Posts Under Just For Fun Category

When I was about 7, one of the spare bedrooms at my paternal grandmother’s house held an antique penny slot machine and a bowl filled with pennies to use with the machine. One of my favourite things to do was (is, much to the delight of Casino Niagara and Fallsview while I was in university) to play slot machines. Nothing made me happier at 7 than seeing three cherries in a row, and hearing the delightful CLINKCLINKCLINKCLINKCLINKCLINKCLINKCLINKCLINKCLINK as previously deposited pennies poured out of the machine.

Now, besides my no-longer-secret slot machine addiction, I have two things to share with you:

1. My grandmother loved cats, and you couldn’t move 5 feet in her house without seeing those squishy cat balls they played with, although the cats were usually sleeping hiding lurking somewhere (no doubt plotting something evil), and,
2. (as if I really need to state this, as I’m sure you’ve figured it out by now) I hate cats.

And no, before you ask – I don’t mean dislike, I don’t mean would prefer to avoid, I mean full out, would-not-hit-the-brakes-if-a-cat-ran-in-front-of-my-car** HATE cats.

This one particular day, not unlike many others, I decided to go play the slot machine. One of the cats was lying on the bed, which I thought nothing of.

I should probably mention that at this very moment, my innocent, naive, 7 year old self did not hate cats. Quite the opposite – I was OK with moving at age 5, as long as it was to the “house with the well the kittens were playing around” (my parents did buy that house, I was devastated to discover neither the well nor kittens came with it when we moved in), and could often be found on the floor rolling around balls with bells at my grandmothers trying to entice the cats to come out of hiding.

But for whatever reason, this PARTICULAR day the he-demon cat started hissing at me and crouched up the second I pulled the lever on the machine – I guess he doesn’t like gambling. I turned around to see what the matter was, and the thing LEAPED off the bed at me, teeth bared, hissing, and attacked me as I ran shrieking, crying, and hysterical from the room.

(Karma – he got run over by a car 2 weeks later.)

I hated cats for years after that.

Then finally, when I was about 11, I finally started to warm up to my best friend’s cat, Cleo. She was this big, fat, sweet, fuzzy ball of cuteness with a limp that you couldn’t POSSIBLY not warm up to. Her mom had 5 or 6 cats at the time (they LOVE pets) and Cleo was the ONLY one I secretly liked would tolerate.

Even I, as a cat-hater, was not immune to this cat’s adorable ways.

Mistake number one.

I learned a valuable lesson that day: never trust a cat; even an old, limping, believably cute one.

One day, we were sitting on her bed and I innocently went to pet it and it BIT ME.

Turns out, my friend had been tapping it’s foot and irritating it shortly before I went to pet it – so it took it’s annoyance out on me, not her… but by that point, it was too late. Surely a DOG would know the difference between two people. My DOG would never bite my friend AT ALL, and certainly not if she was mad at ME.

Angry, I decided I would never again trust a cat.

I still find cats cute from time to time – I love the infamous surprised kitty video (but you couldn’t pay me enough to tickle that cat), and I think Cats That Look Like Hitler is a hilarious site (though possible because it makes them look evil, which they are since they’re, you know, felines). I even “awh” at the white kittens in the toilet paper commercial.

But all THOSE kittens have one thing in common: I’m looking at them through the safety of my computer screen.

To this day, I still LOATH all things feline and am nervous around them… which OF COURSE only makes them want to “make friends” with me more. They follow me around, lie on the back of the couch behind me, and rub up against my leg. One more than one occasion, when crashing at a cat-owner friend’s house, I’ve awoken to a kitty either a) staring at me while I sleep and flicking it’s tail, or b) practically sleeping on my head.

But of course, the cat-owner NEVER believes their pet is plotting my death – nope, it’s “Oh, how ADORABLE, look, he LIKES you! How can you POSSIBLY not like/be scared of something SOOO adorable, he just wants to be FRIENDS!”

No, I’m pretty sure he is just tracking my behavior and plotting my untimely demise.

A few months ago, while at a girl friends house, her cat went bat s&!^ crazy – hissing, lunging at people, running around her apartment attacking everyone and everything that stepped to near it.

I was cowering in the corner by the balcony, standing ON a chair (not like that would save me from a cat), ready to open the door and jump down two stories before that thing was getting anywhere near me.

And this was all because she PICKED IT UP AND BROUGHT IT INSIDE when the pizza guy came.

When I pick my dog up and take her somewhere, she gives me a dirty look and leaves the room if she doesn’t like it.

Even my friend was scared of her OWN cat, and she finally had to throw cat nip into her bedroom and lock it in there – at which point it began slamming into, and clawing at, the back of the door.

Holy. Crap.

If that doesn’t prove all cats are evil – I don’t know what does.

Give me a dog any day!

**I’m (mostly) kidding about the not-braking part, cat lovers/PETA… a cat would surely dent my bumper.