Cat Matters

• $8.50 Wednesday
  
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• 24th Day Sober Reached
  
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• The Cat
  

I just had to swat the cat off of the keyboard of this laptop, where it had decided to park itself.


I often wonder about how it chooses its lounging spots.


It used to lay upon the window sill, which made sense given the curiosity inbred into cats and the activity which can be seen through the window.


It stopped using the window sill at about the time the temperatures dropped when winter came, which also made sense. The coldest spots in the whole apartment being the window sills.


It then began to use the chair upon which I sit behind this computer, and even if I were sitting in it would wedge itself behind me.


This afternoon, though, it lay down upon a pair of jeans that were on the floor, close to the dirty laundry pile.


The jeans were black, as is the chair that I sit on behind the computer. They also would have my scent in them, like the chair.


I thought that it moved because I usually leave a bright lamp on and if it slept on the chair it would be doing so under the glare.


The jeans were in the shade.


The laptop is black, and is probably redolent with my odor, just as the black jeans and chair would be.


For a period of about a week, it was laying atop the backrest of the couch in the living room, which is a brownish green, and doesn't fit the pattern.


The entrance door, though, is visible from that vantage point, and, having been relatively new to the apartment and myself as its owner, it hadn't gleaned the regularity of my schedule and probably sat there waiting for my return whenever I had gone out, thinking, probably, that the door is where I came from and worrying that if the doorway was out of its sight then I may never materialize.


I made sure the cat knew that sleeping upon the keyboard of the laptop is unacceptable by throwing a fit and slamming my hand down upon the table that the laptop sits on, which is also off limits (the whole table) because it could and would swat my speakers onto the floor.


$8.50 Wednesday


After posting from Starbucks yesterday, I left there and walked through the chilly air to the Lilly Pad.


I felt like I might be the only busker out, as I saw zero of them the entire length of Royal Street, which is rare.


Louise was even absent from her cubby hole across from the Supreme Court building where she reads tarot cards and gives advice. She has yet to try to rebuild the bridge that she has burned and try to use my apartment again; she just can't unring that bell. I will try to be as polite as possible should the occasion arise, and refrain from saying something rude. I might just say: "It's just not in the cards, Louise..."


Maybe she does indeed see in her cards that it would be futile to attempt to be my roommate again.


She is a textbook "borderline personality," and as Brian Hudson, musician, put it: "She seems to be either overly loving and kind; or walking down the street spewing hatred towards everyone and everything; at the top of her lungs."


There were hardly any people out.


I lost out on a couple of tips because of experimenting with the harmonica in the key of E flat, unsuccessfully at times. I also did one of my originals when I was feeling that a group had paused to listen; and that a familiar song might have been called for. Call it "buskers instinct."


A five dollar tip after I had found a song "After Midnight," by Eric Clapton which fit the harmonicas mode, brought my total to the above, after 2 hours of playing. I was satisfied, and bought instant coffee, a newspaper and a can of cat food; and then made the mistake of paying $1.25 for the trolley when I had an all day pass in my pocket. D'oh!!


Now Starbucks is closing, it is Thursday and not much warmer, but I will get to the Lilly Pad an hour earlier than last night, because this one closes at 9PM (in 3 minutes).


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