The 9 Cats of Distraction

Finally, the evening has arrived, the hot, muggy day is behind me. That is the life of this American here in the Philippines. I have not yet moved to the seaside where the air is fresh and the breeze is very cooling. I am stuck in General Santos City, a Fish Port whose main products are tuna and quarrying. I get the end product called dust. There is a dusty road out in front of our small home where I can find seashells. I joke to my friends back home that I live on what once was a beach eon ago. Yeah, it is extremely hot and dusty here. But tonight it is raining.

I enjoyed my fried chicken dinner and so did my 9 cats. Now I can begin to write another chapter in my Novel that I have titled Scorpii, a Sci-fi story about mutant scorpions that repopulate Arizona as a result of global warming.

I live in a one-room apartment so it is difficult to find solitude, and it seems tonight these cats have a plan of their own. As I settle down in my chair I carefully scan the room for any signs of movement. So far so good, no cats around.

I close my eyes and start dreaming, letting my creativity flow, and now I can see the words for the ninth chapter of Scorpii, "Into the Depths of Inferno Mine." I type one word, then another, and then whoosh, here they come, all 9 furballs. Salt and Pepper climb up on the small table to my right. Jade and Apollo jump on the box next to the other two. At my feet are Starbuck, Beauty, Athena, Ulysses, and Diamond are at my feet under and around the chair. I lower my head in my left hand as they are all screaming at me. I forgot to turn the typewriter sound feature off on my writing software program. To the cats, that sounds like I am eating with a fork, and they want their part of my food. But they soon find out it is a false alarm and off they go.

Alright, typewriter sound now muted, its back to work. I have had much practice of quickly getting back into the creative flow stage when I am interrupted. The words are now flowing, sentence after sentence and poof, brownout. Electricity is off. This happens here quite often, sudden power outages never announced. Another interruption, so it's time to sit outside and keep plotting. Most unannounced power outages last about 2 hours, but this was a short one, only 1 hour.

I head back inside to continue writing and Jade is sleeping on my computer desk and Salt in my chair. I chase them outside. I turn the computer back on and start typing before I forget what words I was going to put down. Ah, back on track, and then, what the hell is that on my foot. I look down and a cockroach. The brownout told the cockroaches it is dark, so out they came.

These cats love cockroaches. They keep the house clear of them, but they bring many of them inside, to begin with. They sit around in a circle and swat the roach around until it ends up on its back. Then they take turns spinning it like a top. When they tire of it, they eat it. They leave the legs behind which I have to clean immediately or else the ants will find it. The cats like to put the cockroaches in my shoes or on my feet. Now they are gone again, outside to find another roach.

Just as soon as I type one word, here comes my wife Joy, "the neighbor wants to talk to you." I reply, "I am busy, not now." Joy replies, "It will only be for a minute." My frustration starts to mount, "I do not care if Lady Godiva was here, leave me alone!" Wait a minute I said to myself, if Lady Godiva was here, I would surely stop writing to give her my time. I mean, that would be historical. I am still dreaming, the creativity still flowing. "Let's Go" I shout out loud and here come the cats again, flying through the door like an overdue freight train.

I forget the danger of those two words, never to say "Let's Go" as the cats know what it means. Every Saturday, we watch a movie and I eat a Chicken meal with a fried egg, potato wedges, onion, red pepper, and garlic. I eat everything during the movie but the chicken. The cats will have some potato wedges and Beauty loves the egg yolk. I don't dare touch the chicken. They will sit and stare at it, but if I touch it they will go crazy. They know that after the movie they will get a piece of chicken. When the movie is over I shout "Let's Go" and out the door they rush and sit and wait for me to bring the chicken outside. If I am late, Starbuck will come and meow meow to me very loudly.

Now the cats are at my computer desk wondering where the chicken is. It is hard to write when you have 18 eyeballs staring at you. Wait a minute, I can use that as a scene in my book. Yes, the terror in a hapless victim when he is cornered by scorpions and can only see their eyes. The cats are helping me write this book. The cats realize that I have no chicken and leave again. They come back every so often, suspicious that I am hiding something from them.

This book is getting harder and harder to write. It may be a rough draft, but it is so rough that I will need a chisel to edit it. I keep thinking about Lady Godiva and decide to sleep and go to dreamland since it is almost 10 P.M. Of course, just as my head hits the pillow, Joy comes in to feed them a late-night meal of fish and rice. They quickly gobble that up and run outside to play after glancing at me. I couldn't but help get the impression that they saw no more fun in me and ran off to look for more bugs.

The cats won this night, progress is slow, but moving forward, and at least they gave me inspiration for a scene in my book.