I'm beginning to suspect Oreo of being a Southern belle kitty, despite all evidence of her having been born here in the Southwest. I'm from the South, Atlanta, and while my speech has no Southern accent to speak of (foreign-born parents) I do say ya'll but what I must think is a dead giveaway to my Southern beginnings is the copious amount of ice I put in my water and every other cold drink I prepare. I mean my son asks me if I want a little water with my ice when he sets the table. I ask some New Mexican natives if they want ice in their drinks when we have guests and get some odd looks.

I caught Oreo on the kitchen table yesterday hovering over my glass in full dainty slurp mode as she drank and drank and drank from my cup'a ice water -- and drank some more. Following an intuitive leap, my daughter went to the freezer and pulled out an ice cube and plopped it in the cats' water bowl. As the sounds of crackling ice tinkled through the air, Oreo's ears perked up, she jumped down from the table and after eyeing the ice cube floating around in the water bowl, began to dip that cute little pink tongue and lap, lap, lap for all she was worth! Being the scientifically minded sort that we are we repeated the experiment tonight after she meowed very plaintively at us while we were sitting at the table after dinner was over. Now it could've meant, "I want your dinner!," but we went with the "I want an ice cube in my water bowl, Meowmie," interpretation and bingo if that wasn't the right guess. This time she got 2 ice cubes in her bowl and she trotted over and was quite happy to start lapping.

On another note, have I mentioned the kitty dinner theatre wrestling matches we get treated to nightly while we eat? Omar and Oreo do this every night on the kitchen rug for our personal entertainment -- (probably to listen to us getting nauseatingly gooshy over how cute they are when they play).

Copyright © Christine Burel
January 23, 2002