01/14/2008 23:25

506 How to Dispose of a Cat

At some point this evening, my beloved kitty decided that he was hungry. Not for cat food or cat treats. Not for delicacies like tuna or cheese. Not even for table scraps, bits of shaved ham, cotto salami, or morsels of tilapia. No, Mulder decided that he was hungry for one of the anaheim pepper plants that I'd brought inside a few months ago in an attempt to overwinter them. And surely enough, he bit and chewed, reducing the poor plant to a mere stub of its previous self, severing its stalk and rendering the majority of the plant useless. It's likely a goner now, with a stalk and a sparse set of leaves remaining; a wasted effort at this point. One of the others has yellowed over for lack of sun, leaving only one real candidate for overwintering and early production. I might as well give up. At just about the time I caught him, my Mulder was beginning to regret having grazed upon this particular bit of vegetation. I'm not one to eat the non-fruit portions of pepper plants, so I'm not keen on the positive or negative piquancy of the greenery; you might say I'm far more well versed in the seeds and stems of herbs in another genus. In any case, kitty didn't appear to be very happy about his choice of leafy greens. I hope it's served as a lesson in what not to eat. It takes a lot more effort to raise and nurture a pepper plant than it does to raise a cat. So the way I see it, peppers are beloved but pussy is easily replaced. Suggestions for clandestine extermination and disposal of unwanted felines may be hereby solicited.