The Cats are Back and River Song is Ready to Declare A National Emergency

It was New Year's night. After a tumultuous holiday season, my parents settled down at the dinner table for a relaxing meal.  I was in the chair to my Mama's left, laying across it, with my head on her lap, hoping chicken was on the menu and I would be offered a piece or seven. Pocket was in the living room, playing hard to get, at least when it comes to food. Halfway through the meal, her resolve melts, and she begs for a taste.

Suddenly, as if from the depths of the earth, came a blood curdling, "meow.” I jumped from the chair forsaking the chicken, put my nose to the floor and began sniffing. Pocket charged in from the living room barking "man the battle stations, hoist the flag, raise the periscope, damn the torpedoes and full speed ahead.  We have cats!”

We met under the table. We could organize a methodical grate by grate sniff search of the house until we pinpointed where under the floors the cats were, then scare them into leaving.  Or we could run around the house barking hysterically. We chose the latter.

After a few minutes of barking, with no results, mama yelled at us to stop.  "But mama," Pocket barked forlornly, "they’re cats who have come for our chicken."

Last winter our claims of cat infiltration and constant grate guarding were dismissed by our skeptical parents. This time, we were listened to, thanks to a neighbor who, last summer rapped on my parents' door, and when Papa answered informed him that we had cats living under the house.  They had gained access via a small hole in the plastic skirt surrounding the house. Their presence was further confirmed via visual contact. Papa saw two little kitties poking their heads through the hole by the HVAC unit while he mowed the lawn. The kitties meowed a complaint about the noise.  

After the first meow warning shot, the security council consisting of my parents and no one else met to address the kitty issue. They recklessly decided to continue with a pacifistic approach.  My parents wagered that, since we live in the middle of the development with two streets on either side of us, and that there are many similarly built houses between the woods and our house, that these were not feral cats but pets belonging to one of our elderly neighbors who put the cat out before bedtime, which, for them comes at 7:30, and let the kitty back In the next morning not realizing the cat only kept itself from freezing by going under our house and stealing our heat. My parents don't want to trap the kitty and have animal control cart it away because it was more than likely some senseless seniors’ pet.

I say the cats incursion onto our property is a full-scale invasion.  I know our silly senior neighbors to the south aren't sending us their best cats. They are sending us their hairball hurlers and mouse tormentors, their incontinent and intact, who want to come to our house to have their babies and take advantage of our health care. I am sure some of them are good kitties, but the rest are either lazy, pregnant, or have bundles of catnip tied to their undercarriages. Believe me. Believe me!

The problem with the flimsy skirt that blocks the crawl space is that it poses no impediment to whatever vermin want to get under the house.  Right now the cats are streaming under the house, (probably Stranger Things, via our Netflix account.) We need a deterrent. We need something protective. We need a wall!

A great big beautiful wall that goes around the skirt and stops thousands of cats getting under the house. I have stared into my parents’ eyes trying to convey my message “BUILD THE WALL” to no avail. My parents are for open skirts.  They are for mass penetration. If you can't secure your property how can you have a house?

Join with me to urge my parents
BUILD THE WALL!
BUILD THE WALL!
BUILD THE WALL!
What's that Pocket?  And the cats will pay for it? Don't be daft Pocket!  Why would the cats do that?
BUILD THE WALL!