The Circus of Life

Our house is full of clowns, acrobats, and magic tricks.

The Clowns
Loco and Maya. They sleep together, and they fight together. Usually Maya starts it by chomping on Loco's leg. If he doesn't react, she moves to other parts of his body - his ear flaps, his mouth, his nose. She grabs onto his face with her claws and bites away until he responds. And then the fun begins - they chew and wrestle and run. Loco is 20 times bigger than Maya but she doesn't care. She's nuts, and she has no fear of any animal here in the house, possibly with the exception of Luna (although she's actively working on that too).

Maya will stand on her hind feet like a prairie dog when she's confronting Loco. Braced for attack. Loco body-slams her to the ground. Thunk. Maya bounces back up and either dives at Loco for more, or runs off, only to return in a minute - hiding behind pieces of furniture to do a sneak attack.

On his own, Loco will put on a burst of energy for no reason. He'll just run at full force from the front of the house to the back of the house, slipping and sliding on the ceramic floor. One front leg might be a bit longer than the rest, because his leg sort of swings out as he runs. He looks like an idiot.

Sometimes the live show is better than what's on tv.

The Acrobats
Minina and Luna. Both are very agile and can jump heights and distances without error. They can scale ladders easily, and use the one at the back of my neighbor's house to get down to ground level after they've jumped over to his roof. Minina is not supposed to be doing this, of course, but sometimes Miguel is not watching her when they're out on the second level terrace, and she jumps through a hole in the wall over to the neighbor's roof.

Minina can also jump and hold onto the screen on the back door until you give in and let her in. Minina has slipped occasionally when jumping across the staircase; one time she tried to grab the potted plant to save her from falling, but the result was that they both fell. Lucky for Minina that she had just enough time to scramble out of the way before the plant came crashing down right where she'd fallen.

Maya is in school to learn how to be an acrobat, and she seems to have some talent. She does somersaults on her own - sitting on the ground she will suddenly just do a flip over her head, for no reason. I told you, she's nuts!

The Magicians
Any one of our cats is a magician when they want to do something. Minina can move the screen in the kitchen window until the clasps give way and the screen is off and she either gets in or out. Minina knows if she jumps at the front door it is likely to spring open, and she knows if she pulls the sliding screen doors from the side she can get them open enough to get out. Maya knows if she fishes under the couch long enough she's likely to pull something out of there (not quite a rabbit out of a hat, but regardless - they turn up with things we didn't even realize we had).

Maya is a master of showing up in places where she wasn't just a second ago. I will have walked through an empty room, and often when I turn around, there is Maya, sitting right in the path, watching me. Where did she come from? I have no idea. She is fast, and sneaky, and small enough still that she can hide in places the other cats cannot fit into.

But the magic tricks don't stop with the animals. This morning I was tidying the downstairs bathroom, and when I turned off the light, a little electronic musical tone sounded. What? I turned the light back on. Nothing. Turned it off again and the music played again. Was it the bulb in the night light making a strange noise just before blowing out? I pulled out the night light - and heard the sound again. Not the night light. I put on all the lights in the bathroom to get a good look, and found the culprit. An electronic Suduko game that was lying on the top shelf. I guess when I placed something up there I jiggled the shelf, which triggered the game to turn on, and it was playing its opening screen music.

There is always something here to keep us on our toes. I feel like a ballerina!