Doors

In my puppy days, my humans had a plan. They fenced off a section of the yard and they closed the door from the porch to the house. When they had to leave me home alone (something I can't say I necessarily approve of -- after all, why wouldn't they want to bring a yellow puppy wherever they were going?), I had a safe space to be with an indoors and an out.

Fast forward to September 2009. The porch has been finished off and is now part of the house. There is no door separating the two. So when I get left alone, it's either in or out. While I love being outdoors, I don't love my yard. It's too... familiar. So I always choose to remain indoors (that way, if I need to use the phone or, for example, type up a blog entry, I can).

And, I should clarify the word "alone." I have never been left completely "alone." Scout the cat and Waffle the kitten are always here with me. And herein lies the problem. I am content, when I'm home alone, to sleep on a couch or bed. Waffle -- the new generation pet -- is more of an instant-gratification cat. If he's outdoors and he wants in, he wants in now. Which is why he has been scratching furniture, walls, doors, and so forth. The most obvious example: he has completely destroyed the weather stripping on the exterior door between the porch room and the yard. It's shredded.

And so our humans went to Lowe's home center on the Vermont tax-free holiday a few Saturdays back. They purchased a screen door... with a pet door! Whee-hoo! Now when they leave (as long as the weather's warm), we pets can be indoors or outdoors at our leisure! We have total control of our destinies!

Except for one thing: the Lowe's people who are supposed to install the door never call us. It's been almost three weeks! So they still have the door and Waffle is still scratching. I suppose, now that everyone knows Waffle is the culprit, I could try to blame him for some of the other shenanigans that go on around here: the granola bars that keep getting eaten... the backpacks that get chewed up if anyone leaves dog cookies inside them... the vegetables that get picked out of the veggie basket on the counter...

But I would feel bad pinning those on an innocent kitten. So I'll stick to my original story. It was aliens! They buzzed down in a spaceship, opened the door with their space blasters, chewed the backpack, and ate the dog cookies! I told them to pick up after themselves, but they just ran back to the spaceship and flew away!

Oh boy. I just hope we get this door installed soon.

Oscar


Waffle and his weather stripping project (click on photo for a close-up of the shreddage)