Mama Kitty - 1; Hubby - 0

If you haven't figured it out by now, I'm the cat lady.

My husband hates it, my daughter thinks it's hilarious, but the truth is, if anything were to ever happen to my husband (God forbid) and my daughter move out on her own, I'd be the crazy old lady on the corner with 200 cats in her house, sitting on everything, making me fall and break a hip and eventually having my own special on a "Cops" episode, or maybe one of those animal cruelty prevention shows.  Still can't figure out how it's cruelty if they take over YOUR house and you're starving while they've got fat little bellies and clean places to make poo, but I digress.

It's been cold here.  Not, just cold, but c.o.l.d.

Our four cats are good cats.  They stay in the house where it's warm.  They've obviously evolved past the whole "Oh look it's white stuff, let's go play in it" stage of their lives.  The others?  Not so much.  When I came downstairs this morning, they were huddled around the french doors looking pitiful.  So I let them out.

Why is this a problem?  Because they have decision making issues.

"Do I want to come in?"

"Maybe."

Door opens.

"Nah"

Cats run.  Away.  Not in.

Mia and Muffin - Creators of Tango, Skunkbutt, Oreo and Juliet

Repeat this scenario about twelve times and there's a snowdrift on my office carpeting and I've gotten "nipply".  Not to mention the tolerance level across the room (Hubs desk) has plummeted like the temperatures outside.  Now, having a LOT of the little furballs running around outside, you can already guess that they're not all going to want to come in at the same time.

The only thing they all do at the same time is poop when the litterboxes are clean.  Why is that anyway?  The second a litterbox is clean, every cat within scooping distance discovers the sudden and inexplicable urge to immediately take a dump.  Still haven't figured that out.

Anyhoo, I've managed to corral the four kitten cats (Tango, Oreo, Skunkbutt and Juliet) in the house, although they're still sitting at the door looking longingly out the window.  Tough shit guys, not happening.  Now I've got KJ and Hissy, Optikitten and Deceptikitten still outside.  Yes, the last two were named after Transformers.

Skunkbutt, Juliet, Tango and Oreo

The funny thing though is that they are having a blast outside.  I open the door and kittens and cats alike go sailing across the snow, sending up roostertails of the white stuff, skidding off the deck, rolling around in it, making snowballs (Yes, Patch has discovered how to make snowballs, which she then eats) and chasing each other around until they're freezing and trying to decide if they want to come in or not.

I won this round, Hubs has gone back to bed.  Where it's warm.  So I'm free to freeze my arse off opening the door a zillion times waiting for the little turds to decide when it's time to come in.  Unfortunately, by the time the other four decide it's time to come in, the others will be sneaking around trying to get out.  I've gotten pretty good at keeping their little butts inside, but every once in a while one will sneak past my defenses.  Then while I'm lamenting another thirty minutes of drafts trying to get that one back in, another sneaks out.  Then another.  Then I'm back at square one.

Hubs keeps saying they're not cold, cuz they have fur, to which I reply I've got a coat but I still get cold when it's fourteen degrees colder than a witch's booby in a brass bra outside.  Last night I took a huge bolt of fabric and wrapped it around the little house outside.  Then wrapped it in a tarp and put their food inside so it would be warm and insulated against the snow and wind inside.  Put a deck chair against the door so the snow wouldn't blow in the open door part.  Ugh.

You know this all sounded logical before I wrote it down.  Now I feel like well, the cat lady.

What's a woman to do?  Youngling is grown, so maybe I'm doing the whole caregiver thing, but with cats.  Maybe it's empty nesting.  Maybe I'm just as crazy as people have suspected for years.  At least I haven't done what I did last year.  Yet.


Hey, they loved that!  It was ingenious!  Damnit.  Now I'm feeling bad that I didn't do that.  I prolly should have done that.  Psht, nah, they're ALL in my house now, they don't need shelter, they just need to COME IN the damn door!

Someone please tell me this is normal?  Please?