who do ya love? pt 2

The Tink, or whereby we adopt a cat:

The year is 2000. I have just had an alarm system installed at my house, and like all homeowners with brand new alarm systems, I am actually using mine. (Turning the alarm system on will soon become a thing of the past but it makes us FEEL more secure). A couple of months earlier, Julian and I adopted a new cat named Tink, who I believe to be Cary Grant reincarnated. He's very cool. He also looks like he's wearing a tuxedo. Tink has decided to go out into the world - to mark his territory or whatever it is cats do - and has been gone for 3 days. We're pretty sure he's never going to come back. We're resigned to it.

4:30am: A window breaks and the alarm goes off (hey, these things really do work). ADT calls the police. The police come. They shine their flashlights and check things out. No burglars. No intruders We surmise that the jiggly storm window I'd opened the night before has crashed down and broken on its own. The police leave. Julian and I are about to go back to bed when we hear a meow and discover Tink, hooked to the window screen, demanding to be let in. It appears that our burglar is Tink.

Fast forward to the present day. Tink has developed into a fine specimen of a cat. He likes to vocalize. He expects to be given your empty bowl after you've eaten ice cream, so he can lick it. He can hear the clink of a spoon on an ice cream bowl from miles away. He will wake you up in the middle of the night if he feels like talking. There's nothing you can do about it. If there's no food in his bowl, he'll knock it to the floor. This makes a semi-loud noise. If you don't feed him right away, he'll wrestle the entire food container to the floor, which makes an even louder noise. When you go looking for the noise, he's there waiting for you. He spends most of his time outside and God only knows what he does or where he goes. Generally, he only comes in to eat or lick your ice cream bowl.

Two weeks ago, 12:00am: Julian wakes me up, whispering that there's someone downstairs; that he has heard footsteps. We, of course, don't use the alarm system much anymore so we're kind of on our own. Being a manly 18 years old, he calls the police himself and handles the 911 operator. The police come. They shine the flashlights everywhere. There's been no sign of a break-in and no one else is in the house. The police leave. Using my female powers of deduction, I inspect the room where the cats are fed. The empty food dish is on the floor. Tink is waiting to be fed.

Yesterday: The pumpkin that has been sitting precariously perched on the porch rail for one whole month is found smashed on the front walk.

Vandals?

I think not.

This marks my 100th post. Jeeves, you may detonate the fireworks now.