My crazy cat

All you writers out there had to know that I have a cat. I think it is a prerequisite; writer = cat. So, yes I have a cat. She is eleven years old but still acts like she's a two year old kitten. One of her favorite things to do is run up the stairs like a maniac, meow incessantly at the top of the stairs, and then tear down the stairs ending up where ever I happen to be.

Most of the day she spends sleeping in my closet When she's not sleeping you can find her in my lap so that it is impossible for me to use my laptop. She loves to lay across my right arm, rendering it immobile. When I nudge her to move she gets all huffy with me and tears off down the hallway.

The fun begins when it's time for me to turn off the TV, shut down my laptop, and head off to bed. Simple enough, right? Sure. No problem. I get my water and start my ascent to my bedroom. Typically, my cat is sleeping on the couch when I head to bed because she is waiting. Waiting for that perfect moment. The cat owners out there know the moment of which I speak. It's the moment when you have the blankets perfect, you're snug as a bug in a rug underneath them, and you have just begun to doze off into dreamland when "Meooooowwww. Meeeooowww." My cat is at the top of the stairs staring at me and crying. Why? I have no idea. All I know is it is the most annoying thing ever. This goes on for five minutes. In the meantime I am trying to get her to come to bed. Calling her name, using the sound I make to get her to come to me, but nothing works. She just sits there and cries at me. Finally, she runs and makes an acrobatic leap onto the bed. But the fun doesn't stop there.

Now we have entered what I like to call 'The Patrolling of the Bed.' I'm awake now and flipping through the channels trying to find something decent to watch at eleven o'clock at night while my cat steps on me, purposefully blocking my view, and doesn't move an inch. I gently nudge her off and she walks up the side of me, onto my pillow causing my head to dip, and back down the other side of me. Then she steps on me again and thus creating the vicious cycle of her patrolling. This goes on for a few patrols before she decides to sleep at my side. Then the licking begins. She licks my neck, my cheek, anything she can reach. Her rough tongue hurts but after eleven years I am used to it. She will lick for a good five minutes before I tell her to stop, I swear I should buy her a salt lick, and then I can get some rest.

So, while I go to bed around 10:30 the truth is I don't get to sleep until a quarter after eleven because of my crazy cat.

Trivial Pursuit

A few days ago I was playing Trivial Pursuit with a good friend of mine. Every now and again we get together to play, and every New Year's Eve we play with a group of friends while we wait for the ball to drop. So, getting together with my friend and playing was sort of like a little practice session. I personally love trivia of any kind.

Have you ever noticed the odd words that are used in the questions? Seriously, who uses the word warbled? I have never once in my life heard someone say, "Hey have you heard that new song that 50 Cent warbled? It's the shizzle!" No one I know uses that word in everyday conversation.

A question taken directly from a Trivial Pursuit card:

What dog breed's four billion olfactory receptors let it track a trail of single cells left by its quarry?

Say what?! Who talks like this? If they wanted us, really wanted us, to understand the question they would have worded it something like this: What dog has the greatest sense of smell known to man? That I understand. Not all this olfactory receptors and single cell craziness. I believe that one of the reasons the questions are written in that manner is to trip up the players, and it really works especially after a few cocktails.

So you've been playing Trivial Pursuit for hours and hours. Finally you have just answered a question that has earned the last pie piece to complete your token. "Yes!" you exclaim pumping your fists in the air but then your opponent reminds you that in order to win you have to make your way back through the wheel and land exactly in the center. Then you need to answer a question of their choice. No big deal you say to yourself. And now the real torture begins. It wasn't enough with the odd words and the questions you had to decipher. They didn't even give you a decoder ring. Or the grueling hours you have put into this game. No, that wasn't enough for the creators of Trivial Pursuit. Now your focus is getting to that middle hub, as they call it, and answer one final question that no one on the planet knows the answer to. So you land in the hub for the first time after five attempts and your opponent being the person they are reads you a question from the category you are the worst in:

What gigantic estuary was formed when rising sea levels flooded the mouth of the Susquehana River?

What is an estuary? And where in the world is the Susquehana River? Does such a river exist? Smacking your palm to your forehead because you know it's going to take another two hours of rolling the dice to get back into the hub, you yell out in desperation "Oh hell I don't know. The Hoover Dam!" Wrong, of course. Eventually you manage to answer a question correctly in the hub and are declared winner. It's now the year 2010, but hey you are the Trivial Pursuit master.

I love this game, even though it gets on my last nerve with the crazy way they word questions and how they seemingly do not use words that come from the English language. I always have a blast playing and this year I think I will be purchasing the Seinfeld version to mix it up a bit on New Year's Eve.

Are you a Trivial Pursuit fan too or a trivia buff?

Answers to the above questions respectively: A. Bloodhound B. Chesapeake Bay