Hello. This will be funny to you. It was not so funny to me, but I thought someone should get some enjoyment out of my experiences.
Sometime in the pre-dawn hours, I hear the hacking of a hairball about to come up on the pillow next to me. I realize Pete, our 16 year old tuxedo cat, is in bed with us. I say, "Pete, don't puke in the bed." For some reason, this always works and he stops. I fall back asleep.
I am awakened again, still pre-dawn, by what feels like a furry finger across one of my eyes and the bridge of my nose. I hear a furious licking. Pete has decided it is time for a pre-dawn bath and has thrown a leg over my face in his bathing contortions. He finishes his bath and gets under the covers between me and Bart.
We now have Killer and our new dog, Lucky, at the foot of the bed and Pete between us. The queen size bed is getting smaller by the minute. I fall back asleep, again.
Still pre-dawn, I am awakened by the phone ringing. This, of course, makes my heart race. Who's dead? Who's been in an accident? Pre-dawn phone calls are never good.
I did notice, as I leapt out of bed, it was 7:00 a.m. I see on the caller ID that it's State Farm Insurance. No doubt my East Coast agent who still has my property there insured. Even though I certainly don't want to talk business at this hour, I answer the phone so that the ringing doesn't wake-up Coffee aka Bark-o-matic.
The cheery receptionist, Brittany, says, "Good morning Cowgirl Domino." I interrupt her and say, "It is 7 a.m. in the Northwest." She says, "I beg your pardon?" Apparently she has dialed my area code without the faintest thought that that is not a local area code and no occurrence that maybe she should look it up before dialing.
I say again, "I live in the Northwest now and it is 7 a.m. here." This does not slow cheerful Brittany down one bit, "Well, we see your p.o. box has expired and we need your new address." Now, how they have my new phone number and not my address, yet I still get correspondence from them is beyond me; but I'm too sleepy to articulate all of this, so I give her the new p.o. box. I go back to sleep for the third time.
The final awakening is at 8:10 a.m. At least the sun is just now coming up. It is Coffee in full Bark-o-matic mode and 20 minutes early. This gives Lucky the cue that it's time to greet us with his morning exuberance.
Lucky does mornings like no one else can. Sometime in the past hour since cheerful Brittany called, Lucky has gotten off the bed and started entertaining himself with looking out the window.
Once Coffee sounds the morning alarm, he leaps into the middle of the bed. I reach up, my eyes still closed, and rub his chest. I say, "Lay down, Lucky." He flops, all 56 lbs of himself, down on my leg and drops his head on my hip. He begins licking my hand.
Then, he decides "Daddy" really needs some morning kisses, too. So, he stands up, approaches Bart, and begins licking him full force all over his face. I roll over and say to Bart, I'm just laughing out loud at this point in the absurdity,"It's like having a pack of 3 year olds sleeping with us." To which Bart responds, "Three year olds get up earlier." Bart, who can sleep through anything, has missed all of this up to the 7 a.m. phone call from cheerful Brittany.
Lucky then leaps off of the bed again and begins playing fetch with himself. He accomplishes this by taking a ball in his mouth, tossing it across the room, bouncing it off of furniture, and then chasing it. This sequence repeats itself many times. It is not a quiet process, but Lucky enjoys it. It makes him so happy, I cannot tell him to stop.
I gave up on sleeping until 8:30. We got up. Bart took everyone out. I made everyone breakfast, including Bart, give Pete hairball medicine, and here we are. Hope you had a laugh!
As most people know, I am not a morning person. And, as my friends know, I have been off of caffeine for a year and a half. Right now, I really miss coffee and diet coke!
Have a good day,
Cowgirl Domino
