Recently, we experienced a winter deep freeze that lasted for days. Most people hunkered down around a nice warm fire. Me? I was besieged with critters. 

Besides Dearly Demented Mom and the Teenage Eating Machine, this home has three more residents; a dog and two cats. Who am I fooling? They aren’t residents, they run the place. 

The master of this abode is Marshmellow. She’s an 8-year-old, 40 lb. Border Collie/Lab mix that can run faster than the wind; herd anything that moves and dances in circles when the UPS truck drives by. I refer to her as my “cow dog bed hog” because she manages to take up two thirds of a king size bed and moos in her sleep. 

She came to us via the pre-Teenage Eating Machine’s hysterical begging over a box of abandoned puppies. I had never owned a dog before and wasn’t prepared to be the Alpha dog, so I dragged TEM and Marshmellow to puppy training class. We got through “sit” and “shake” but then soccer practice took precedent and training came to a halt. 

The biggest problem is TEM taught her to “hug”, so I’m stuck with a dog that can’t “come”, “stay” or “”lie down” but if you walk in our front door, she’s right there trying to give you a big old hug. It’s frightened off more that one good man, I can tell you. 

Since Marshmellow has never been properly trained, she thinks floors are for walking on and big beds are for sleeping in. 

Then there are the two cats: Smokey Robinson and Chuck. I know, we just don’t believe in names like Fluffy and Snowball. 

Smokey was an abandoned dark gray kitten that somehow managed to jump into the TEM’s arms when he wasn’t looking and magically ended up at our house. He’s the only cat I’ve ever met that wants you to scratch his head with your feet. I’ve learned to give a pretty mean foot massage thanks to him. 

Naturally, he likes to sleep at the foot of the bed, right on my feet. 

Then there’s our orange tabby, Chuck. This teenaged cat showed up one cold February night a couple of years ago and promptly adopted us. He  spent his first night here sleeping on my head. 

If they had contact lenses for cats, Chuck would need an extra strong pair. I’ve watched him walk straight into the glass storm door every time it’s sparkling clean. Luckily, that’s only about once a year. 

Chuck’s a real lover and likes to lick my face before he bites the heck out of my chin. I’m starting to look like I’m dating a vampire.

So, you can imagine what kind of sleeping arrangements I have on a cold, winter night. Somehow I can still manage a small spot of my own, but the rest of my bed is taken up with spoiled beasts. Now I understand why people have horses. They live in a barn. 

The critters were pretty rambunctious on our coldest winter night. Marshmellow woke me up at 1:30 barking at the deer outside, I got my face licked and bit about 3:15 and by 4:00 my feet were numb from a slumbering cat parked on them. By 4:15 I was sitting up and begging for a good night’s sleep. 

Oh well, I may not have found the perfect man yet, but I’ll never be lonely. Take in a stray or donate to an animal shelter today. You may not sleep better for it, but some lucky animal will.

Mikie Baker
www.mikiebaker.com 

Copyright Medina Mikie, Ink. 2011