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This is Fredrik.
Fredrik Archibald Tigerbear III is our cat. Unlike his name, which means "peaceful ruler" his personality is more akin to "devil asshole with fur". Fredrik lives with Carol and Phil these days, so as not to disturb the chi that Ben and I have carefully cultivated in the apartment. You might think that's mean, but trust me, we all sleep a lot better with the separation. This is the story of Fredrik.
You should know, as a disclaimer, that I have a notoriously bad track record of picking out cats, but that's for another post.
It was my 25th or 26th birthday (I'm so old now, who even cares) and I begged and begged and begged Ben to let me get a cat. The reasons to not get one were obvious to him: the hair, the food, the kitty shitter, the claws, the clear violation of the lease. The reasons to get one were clear to me: it's fuzzy. In the end, my logic won out and I ended up at the Humane Society eyeballing the merchandise like a society girl in Barneys. I test drove all of them (except the weird ones with gooey eyes) by picking them up, cuddling them, playing fetch, and doing this maneuver. What? It's just bonding. I was almost convinced to get a cat named Snugglekins or Snickerlovins or something, a clumpy whiteish cat who probably only had a few years left in him. He would have been a great cat...mellow, lazy, and on the last legs of life just in case it didn't work out.
Just as I was about to claim Snigginpooper as my own, I saw a beautiful pink nose poking out from a shadowy cage. "How did I miss this?" I thought. I walked over and saw a handsome orange tabby with the most perfect pink nose you could ever wish for. He looked at me; I looked at him. At nine months old, he was a little younger than I was hoping for, but oh, that nose. I took him out of the cage for a brief petting session, where he bewitched me with his lively antics. He was so loving and cute and had great, thick fur. I honestly thought that Ben would love him more than Sugarmitts and my allegiance was quickly changed to this little angel of a cat.
Warning #1 that this was going to be an asshole cat: his name was Pauly D. I confused him with Pauly Shore. Apparently it's this douche from MTV. Pauly Shore is probably a lot nicer.
Warning #2 came shortly after I settled up with the front desk. After I went back to pluck my new best friend from the walls of purgatory and take him to the palace in the sky that is Clinton Court, he attacked me. At the fucking humane society. This was a full-body, kitty ball wrapped around the arm back legs kicking attack. Did I drop kick him and tell him to fuck himself at that moment? No. Being a stranger to commitment had made me afraid of being labeled a commitmentphobe, so I packed him in the crate and took him home anyway.
Funny thing, when you notice balls on a cat and the woman at the Humane Society says, "Oh that? That's just swelling." know that the whorebag is wrong. Very, very wrong. Ben and I found Fredrik humping a fuzzy green blanket Brokeback Mountain-style and we thought, "Hm. That's weird." A week later when we took him in for his check up, the vet laughed and told us that those fuzzy little mounds were indeed testicles...the testicles that were supposed to be removed at the Humane Society.
The nights were rough. Fredrik attacked our hands, feet, elbows or any other body part that moved during the night. He tracked litter throughout our pretty clean apartment. He dumped his food over. He mercilessly chased cat toys up and down the hardwood floor hall for hours as soon as we went to bed. Fredrik was everywhere when you least expected him to be. He would sneak onto window sills and swipe you as you walked by. He would be in the bathtub waiting for you to shower. He would hide and stalk you when you, bleary-eyed and half awake in the middle of the night, had to pee. We called those drive-by kitty attacks, because your leg would be scratched and bitten before you even knew what was going on. He hit you when you were at your most vulnerable. Most of the laces of our shoes are 5 inches shorter due to him chewing through them. The worst infraction was when I was awakened by Fredrik ass-stamping the bed with his dirty little kitty butthole. I'm pretty sure he purposefully pinched off early to keep a little poo smear right on his 42 wrinkles (are there 42 on a cat?). This went on for endless months. I started developing PTSD from the nightly attacks.
One day, I couldn't take it anymore. I was moving to New York and Fredrik would have to wait until I had an apartment and a job before I could bring him along. That was several years ago. Several years and two cities ago, actually. Fredrik never made it to New York. Fredrik never made it to Seattle, either. Strangely enough, Fredrik still hasn't returned to my care since moving back home. It sure is nice to see him when I go to rummage through mom and dad's fridge.
I still ask people if they want to adopt a cat from me. Everyone says no. Well guess what, people? He's not up for adoption anymore. Fredrik is now the leader of the weight-loss boot camp for kitties at the Chateau Morgan, where he has 5500 square feet to run around and harass other cats. I love Fredrik, but I'm glad he doesn't live with me anymore.
