I'm getting really tired of pulling Athena off of my calico cat. For that matter, I'm getting tired of pulling a long history of cats off of her. I don't understand why she is always in that position. She's always hiding under some piece of furniture, screaming the worst kitty obscenities she knows, with some cat giving her the stinkeye. I've stopped getting up to check on her half the time. I just yell across the house, quoting from that wonderful internet meme, "LEAVE BRITNEY ALONE!!" I've heard repeatedly that predators go after the weaker prey animals, instinctively culling the herds. Is my little "Britney" just the weakest member of the Pride? She has been picked on for so long, by every other cat, I have to assume so. Athena gets crazy eyes every time she sees her, all pupils, barely a sliver of yellow visible. She jumps and bullies her just like my daughter's stubby-legged tuxedo cat, pounding on whatever surface the calico is resting on, to startle her into swearing, and then prancing off with a fluffy black tail bouncing as a final taunt. It all started with the little brown tabby who grew up with her, focusing like a laser beam on her as a target. He knew I didn't like it, but he would stare at her while she slept next to me, wanting to bite her on the butt. He would look at her, look at her butt, look at me, and then look away. Over and over. Look at the butt, look at me, look away. Eventually it would be more than he could bear, and he would jump up, bite her, and then run. The older my calico gets, the more frail and grumpy, the worse the abuse gets from the other cats. She just looks so pitiful in her old age. It paints a bigger target on her head.
I had a moment of zero self control this afternoon. I went to Lowe's with the express purpose of picking up a few more plants, and came home with three times as much as I meant to buy. I would have more guilt about overdoing it, if I didn't know for a fact that my man suffers from this exact same weakness, and he comes home with truckloads of plants and a sheepish grin. Granted, his worst excesses are typically the clearance plants that cost a dollar or less each. They're frequently just a little sun scorched, frost bitten, or simply needing deadheading to come back to life. But even if they're too weak to survive, the investment is minimal and the loss is easily absorbed. Today I pulled out several plants from the clearance racks, but I think the bigger investment was in insect-repelling and hummingbird-encouraging plants. This year I am tripling up on citronella plants, and I bought a trio of lemongrass, and more mint and rosemary to go with it. It was no fun getting chased out of my own damned Park last year because of the mosquitoes and banana spiders. I'll do whatever I can, short of poison, to reduce the insects and maintain my access to my own yard this year. All the fun was gone by the end of June, while the summer was still young. I intend to make it through full maturity this year. Or at least through July.
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