It has been the tradition that the cats come into our room at five a.m. to announce the fact that they are Hungry. It used to be the tradition that one of us would rise from the bed and fumble downstairs and open a can of cat food and plop some into the dishes and put the dishes down on the floor and then stumble back upstairs to grab a scant few moments of slumber before Alfred would come back into the room meowing loudly to announce that he was ready to go outside, now, please.
(Sometimes, I actually have the intelligence or wakefulness to go to the front door after giving them their breakfast and await His Majesty in order to let him out before heading upstairs again; but that is generally the exception rather than the rule.)
In more recent times, it has become the custom that the earliest riser in the house - i.e. James - feeds the kitties while waiting for his morning coffee to brew. This has been a delightful development. It means that we get to stay in our warm, comfy bed just a little while longer.
But sometimes Mr. Early Riser forgets to take care of the cat-feeding before he jumps in the shower, in which case the cats come into our room and complain. Loudly. Erin attempts to shred the carpet with her claws, Alfred sings an aria from Die Fledermaus (he's a baritone).
I don't like carpet shredding, nor am I a fan of early-morning opera. I am also not a fan of getting up too early in the morning to deal with annoying felines when someone with the capability of dealing with the situation is already up. Namely, Mr. Early Riser.
Sometimes, Mr. Early Riser needs a reminder that I expect him to take care of the annoying felines. Not for my sake, of course, but for the sake of his dear mother, who needs her sleep. We all know what happens when we are pulled out of our "deep-sleep" REM phase too early: we go through the whole day but never feel really rested. A not-fully-rested mother (or wife) is not a good thing. It can lead to all sorts of bad consequences. It is to be avoided at all cost.
Mr. Early Riser performed his task well this morning. Indeed, I never heard a peep of cat, and was able to rise at a normal time. I enjoyed a leisurely, casual breakfast with my Lovely Lady, and felt mostly rested all day.
Ah, if only the days could all be like this. Whatever will we do when our Early Risers have moved on?
NOTE: To those of you wondering (as my mother does) why these posts are suddenly appearing with dates from the past, it is because I am taking advantage of the ability to set the date for any entries, rather than having them set automatically by the blog software.
I must confess that it has been difficult of late to spend any time doing web updates, which explains in part the vast gap in time between entries. Yet my personal logbook is something I write in every day, a habit which I started way back in 2000. Most of the entries in the daily log are for keeping track of work activities; several of them are related to evening activities with the family, or weekend plans; some few are actually ideas or essays which spring to my head and must be written down.
Reviewing the daily logs and transferring interesting excerpts to my weblog is of necessity a background priority, subject to interruption by various and sundry activities, which lately include First Robotics over at the High School (even though none of my children are interested). But I want the entries to remain linked to the original date on which they were composed, not necessarily the date on which they finally made their public appearance. This is to ensure that the weblog retains some historical aspect, so that I or my progeny are able to review these logs at a later time in order to remember the "good old days".
I apologize if this is confusing.
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