The Present Moment

About five minutes ago, I had just gotten my coffee and was sitting down to waste some time online before the little dictator awakened and began dictating when the cats started going nuts. Well, the Devil Cat did, anyway, racing around the downstairs and generally behaving like an irritating pain in the ass. Not that this is unusual for her, but the old cat was being kind of weird. I could hear him sort of growling at her, which he doesn't usually bother with.

Then I heard the squeaking. Right at my feet, which were under the dining room table. The cats were under the table, and apparently, so was a mouse. When I leaned under the table, I could see the Devil Cat was holding a mouse in her mouth. A very much alive mouse that I very much wanted to get out of the house. But when I opened the door to try to get her and the mouse outside, not only did she not go out, but the dogs wanted to come in.

I could imagine the scene if I allowed them inside, so I closed the door.

Then the cat let the mouse go. Then she caught it again. And let it go again. It was pretty clear by now that she was not going to kill the damned thing for me--thereby definitely confirming that she is a totally useless cat and not worth the kibble we feed her--so I got a dog bowl to try to trap the mouse myself. Except it had wedged itself among the shoes by the door, so I couldn't get the bowl down flat and it wiggled out.

So. At this very moment I am sitting in my dining room with two completely useless cats and a no-doubt terrified mouse cowering behind the enormous crock in the corner. That's just swell.

What's happening right now where you are, duckies?

P.S. It occurred to me that if I were on Twitter I could have posted some pithy little Tweet like, "Cat has mouse cornered in dining room. What now?" and you would have all been spared several paragraphs about essentially nothing. But I feel Twitter really doesn't have the scope to capture life at Blackrock. And anyway, I don't have an account.

Edited to add: Stop the presses! The first lambs of the year have been born, as I discovered a few minutes ago when I went outside to check on the Merino that A. was pretty sure was ready to lamb last night. When I got up to the pasture, I saw that she had two lambs, already on their feet and apparently nursing. Since the Merinos are pretty wild and skittish, I left her alone and came inside to call the shepherd. I'm sure the rest of the lambs will follow in quick succession. Along with hand milking for the ones having trouble nursing and tail docking and all the other fun that comes with lambs.