Decorating and Drama

So, it's early in the Christmas season & Opie has been wondering if the decorations are ever actually going to make it out of the boxes in the living room and into the house.

Would you believe I already
 have half the boxes put away?

Which is, obviously, the wrong question.

The right question question would be "Are we still going to have all three pets by the time the decorations finally make it up or will I be forced to murder them to death?"

And, to be honest, it doesn't look good for the ridiculous animals.

See, The Bub is staging some sort of protest...He has spent a shocking amount of time walking in circles around the boxes in the living room, crying to be let outside, standing on the porch for all of 30 or 40 seconds then barking to be let back inside. I haven't had a chance to really explore his list of demands but knowing his long history as a political activist, I'm sure it has something to do with the plight of dogs in third world countries.

I tried to be kind as I explained to him that his protest, while admirable, is incredibly annoying but he didn't take it well. To put it mildly, we are no longer speaking.

I am also no longer speaking to Princeton P Kitty.  Largely because he's trying to kill me.

Here's what's happening: Opie has always said we can't have a real Christmas tree because we have a cat. The thing he forgets is that we don't have a normal cat. A normal cat would probably try to climb the tree and/or bat the ornaments down with his paws.

Our cat likes to hide behind the fake tree and then fling himself out at whomsoever is passing by.

Considering that I am the one who is usually passing by--with things in my hands and distracted  by a politically protesting dog--I'm pretty sure his plan is to give me a heart attack or send me tumbling to the ground in a flurry of tinsel, trinkets and tree debris.

Sassy, clearly, is the only one who  feels any sense of loyalty to me. Unfortunately, that loyalty has manifested itself in protecting me AGAIN from all the Kleenex we have in the house...to the extent that she pulled my jacket off the back of the chair, stuck her nose in the pocket to dig a couple out, then proceeded to try dragging the entire jacket up the stairs...distracted only by the awful attack of the mailman--who chose that moment to announce his intent to murder all of us by delivering a package.

Which seems a strange way to share a death threat but what do I know about the ways of assassins?

Sassy, though, wasn't fooled. She immediately dropped my jacket, ran across the room to the baby gate that keeps the animals out of the front room and actually broke through it like some sort of crazed mutant hulk of a dog.

Yes, you read that correctly. She broke the gate.Now the only thing we have keeping visitors, door-to-door evangelists, delivery persons, etc. from our dogs is their steadfast obedience to my authority.

We're doomed.

On the bright side, after days of decorating, although I haven't gotten as far as I'd like, I managed to create a cool way to display the Christmas cards...and by "create" I mean "shamelessly steal a cool idea from a friend."

But it's Christmas, why get caught up in semantics?

Anyway, I got some ribbon and a bow, wrapped it around the top of the fireplace, and now I can attach our cards to the ribbon and display them all season...

In fact, I liked the idea so much, I also wrapped one of our doors like a present, put a ribbon and bow on it too and have 2 places to display Christmas cards.

So, in short, bring on the Christmas cards!  But bring them on carefully since our protective gate is broken, our dogs are crazy and our cat is plotting murder!