 15 minutes away.

DD's first cat's name was Dash. Dash was pretty. Longhaired and gray, she liked to hang out and see what people were up to. She used to come in and turn on the printer when I was typing. She was the cutest thing.

Then one night I was at work, and at about midnight ds, then about 10, called me. Lots of uh, um, ahhhhs, and Mom had had it: "Thomas, what do you want?" Immediate response from the kid: "The cat's dead." What? I figured he was talking about Chelsea, who was at least 16 at the time, but no, it was Dash.

Well, I was working all night, so I told ds to go wake up his father. No way. No way I could convince that kid to wake him up, "cause he gets mean." It was years later when I realized what he was talking about, but he's right -- that dude wakes up very grumpy. I don't remember how it ended that night, but the next day, when I was trying to sleep before working nights again, ds and his buddy come bursting into my room.

Babbling on at the same time, till I couldn't make any of it out -- and these were two boys who never talked. Here was their version of what had happened to the cat -- who was less than a year old at the time, I might add:

"We were downstairs playing video games. In the basement. There was this weird noise, and I said Dude, what was that? It sounded like a duck. And he said Dude, I don't know what it was, so we started playing again. Then we heard that noise again and I said Dude, what was that and he said I don't know. So I decided Dude, I'm goin' to bed, so I go upstairs." Then the buddy chimes in, "so he goes upstairs to go to bed, and I decided that it was creepy playing video games with that duck noise, so I decided to go to bed. I went to pull out the couch bed, and I couldn't pull it up. When I looked down into it to see why it was stuck, Dude, there was the cat. And so I go upstairs and try to wake him up and he won't wake up and I say Dude the cat's dead. And he says WTH and I said DUDE the cat is dead. And he says leave me alone I'm tryin' to sleep so I yell DUDE THE CAT IS DEAD. And we went down there and she was. Dude, it was so creepy, but I think that duck noise was the cat, cause she got stuck inside the couch, and I think she hung herself cause Dude, she was dead."

So, I say "Dude, where is the cat now, and does your sister know?" And they say, "Oh man, that wasn't good. But they are burying her in the back yard now. Dad bought a cooler to put her in, and they are having a funeral."

I don't think those boys ever tried to sleep in the basement again, cause Dude, they still talk about that duck noise that was actually the cat dying. "And Dude, that was so creepy." Oye.

So, may Dash rest in peace. We went out to the Humane Society three days later and got Izzie, who now rules the roost with a wave of her calico tale. Not long afterward, we got Bandit, who is so cute, but dumb as a rock, God love him. He even sleeps with ds, now 17, every night.

And so, in memory of Dash and her not so ducky end, here's a cute Enid Collins Turtle Purse, from North Mountian (sic) Vintage, on ebay. Cause a turtle is one of the few animals that we've never had here, though ds12 wants one. Cause Dude, turtles are cool. And they don't make noises.