Creatures

There is a creature sitting on me. It currently is sleeping, judging by the noises coming from it. Based on past experience, it may begin emanating odors soon. So far, this thing has done nothing productive that has benefited The Muse, The Mermaid, Enthusio or me. Ever. It often drives us crazy with the ungodly racket it makes. We have had people leave notes on our front door complaining about it.

There is another creature that lives in the garage. It once lived in the house, but, after we bought this house -- our first house -- it decided that it would use the corner of the living room as its personal outhouse. We could not convince it to stop doing this. It was mutually decided that it might be better off living in the garage. Just about every morning when I go to work, and every evening when I return from work, it complains at me. It often vomits all over the hood of my car, the one that is the culmination of my 20 years of sports car lust. One day, a couple of years ago when I had my old car, it vomitted all down the drivers' side window. There was so much vomit that I had to deal with it at the local gas station where they have squigees and such. This meant driving a couple of miles with disgusting stuff about six inches from my face. Of course, this isn't anywhere near as bad as what happened to The Muse's dad once. He had one of the creatures that lived at his house pee in his car. He had to drive around for several weeks with the windows rolled down because it smelled so bad. In December. In the rain.

Why do we let these things live us? Literally, they live with us. The one that is currently sitting on me would, if given its preference, sleep in the same room as The Muse and me and snore slighly more quietly than an elephant passing through. As it is, it frequently plants itself outside of our bedroom about the time that I am finishing my morning routine and whines, moans and moos until I let it in.

Sometimes they injure us. Once I was playing with the one that lives in the garage and it scratched my nose so badly that it bled profusely and had a nice scab across it. One of my law professors asked me, "You feed something that did that to you?" Exactly.

And yet we do feed them. Frequently. Then they want more or at least give you the very distinct impression that they are put out that you are feeding them food that is not as good as the food that you are eating.

Sometimes we pay big bucks to take them to doctors. Sometimes we break up their fights. Sometimes we do the former immediately after doing the latter (or at least The Muse does).

It is very strange. If there is some biological imperative that drives us to do these things, I'm having a hard time understanding it. Usually, we try to keep little beasts out of our houses.