Holiday Spirit

It seems like the last couple of days, the Buddies have really gotten into the holiday spirit.  Maybe it's the manufactured "tree" sitting in our living room.  Maybe it's the knowledge that fun things come out of those six weird sock things hanging from the mantel.  Or maybe, just maybe, there is something kind of magical about this time of year.  The lion laying down with the lamb and all that stuff.

Take Otto for instance.  Usually, when Elroy tries to shower love on him in the form of a head bunt, he has one of two reactions:  either run away, or smack the living daylights out of Elroy.  Yesterday though, as we were sitting at the breakfast nook eating dinner, Otto stood on my lap while Elroy head-bunted away.  Elroy rubbed his beautiful black-and-white face all over Otto, purring to beat the band while doing so.  I would be lying if I said that Otto seemed to be really getting into it, but he ducked his head and made a decent facsimile of head-bunting Elroy back.  And as far as I'm concerned, the fact that there was no bloodshed was a step up.  (Okay, there's rarely any bloodshed, but there is often swatting, scratching, and yowling.)

Or take Mister.  Yesterday I came home from work to find Mister playing with a large rubber band he'd found on the floor.  He was batting it around and it looked for all the world like he had found himself a snake that he'd decided to play with.  I watched him play like a kitten for a while, then when he got bored, I collected the rubber band so as not to find it later in the litter box, or worse, on an x-ray at the vet's office.  

But Mister didn't stop there.  A few hours later while I was ironing (yes, occasionally I do take a break from lounging around with the Buddies and chronicling their adventures), Mister decided to play with the lump under the covers, just in case it was a Chupacabra.  (It turned out it was just Wanda, but that's just splitting hairs.)  Mister dived at the lump, batted the lump, rolled over on his side and invited the lump to play.  It would have been a normal cat scene if it weren't for the small fact that Mister doesn't play with other cats.  So the fact that he was trying to engage the lump in play was kind of a big deal.  I guess it's entirely possible that Mister only plays with Chupacabras, but since they're messy and smelly and tend to try to eat you, it's probably just as well that he didn't find a live one this time.

And then, just to top it all off, Mister wanted to play with a string after he grew weary of baiting the Chupacabra under the covers.  So, Mister appears to be experiencing a second kittenhood, or else he's just gotten the holiday spirit in some kind of major way.  

I found Reggie just a few minutes ago hanging out in one of those paper bags with handles, waiting for someone to come along and play with him.  Apparently the holiday spirit is catching.  Maybe we'll even invite the Chupacabra over for a nice cup of hot cocoa and some lamb or goat scones.