I woke up yesterday morning to the realization that the spousal unit was putting the moooves on me, a pleasant way to awaken. Things were going quite well until I shifted and my bladder started screaming, "Danger Will Robinson."

Why my bladder continues to make cheesy pop culture references is just one of life's little mysteries.

The situation was dire so I quickly made apologies to the spousal unit, encouraged him to hold that thought (and whatever else might need holding), promising I would be back pronto. I bolted downstairs, answered nature's call, and then raced back upstairs.

Followed by a herd of cats. Four cats. Because you know, we can't be normal people and have oh, say, one or two cats. No, no, we've officially crossed into the world of Crazy Cat People and now own a herd of four cats.

The morning ritual around here is that the humans get up and the first thing the male human does is open a can of delicious stinky cat food and distribute it betwixt the herd. As far as the herd is concerned, the ritual of the delicious stinky canned food is one of the high points of the day.

I want to stress that there are two large bowls of dry cat food that are always replenished so there is never any danger of hunger, let alone starvation, for our herd of cats. But, well, it's dry food and in the eyes of the cat herd not nearly as delicious as the stinky canned food.

My appearance downstairs without the male human in tow, followed by my run upstairs, completely threw off the morning ritual. The herd of cats that followed me upstairs were deeply, deeply disgruntled by the fact that humans had awoken yet had not fulfilled their primary duty to serve the herd of cats.

Zubby let out little squeaks of displeasure. Binky hopped up on the bed and started roaming back and forth across our heads, which kind of broke the focus of the marital duties. Enid hopped up on the bottom of the bed and just brooded at us, sending huges waves of her displeasure about Man's Inhumanity To Cat washing over us.

Occasionally I like to stand up to the herd, re-affirm who's really boss. So I told the spousal unit through gritted teeth that we should ignore them, focus on our own needs, and feed the fuzzy ingrates afterwards.

Focus we did until I heard Savannah chewing on something, something I could not identify. I looked over and she was chewing on a plastic tag dangling on a new floor lamp we've just bought. The plastic tag wrapped around the cord to said lamp. The cord that was plugged into the electric socket.

I briefly considered whether or not the electrocution of one cat might provide a valuable life lesson to the others about patience and more positive ways to alleviate feline boredom. However, I decided that cats being cats, the lesson would be studiously ignored.

So I yelled at Savannah, clapped my hands until she stopped trying to cash in one of her nine lives. I then turned to the spousal unit and suggested that perhaps it would be a good idea to feed the cats.

There was much grumbling and eye rolling on his part about needs but when we saw Savannah again drifting towards the lamp, the spousal unit decided that maybe feeding the cats wasn't such a bad idea. Somewhat crankily he stomped downstairs with the cat herd in tow. I wandered over to the lamp and peeled off the tag on the cord, a tag which somewhat ironically was covered with safety information for the lamp.

The fact that we stopped the marital duties to feed the herd and that I left a warm and cozy bed to futz with an annoying piece of plastic labelling does not mean that the cats are the boss of us. No, no, technically we showed the cats who was boss because we didn't instantly hop out of bed to feed them the delicious, stinky canned food.

I'm sure they waited three, four minutes.

Oh yes, we showed them.

I've been recovering from a low level cold forever. When I got out of the bed I could feel an enormous sneeze coming on. I grabbed a Kleenex, quite noisily and somewhat disgustingly honked away into it. Even I was impressed by the enormous amount of mucus I managed to expel.

I normally try to be somewhat more ladylike when expelling disgusting bodily fluids, but I assumed the spousal unit was downstairs feeding the herd and wouldn't be subjected to this horror.

Only, well, he wasn't. He was at the top of the stairs. Doing his best not to look repulsed by the sodden, greenish wad o' Kleenex in my right hand.

"Maybe we should do this after you come home from the gym," he said, referring to the marital duties.

If there is one thing I've learned over 30 plus years of marriage, it is the fine art of verbal seduction. So what hott and somewhat nasty enticement did I give the man I love?

"Aw, c'mon, we've already started. Might as well finish."

Who, I ask you, who could resist a come on like that?

A lesser man ... well, a lesser man would have been overwhelmed by the cascade of events�the bladder interruption, the herd o' cat distractions, the woman who had noisily emptied half a lung's worth of mucus into a Kleenex she was now grasping.

But I did not marry a lesser man, No, I married a man who's 50th birthday was crowned with the words "wangitude, stamina and prowess". All that needs to be said about what happened next is that it is not a crown he wears lightly.

Oh, and one more thing for the record?

The cats are not the boss of us. Really. I mean it.

--Marn

Mileage on the Marnometer: 266.43 miles. Oh, man, I'm falling behind

Goal for 2005: 1,250 miles - 2000 kilometers