Smelly Cat

I’m sitting here staring at the TV binge-watching Friends, laughing hysterically at Phoebe singing her staple song, Smelly Cat.  “Smelly cat, smelly cat, what are they feeding you?  Smelly cat, smelly cat, it’s not your fault”, I laugh until my cat, who is sitting on my lap, lets out the most foul-smelling fart and realize, that song is about my cat.  How dare she insult my cat!

I’m no longer laughing at Friends but instead, I am getting angrier at the pompous song insulting my cat.  I know I’m about to be enraged so I gently nudge my cat to encourage him to get off my lap.  My cat refuses to move and give me his look that says, I’m comfortable so I’m not moving!  I gently pick him up and move onto the couch next to me.

I stand up from where I am sitting and in a fit of rage, I throw the bag of cheese balls that my cat and I have been sharing.  Cheese balls go flying all over the floor.  My cat sees this and quickly leaps from where he was laying on the couch and makes a mad dash to the cheese balls.  It is awe-inspiring to see the speed and agility in which he is eating the cheese balls.

The more I look at my cat the harder it is for me to tell which is more round, the cheese ball or my cat.  I was sharing the cheese balls with my cat on my lap while watching TV, this has how it has been with us since I adopted him when he was a baby just under two years ago.  I think back to when I moved my cat off of my lap and realize just how heavy he was when I lifted him.  Suddenly I realize that the song isn’t about my cat, it’s about me.  Now I’m pissed!

Just then I hear Phoebe singing her song on the show again.  “Don’t you patronize me Phoebe Buffay, you don’t even know me!”, I scream at the TV as if she can hear me.  I then start screaming expletives at the TV in a blind rage.  I dare not repeat what I said as it would prompt even the most misogynistic woman hater to look at me in disgust for speaking this ill of a woman.

The Friends show continues with all of their laughs, the very same laughs that I used to find funny but now see they are just patronizing me.  The cast of the show continues with their scene, but when I look at the TV all I see is Phoebe looking at me in the eyes singing Smelly Cat, while the entire cast sings chorus behind her.  I scream an explicative at them, something so foul that I’m certain my cat\’s hairball that came immediately afterward was born from disgust.

I hear a knock on my apartment door.  It’s my best friend who happens to live in the apartment next to me.  He has heard my rage and has come over to find out if I needed help.

“Dude, what’s wrong?”, he asks.

Enraged, I respond, “Phoebe Buffay has accused me of being a horrible pet owner!”

“Phoebe Buffay?  The fictional character from the Friends TV show?”

The sound of his voice expressing that she is a fictional character calms me a little, but I still respond with extreme anger, “Yes!”

“So you think, a fictional character whose show you are currently watching on an on-demand streaming service, is insulting you more than ten years after the show went off the air?”

I’m starting to hear the ridiculousness of what he is saying and it is gradually calming me, yet I still reply with anger in my voice, “Yes!  She sang Smelly Cat just as my cat passed terrible smelling gas.  At first, I thought she was insulting my cat, but then I heard her sing that part about it not being the cat\’s fault and realized she was insulting me.”

My friend sees my cat eating the cheese balls on the floor and says, “Well, of course, it is your fault, you feed the cat cheese balls all the time.  Look at how fat your cat is, does he even eat real cat food any more?”

The realization sets in that I was acting a fool, but my pride forces me to respond to him in a sarcastic tone, “Yes!  I still feed my cat real cat food!”

“Well you better rethink feeding him junk food, your cat isn’t even two years old and he’s enormous.  If you keep feeding him that crap he’ll be lucky to live four years.”

I stare at him dumbfounded and cannot think of anything to say.

“Regardless of the insanity that you are exhibiting right now, the neighbors came to me and told me that if I can’t get you to calm down they are going to call the super, and after last time you will likely be evicted.”, he informs me.

My friend leaves and I close the door.  I walk to the kitchen and open the cupboard and see many cans of cat food.  “See, I feed my cat real food.”, I sarcastically say to myself.  Upon further inspection, I am shocked to find most of the cans are past their expiration date.  The few cans that have not expired are close to expiring.  Have I only been feeding my cat junk food for this long?

Phoebe Buffay you are right, it is all my fault and I am sorry for screaming at you.  I don’t know why I’m apologizing to a fictional character, but since I screamed expletives at the same fictional character, it seemed appropriate.  I vowed to fix this egregious error I had been making with my cat and feed him only the best quality nutritious cat food.  I wanted him to live with me for a long time.

I throw all of the cans of food away, I decided that I am going to find only the best quality organic cat food I can find to ensure my cat is healthy.  As I’m walking toward my door I see my cat has finished all the cheese balls and now has his head in the bag licking up all of the cheese powder stuck to the sides.  Enjoy this treat one last time sweet cat, because tomorrow you start your new nutritious lifestyle.  I pick up some great quality organic cat food for my cat and a replacement bag of cheese balls for myself and head home.

Later that night my cat starts howling for food; I open up a can of organic cat food and put it in his food bowl.  He stares at me as if to say, \”what the hell is this crap?”  I respond to him with, “you are going on a diet, no more junk food for you.”  He just stares at the bowl, refusing to eat it, I decided that he will eat it when he gets hungry enough and walk away.

I sit on the couch with my replacement bag of cheese balls and start binge-watching Friends again.  I open my bag and grab a handful of cheese balls to stuff in my mouth.  From out of nowhere I feel the pain of my cat clawing and biting my hand to get to the cheese balls.  I drop the cheese balls in my hand due to the pain.

“What the hell are you doing?!”, I scream at my cat.

While looking at the damage my cat has done to my hand I watch him feverishly eating the dropped cheese balls.  When he finishes I see him looking at the bag in my other hand.  I lift the bag above my head and tell him no.  He stares at me and growls the most serious demonic growl I have ever heard.  He attempts to leap at the bag that I am holding, he’s too heavy to reach the bag but his entire body hits my head.  The weight of my cat is enough to knock my head back and give me whiplash.  With this, I drop the bag of cheese balls and they fall all over the ground.  My cat begins to eat, he has won this round.

The next day I try again, I fill my cat’s water bowl and leave the house for the day.  I decided that today my cat can fast while I eat out, stream Friends on my phone, and safely enjoy my junk food.  By the time I get home my cat is starving, so I fill his food bowl with organic food and go to bed.

When I wake up the next morning my cat is sleeping next to me in bed and purring.  I get up and see his food bowl is empty.  I am overjoyed to see that he ate his organic cat food.  For the next couple of months, I continue to deploy diversionary tactics to ensure he doesn’t see me eating the junk food I used to share with him.  During this time he learns to enjoy his new food and he is quickly losing weight.

Now that my cat is at a healthy weight and he finally seems to love his new diet, I decide it is time for the ultimate test.  I endeavor to eat my junk food in front of him while watching TV.  After feeding him his dinner, I sit down on the couch, turn on Friends and open a bag of cheese balls.  The sound of the bag opening does not faze him, he continues to eat his organic dinner.

After my cat finishes dinner he comes and sits down on my lap.  He does not attempt to grab any of the cheese balls from my hand.  I decide to do one final test, I stick a cheese ball in front of him to see if he’ll eat it.  He sniffs the cheese ball and then pays it no mind, it seems as if the high-quality food has made him lose interest in junk food.  Happy that I was able to get my cat’s health back on track I stick the cheese ball in my mouth and enjoy its cheese powdery goodness.

Phoebe begins to sing her staple song, Smelly Cat, and I joyfully laugh with the knowledge that my cat is no longer smelly.  During the song, I happen to pass gas, and it smells so bad that my cat begins to cough as if he is having trouble breathing.  Suddenly I realize that she is still singing that song about me, but even more this time as now I am both the smelly cat and the person at fault.  I cannot believe the audacity of this woman, how dare she endeavors to insult me a second time!

The Friends show continues with all of their laughs, the very same laughs that I used to find funny but now see they are just patronizing me.  The cast of the show continues with their scene, but when I look at the TV all I see is Phoebe looking at me in the eyes singing, while the entire cast sings chorus behind her, but instead of singing Smelly Cat they\’re singing “Smelly human, smelly human, what are you eating?  Smelly human, smelly human it’s your damn fault!”

I know I’m about to be enraged so I gently nudge my cat to encourage him to get off my lap.  My cat seems to have passed out from the smell so I gently pick him up and move him onto the couch next to me…