This is Chester, he thinks he is invisible.
No one has told him he’s not a zebra, and that he doesn’t have stripes the same color as the blinds.
I’ve told him over and over, just because he cannot see me, it doesn’t mean I can’t see him.
But, once again, we have to play the ‘game’.
I should be writing, but once again Chester has successfully distracted me.
If it was a cunning plan on his part, it worked.
This is Chester, he’s lurking in the shadows.
This is near the front door, so I wonder if he’s waiting for someone, or keeping guard, or he’s spotted something outside.
The grandchildren will be here soon, and I haven’t told him they are paying a surprise visit. He has a habit of disappearing the days they usually come.
We both hear a noise outside.
He goes into stealth mode.
Then I recognize the sound, of letters being shoved into the mailbox.
He shakes his head. I think he was expecting a mouse.
I hear the back door rattle and the loud sounds of the grandchildren arriving.
He lifts his head, stands, and bolts.
That’s the fastest I’ve seen him move for a long time.
This is Chester. We have a major discussion coming up.
He knows I’m not happy. We had a discussion about claws and furniture a while back where it was clearly understood that the scratching post was where he worked on his anger management issues.
And for quite some time I thought it was working.
More fool me.
The trouble is, there are certain parts of a room you don’t venture very often, and one of them is that small space behind the chairs in the lounge. We have a cleaning lady so we don’t venture there very often.
But it’s where we keep our DVD collection, not that we look at DVDs any more, but someone else was looking for one. That’s where I noticed the damage. Near the scratching post, on the corner of the lounge chair, clear evidence of the cat’s work.
He thought if he did it out of sight we wouldn’t notice. He would be right, except for exceptional circumstances.
Now I’m looking for him. He knows. Perhaps that was the reason for the fearsome attitude the other day. Where’s the tiger now?
I can wait. He has to come out eventually.
This is Chester. It’s going to be an interesting morning.
When I finally make it out to the writing room, I find him sitting on my desk, next to the keyboard, with a rather benign expression.
Remembering that cats can’t have expressive expressions, it worried me that he’s working overtime to make me think he has one.
I can feel his eyes boring into me, following me around the room, watching and waiting.
Waiting for what I wonder.
I also remember that cats are hunters and killers. If he was a lion or a tiger I’d be in a great deal of trouble now. He’d pounce, and that would be the end.
Is this we hat he’d be doing if I let him outside?
Is he sending me a warning?
I finish what I’m doing on the other side of the room and come over to the seat.
Are you done giving me the death stare? I ask him.
A slight shake of the head, and if I wanted to write anything into it, that would be a no.
A few seconds pass, then he jumps down to the floor and walks off.
Job done, I suspect he’s thinking.
Back to his least favourite dinner tonight, I’m thinking.
Am I seriously reading my work to a cat, as an aid to correcting errors and grammar
This is Chester, he helps with the proofreading.
It’s not his favorite job, and truth be told he’d rather be outside being chased by a dog. But that’s why he’s not allowed outside.
He mistakenly wanders into my writing room ready to take up a spot on the seat near the window.
I watch him, and he’s pretending not to care if I’m watching him. A wide yawn, and a dour look in my direction. Yes, I can hear him now, “do your worst.”
For a moment while I read, trying to add the right amount of inflection and accent into the voices of the various characters, I realize that some of the conversational pieces seem a little awkward.
I think, judging from the expression on Chester’s face he agrees
Stilted, forced, or ‘mate, you’ve got a bloody awful accent, that sounded nothing like an Italian using English as a second language’.
OK, so I can’t write accents very well. Note to self, find an Italian and spend some time talking to them.
So, the conversation needs a little rework, let’s move on.
The next part is a little descriptive, just to set the scene.
‘Flowery’ is the word Chester uses. Flowery? It isn’t describing a garden. Oh, overly descriptive with too many comparisons.
What’s wrong with the sky is as blue as the ocean?
Have you seen the ocean?
Yes.
I doubt it. The ocean is green.
How do you know, you’ve never seen an ocean? This cat is starting to annoy me.
A gentle shrug, he gets up off the floor and heads towards the door. A condescending look over his shoulder and he’s gone.
What’s the definition of madness? Doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result.
It’s official. I’m mad!
This is Chester. He’s keeping an eye on the weather.
This is the second day of Spring where it has started warm, and by mid-afternoon, it has reached a high of over 30 degrees Celcius.
It’s the start of the heatwave that basically starts in October, and doesn’t go away until April next year.
But it’s not the heat that’s the problem, it’s the humidity, and having a day that’s 35 degrees with 1000% humidity, is like being roasted in an oven.
I see the look on Chester’s face when he comes into the writing room, a sly glance up to the roof to see if the fan is going, and a slight shake of the head when he sees it is not.
Not that hot yet, I say.
What did we get the air conditioning for or the solar panels?\
He’s sharp and doesn’t miss a trick. It’s now more a benefit to run the airconditioning during the day when solar power is being generated.
We’ll be using it soon, I say. But, just as a matter of interest, don’t you cats like the heat? After all, in winter, you’re just about sitting in the fire.
A glare, no an insolent stare. That’s in winter. This is Summer.
No, it’s Spring. Let me know when it’s Summer and I’ll be happy to help.
He flops on the ground.
At least you put tiles in, it’s nice an cool down here on the floor, he mutters, feigning going to sleep.
And a wide yawn just to emphasise the fact the conversation’s over.
Why not. I turn the fan on high. Just to annoy him.
Yes,, I can feel his eyes burning into my back.
Since Twitter moved from 140 characters to 280 characters, it’s like having a new lease on life.
Not.
Still agonizing over what constitutes a ‘killer’ bio.
So much so that I have been trawling through thousands of other bio’s trying to understand what makes a good one.
Quite a lot preface theirs with Dad to or Mom to x wonderful children. I think that goes without saying, so moving on.
Quite a lot advertise services using hashtags which is a great idea, perhaps in the hope people are looking for said services and DM them for more information. I don’t think many people would take much notice of that, and move on.
But …
That brings up the relevance of using hashtags in the bio. That gives me a bit more scope to make it to the point.
A quick search of relevant hashtags reveals:
writer, author, thriller, mystery, adventure, writing etc.
All are useful but it doesn’t really carry any pulling power. We need something that grabs the reader’s attention and do it in the shortest, most succinct manner.
I am a writer, a wordsmith, who, I was once told, swallowed a dictionary. But, in the light of the current task, you’d think it would be just a ‘walk in the park’ instead of the proverbial ‘pain in the neck’.
Perhaps I could compose a riddle that comes back to the answer of who I am, but who has the time to sit and work it out.
I think that might be a little pretentious.
So, how about, ‘published author’, technically correct as my books are published on Amazon. I could use ‘aspiring to become the best selling author’. But that one worries me, because a lot of authors use that, and er all can’t be ‘vest’ selling authors.
Or can we?
Perhaps I might say, ‘an author aspiring to become a successful author, who published five novels on Amazon and adding more soon’.
Better, but not great.
Maybe I’ll keep working on it.
Character development
This is Chester, he thinks he is an expert on people
He has meandered in checking out what I’m doing, or maybe he’s here because the room is cooler.
He gives me the ‘What are you doing’ look.
It doesn’t matter how many times I’m a writer, it’s like talking to a brick wall.
I say I’m working on developing a new character.
Name?
I’m thinking of John.
A shake of the head and the eyes roll. Can you be a little more inventive, like, well, Chester?
Predictable. How about Xavier?
Would you call your kid Xavier? He’s going to have a very rough time of it at school. Unless this character has a tortured soul.
Good point. How about William?
Bill, that’s what you get in the mail. Another shake of the head. You’re not very good at this, are you?
Apparently not. Haven’t you got some mice to catch?
He yawns, then curls up on the seat. Wake me when you’ve got some better ideas.
Maybe not. I’ve come up with a name, Daniel, and I don’t care what he thinks.
For now.
This is Chester. Did someone use the word ‘vet’ out loud?
It is odd how some animals can recognise some words and remember what activity is attached to it.
Chester knows the word vet, and his memory attaches a great deal of seemingly horrible experience, not the worst of which is being transported in a pet basket.
Yes, we have just tried carrying him, but there is a sixth sense in every cat that tells them when they’re nearing a vet. Within 50 metres of the front door, the hair stands up, the cat starts hissing as he would face off against a formidable opponent.
We only carried him once, never again.
But the histrionics start in the house where we have to mound a search party to find hi, There are innumerable hiding places, and we have to be organised.\
Invariably, each time something like this happens, he finds somewhere new to hide. We keep forgetting he can use his paws to open sliding doors, and close them again, a talent he had learned.
We’ve also learned to start looking a half-hour earlier than we used to. The vet is only three minutes away, and we used to leave it to the last minute, but being late for the appointment happens only once.
Vets are worse than doctors when you miss appointments. PErhaps Chester knows this and tries to use it to his advantage. It no longer works.
Then, once we find him, the next exercise is to get him into the basket. I’ve never seen so many tricks on how not to let the humans put him in it.
But, over time, we’ve learned, and sometimes it’s easy, others, I have the scars to prove it.
Then, once we get to the vet, it’ss a completely different cat, not Chester, but some other cat disguised as him. Chester has never given the vet an ounce of trouble.
Perhaps we should become vets.
Chester is fine, just a little off-colour perhaps from something he ate. Not all pet food is agreeable, and we’ve been trying to get his to have something different. I even specially cook fish for him, and maybe that was the problem.
What is off-putting is the ease in which he goes back into the basket for the vet.
But all is well, and he will be glad to get out…
This is Chester. He’s feeling poorly today.
When I used this expression, he looked at me quizzically, which is not bad for a cat with a constant poker face.
Where did you get that from?
It’s a favourite expression of my mother’s when she wasn’t feeling very well. She had another, ‘not feeling elegant’ today.
It stops and makes me wonder where these expressions come from, and I suspect, because my mother’s mother was of German descent, that it was one of those translation to English things.
Chester seems disinterested. I’m beginning to think there may be something wrong with him because he’s not his usual sardonic self.
Perhaps, I say, it’s time to go to the vet, get checked out. You’re not getting any younger.
His head pops up at the mention of the vet. He knows what this means. The cat basket.
He leaps up with newfound energy and heads for the door.
I get out of my chair to follow, and he’s gone, moving quickly up the passage to one of his hiding spots.
Maybe he’s not that bad. I’ll monitor the situation.
“You’re safe,” I yell out. “For now.”
Thrills, Spills, and just a dash of Romance 