The Threat of an Early Easter

I keep hearing that this year is going to be an early Easter.  Now I have no idea exactly what that means time-wise, but as soon as I heard, I immediately went into high alert.  As everyone knows, Easter is a holiday built around a crime scene.  Every Easter, some stupid little breaking-and-entering fluffy tailed bunny goes around and tries to force its way into the homes of the unsuspecting populace.  As Head of Security, I can’t have this.  No bunny is going to breach security and eat all the carrots in my house!  Those carrots belong in only one place:  My dinner bowl! 

So, the security level right now in my house is high.  I’m constantly checking perimeters, spying around corners, and snoozing with one eye open.  No stupid little fluffy tailed bunny with a rap sheet is going to infiltrate my house on my watch!

But then I had a security scare a few days ago. 

I was making my mid-morning rounds, when suddenly I discovered, to my extreme horror, an Easter basket sitting in the middle of the living room floor.  I approached it cautiously.  How could that stupid little bunny get past all my security measures? 

I gave the basket a sniff hoping that maybe, with a good enough whiff, I’d be able to track the bunny from the basket to its entry and exit points. 

But there was no bunny scent.  Turns out the basket was merely a decoration—a decorative Easter basket—forgotten in the middle of the living room by Ma when she was distracted while decorating for the criminal bunny’s anticipated arrival.

A side note:  I’ve known for a while that any time that stupid little Easter bunny has managed to breach my security, Ma was acting as its accomplice in the background.  I’m sure this is merely a case of Stockholm Syndrome; Ma wouldn’t betray me otherwise. 

So anyway, faced with this forgotten basket, I decided to explore it in hopes of finding a stuffed animal to disembowel or maybe some long forgotten jelly beans.  I found neither, but I did find something. 

A couple of minutes later, Pa wandered into the room and saw me lying in the middle of the rug, my lips puffed out by something I obviously had hidden in my mouth.  Pa sat down beside me and removed from my mouth a decorative plaster Easter egg.  Slobbery egg in hand, Pa got up and placed it on the end table.  He then looked back at me.  Well, apparently, I lack a poker face because Pa knelt down again and pried my mouth open only to discover that I had a second decorative plaster Easter egg stuffed in there (and this one was stuck to my tooth…plaster is no match for large gnashing teeth).  Having extracted the second slobbery egg from my mouth, Pa began roughing me up in jest.  And what did he discover?  I had a third egg tucked up under my chest. 

So unfortunately, I lost all my plaster eggs before I was able to destroy them properly (though I got them all slobbery enough for Ma to ultimately decide to throw them out shortly thereafter).  But the good news is that there was no breach in security that day; the Easter bunny did not get in.

But Easter is coming and the threat is still very real.

Being Obnoxious

I have to get something off my chest.  Stumpy the Squirrel is completely and totally out of control.  You remember Stumpy, right?  He's the annoying "squirrel" (I put this in quotes because I honestly don't know what Stumpy is...he looks like a squirrel except he is missing 90% of his tail and he hops around like a bunny) that my family has taken a shine to .  Well, while I've always found him rather annoying, I've come to realize that he's also very nervy.  Look what he did!

That's right, Stumpy has decided to use my windowsill as his own personal refrigerator for his half-eaten chunks of Italian bread!  Now, there are many things wrong with this.  First, there is the knowledge that Stumpy is setting paw, not only on my property, but on my house.  Second, he's lurking right outside my window (he's a Peeping Tom now too!).  Third, he's depositing his stash just out of my reach (hey, I like bread too!).

Stumpy Watching from Above

But I suppose, in some ways, and I hate to admit this, Stumpy and I are a lot alike.  You see, we both excel in passive aggressive techniques.  He leaves his table scraps just out of my reach and me, well...

It's no secret that I love to engage in a little thievery from time to time.  But to set the record straight, it's never really my fault.  I mean, did I tell you to leave your purse open?  Did I suggest that you leave your closet door open (giving me access to your shoe collection)?  Did I ask you to leave the dish towel within my reach?  Did I recommend that you leave the folded laundry on the bed?  Of course not!  But once it's done, I have no choice but to react.

So off I run with the pick pocketed key chain, purloined dishtowel, swiped shoe, or pilfered piece of laundry.  And it goes without saying that my humans are usually hot on my tail, determined to steal back my ill-gotten gains.

Of course, my dream is to keep the item, chew on it a little, rip off all its buttons, and tear all its seams.  But I know what is expected of me; mainly that I'm supposed to give up my appropriated goods without a fight.  However, just because I know what I should do, doesn't mean that I won't add my own little flair to the procedure. 

And my way of adding a little flair to the situation is to be obnoxious about it.  As soon as one of my humans corner me and reach for the ill-gotten gains in my mouth, I drop it, forcing him/her to pick the item up off the floor.  And oh boy am I good at this trick.  I can't tell you how many times I've done this and each time whoever is trying to claim my stolen goods complains bitterly about having to pick the item up off the floor when I could have just handed it to them when it was about two feet higher off the ground in my mouth.