We have 5 children: Edgar the Older Brother, Ellie the Little Princess, Agnes the Rat, Loki the Kingpin and Puck the Terrorist. Now the night prior there was a bit of a thunderstorm around the time I went to bed - around 3AM. If you do the math, it's actually going to bed early if you're working that late normally.
Now, Edgar the Older Brother is a giant wuss when it comes to thunderstorms, and he thinks the only way to be safe is to shake uncontrollably, and climb up your face to where you notice and protect him. Since he was already in his crate for the night, he had to tell me all about how he was going to die and rhythmically shake the squeaky part of his crate to match his whiny point. Eventually, he stopped enough so everyone could fall asleep. This was probably around 4:15 or so.
At 9:06AM, the house was on fire.
I awoke out of a peaceful, solid sleep to the news and a flurry of panicked pounding on, and yelling outside, my bedroom door. Loki the Kingpin was on patrol while Puck the Terrorist screamed "BLOOD AND FIRE ARE FALLING FROM THE SKY!!!! EVERY MAN FOR THEMSELVES!!"
This, naturally, caught the attention of Edgar the Older Brother and Ellie the Little Princess, who immediately chimed in "We wanna play too! Fire and Blood is exciting! Why does Puck get to have all the fun?"
Then my senses came to me, I remembered all of our children are four-legged furry things, and my wife, who I love and missed dearly, was not around to save me from the impending hell-borne collapse of my house on my family. It was just breakfast time. Unfortunately, I'm all Night of the Living Dead at this time, so here's my recap, with the underlying drone of "braaaaaaains" the whole time. Just plug it in yourself as you read.
Awake. Roll out of bed. Try to get feet down first. Shuffle to crates. Release the hounds. Open the bedroom door. Terrorist and Kingpin scatter as hounds give chase. Stumble through the house to let the hounds outside. Release the hounds. Terrorist is on the counter, screaming orders. Kind of like the vietcong leader in that famous russian roulette scene in The Deer Hunter, only with way less face slapping and guns.
Pick up cat food dishes. Place them on counter. Take Puck off counter. Thank Puck for his help. Get canned food from fridge. Avoid tripping over The Kingpin. Scoop Puck's dry food from bin. take Puck off counter, thank him for his help. Place Puck's food in the dish. Cover food with canned food so The Terrorist doesn't push the dish on the floor. Scoop Loki's food. Avoid tripping over The Kingpin. Take The Terrorist off the counter. Avoid his helpful claws.
By now, the hounds have been outside for a few minutes. Since it rained the night before, and Edgar doesn't like dealing with wet feet, he is now howling his displeasure to all the neighbors. "Sounds like the Floro's are butchering dachshunds again Millie." "Oh Roger, those awful people! And to think I gave them a green Jell-O mold when they moved in. Green, Roger!"
Meanwhile, Ellie is mopping up the yard with her wirehair and 2 inch stature. At least, I assume she is. Ellie has the desire to show how she can get under anything (she will walk under the cats just to mess with them), and anything includes the fences in the back yard and all points beyond.
But I can't worry about that now. In my moment of distracted hesitation, The Terrorist has taken a glass hostage near our sink. He's now pacing back and forth, nudging it closer to the edge of our new speckled green Corian counter top, escalating the volume of his list of demand to painful heights. If I was more awake, we'd have the makings of an epic, botched bank robbery turned hostage situation negotiation scene if I was Denzel Washington, and The Terrorist was the shaky gun-toting masked assailant. "Put DOWN the Gun" "I'll Do it man. DON'T PUSH ME!" "DROP IT NOW" "AAAAAAHHHHHHH"
Meanwhile, The Kingpin sits on the table and smiles. All is according to plan.
I finish preparing the cats' food as The Terrorist has moved on to more intense tactics to get the food on the ground faster. For the best example, watch the brown striped cat with the white belly for the first 30 seconds.
Ambitious little bugger climbing up people and furniture to make his point? Now instead of a tiny cute kitten, picture this guy.
The Terrorist, while The Princess sleeps.
Edgar continues his ballad of sorrow. Now from round the corner of the house I hear the bearded bark of The Princess. She likes to join in whenever there's a good amount of noise from The Older Brother because she wants to be like him. At least I know she's not in Toledo. Yet.
Open the door. Call off the hounds. Catch them on the way in with the towel. The Princess would like to inspect the cat food with her face. The Terrorist would like to inspect her skull with his teeth in the process. Separate impending disaster. Feed dogs. Set up Living room to pen in dogs, and let me sleep again.
Edgar gets it. Time for tunnel and sleep after meal and potty? Sign him up. Ellie says it's time to play with The Princess. Everyone come play with me! Now! My arms are washed clean within seconds of my hand dozing off while playing with her, prompting more play time until the next nod off.
Right around the time everyone settles down enough for me to stop droning "braaaains" and start drooling in to my pillow again, The Kingpin Strikes.
I'm certain the mail from yesterday is better served on the kitchen floor. But this draws the growly attention of Edgar, and the Princess is ready to play again. Puck now sounds his schoolhouse fire alarm "I'm full now?" song to the toilet. (It sounds like "brrrrrrrrrringgoow?" only it gets progressively louder after the first 3 verses, and there's delightful call and response bridge where he handles both parts)
There are many reasons why I love my wife. Her morning routine for the furballs is reason #14.
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