Cats and Mouse

The day begins on an interesting note. While walking Duke in the athletic fields behind our house we passed an owl (Great Horned I believe). He/She was sitting on the top of the football goal-post. It was dark (5:45 am) but you could make out the owl’s outline and see its head spin slowly around as it followed us as we walked 20 to 30 feet behind it.

We arrived back home to discover Roscoe and Reggie – the two more adventurous cats – had left a mouse for our inspection/enjoyment. It was quite dead, and Roscoe posed over it proudly while Reggie paced around behind him. Roscoe let me pick it up and dispose of it without incident. On other occasions, when they have a mouse we (the Dude and I) end up chasing the cats around the house, forcing them to drop it so we can take the mouse outside and release it. Of course, that’s when the mouse is still alive and who wants to give up a live (or partially alive) mouse? They are so much fun. Next time, if I’m home alone that is, I will just cat nature run its course. Once the mouse is good and dead, the cats will tire of it and probably even bring it to me.

Work continues to be busy, and I’m especially busy making up for time lost traveling. I missed two days last week for travel, and two days generate a ton of email. It feels like I’m always playing catch-up. After my regular “stand-up” meeting and a rather unproductive email exchange, I needed a mid-morning mental health break so I escaped to the walking path.