Here’s to you, cats!
Some of you probably already know this, but I have a girlfriend. I’ll give you a minute to let the shock of that sink in. Good? Okay, moving on…. Not long after we started dating, I was spending the afternoon with her and her roommate in celebration of her roommate’s birthday. It was a Saturday. I played volleyball that morning, met up with them to watch some World Cup soccer that afternoon, went back to their apartment to watch a movie, we ate some dinner, then met up with a large group of our friends later that evening. It was a fun day. All in all, I was probably away from my house for a total of about 16 hours.
After dinner, and before we went out to meet our friends, we were all getting ready. I brought a change of clothes, knowing I would be sweaty and gross from having played volleyball that morning. The ladies retired to their respective bedrooms to get ready and I went into the bathroom, the one and only bathroom in the condo. While I was in there, I decided now was as good a time as any to….uh….”take care of some business.” Okay, ya know what, we’re all adults here. I had to poop. There, I said it. You do it, too. As I said, I had been gone all day, and 3 meals later, it was time. Anyway, there I was, in what seemed like total peace and quiet, “making progress,” when I heard a noise. A very familiar noise. A noise that immediately sent a chill of terror through my entire body.
I forgot to include one minor detail about my girlfriend and her roommate. They each have a cat. But, these are no ordinary cats. These are very energetic, highly intelligent cats that are capable of such things as, oh, I don’t know, opening doors. These cats also have their food and water bowls in the bathroom, the aforementioned bathroom, the one and only bathroom in the condo, the bathroom that I was currently occupying. Any time someone goes into the bathroom, the cats want to be in there too. They think they’re getting fed, or, at least, it’s a fun place to hang out and torment the people inside.
Apparently, I hadn’t closed the door enough for it to latch, so as I’m sitting on the toilet in what could be described as a “very compromising position,” I hear the click of the latch opening. The door slowly cracks open and one of the cats slides in. It walks immediately to me, sits down awkwardly close, and just looks at me. The door was only slightly open but continued to swing open from the momentum of the push it received from the cat. So here I am, in a very embarrassing situation, with the bathroom door wide open, and two women within 10 feet of the door, capable of walking past at any moment.
*not an actual picture of me on the toilet
I quickly debate my options. Do I call for help and have one of them awkwardly stumble their way, eyes closed, to close the door for me? Do I do nothing and try to finish my business in hopes they won’t walk in? Or, do I make a death sprint to the door, pants around my ankles, to securely close and latch the door? Death sprint it is. I’m a fairly tall guy with very long legs, so it would normally only take me maybe 3 steps to get from the toilet to the door (it’s a pretty big bathroom). In this situation, however, it took at least 10-12 shuffle steps to make it to the door, almost diving to reach it, close the door, push hard enough for it to latch, check it, check it again, then lock it. At this point, the cat is locked in the bathroom with me and decides that right behind the toilet is the best place to be to hide from me after being scared by the noise and commotion it took to close the door. Great. But, after the potential embarrassment of the open door, having a cat in the bathroom was a walk in the park.
So, here’s to you, cat, for what could have been an incredibly awkward situation between myself and my girlfriend, or her roommate. And here’s to you, ladies, for taking just long enough to get ready that you weren’t walking past the door at a very, very, inopportune time.
