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Mr. Blue Skies

Mr. Blue Skies

img_0498Ever have a morning when the clock radio wakes you up to MacArthur Park,* the toast is burnt, and you haven’t done laundry in so long you have to wear the emergency backup underwear?

Cats don’t.

Patrick most assuredly doesn’t.

Patrick in a rare moment of stillness, by Mark the Stellar
Patrick in a rare moment of stillness, by Mark the Stellar

You may have seen the recent ad campaign brightly proclaiming that cats are morning people. This is all well and good for selling cat food, but c’mon now: are they kidding?

Cats? Morning people?

Leaving aside altogether the embarrassing comparison of cats to people (I can hear Cecille already: “Quelle horreur!”), does anyone really think that cats are morning people?

Cats are no more “morning people” than they are “afternoon people” or “evening people” or “stroke of midnight people.” Cats are this-very-moment people. And that’s the secret to their great, giddy, glorious joy.

"OH MY GOSH I LOVE THIS CAGE DOOR!!!!"
"OH MY STARS I LOVE THIS CAGE DOOR!!!!"

Just ask Patrick.

Patrick has his Ph.D. in Living In The Moment. Even if you threw him in a cold, dank cave with moldy mustard smeared all over the walls, he’d find something to celebrate: “OH MY STARS MUSTARD IS YELLOW AND I LOVE YELLOW! YES I AM YELLING!”

In the Universe of Patrick, every iota of reality orbits around his joy. His current constellations are the same comrades who accompanied him from a crowded North Jersey shelter. Giddy Patrick needs no telescope to see the beauty of Purple, Mario, Luigi and Hank.** Patrick sees splendor with his naked eyes.

That’s impressive when you look at our Mr. Blue Skies’ eyes. If Patrick looks a little squinty in these shots, it’s not because he’s shading his gaze from the bright rays of bliss. Patrick, like Ben and Mervyn before him, has entropion, a mean little disease in which a cat’s own eyelashes turn inward and scrape his eyeballs. Highly ouchworthy.

"OH MY STARS I LOVE THIS HUMAN LEG!!!"
"OH MY STARS I LOVE THIS HUMAN LEG!!!"

Yet not worthy of Patrick’s complaints. Complaining = pausing The Happy. This, he cannot do.

Before we performed surgery to repair Patrick’s peepers, he was over-the-top happy, rubbing his entire being so hard against every surface/person/idea that he kind of scared us. (“OH MY STARS I LOVE YOU DR. C EVEN AS YOU ARE STABBING ME WITH NEEDLES!”)

After we performed surgery, Patrick was over-the-top happy, rubbing his entire being so hard against every surface/person/idea that he kind of scared us. (“OH MY STARS I LOVE ANTIBIOTICS! I LOVE FANCY FEAST! I LOVE PARIS IN THE RAIN! I LOVE READING KIERKEGAARD! I LOVE I LOVE I LOVE!”)

"OH MY STARS THIS SHOE THIS SHOE I LOVE THIS SHOE!"
"OH MY STARS THIS SHOE THIS SHOE I LOVE THIS SHOE!"

From now unto the end of the age, Patrick will be rubbing his entire enthusiastic being so hard against every surface that…well, he kind of makes us laugh out loud, even if we’re having a day that began with burnt toast, emergency backup underwear, and MacArthur Park.

You can’t keep a crazy-happy cat down…and around Patrick, there ain’t no way you’ll be able to stay down long, either.

*If you have not experienced the auditory mindwarp that is MacArthur Park, cease and desist your blog reading and go remedy that this instant. Walk on by the Donna Summer version, which can get away with being campy, and go directly to the Richard Harris version. Prepare yourself for full-on melodramatic moanings on how someone left the cake out in the rain, and he doesn’t think that he can take it, cause it took so long to bake it, and he’ll never have that recipe again and (I quote) “oh NOOOOOOO!” Richard clearly does not mean for this to be funny. He’s not kidding around. He sings these words with a gravitas appropriate for, say, a dirge about tuberculosis, or a soundtrack to a movie about genocide. And we haven’t even gotten to the bit about the sweet green icing running down. I am not making this up. Go. Now.

"OH MY STARS I LOVE YOU!"
"OH MY STARS I LOVE YOU!"

**More on them soon. Much more. Moohoohoohoohahahahabwahaha.

Photo credits from top: Flangela, Mark, Mark, Flangela, Flangela, Flangela. Note that Mark’s photos are molto excellente and mine are blurry. Note that blurriness does not blur Patrick’s awesomeness.

6 thoughts on “Mr. Blue Skies

  1. Amazing blog, Angie! And I think I recognize a certain pink shoe in one of the pictures?!!! What an awesome cat and I can’t wait to steal, um, meet him!

  2. Patrick was such a nut when I was there to take some photos and talk about making the most of things no matter what is going on. He is a real inspiration.

  3. what Suite is his in, and why have I not met him??? Maybe I came to visit when he was getting his surgery? I LOVE LOVE LOVE that picture of him with the cage door! I can only guess that he knows he is safe at Tabby’s Place and that is part of the reason he is super happy 🙂

  4. Hi Patrick! You have lucked out to be at the fantabulous TP but then again maybe it is the TP Crowd who have lucked out! Keep that Love rolling my furend!

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