Catnapping on Carson!

We all know and love Kindsay...at least I do...I just don't know about the neighbors. As you know, Kindsay is NOT to be trusted with the life of another being, so we don't allow her to have pets. Granted, she's tried...if you haven't noticed, we just got rid of the lizard, which was after the birds she found in front of our house. Kindsay is no dummy. She knows Mom and Dad won't buy her a pet, so where should she get one? That's right...out in nature where things live. Except, on this wonderful day off she helped herself to someone else's living thing.
It's Wednesday morning, the day we honor veterans, and I'm lazily sleeping in (does 8 AM count?)...and I hear the garage door open. While my guard SHOULD be up, it's not and I stay in bed. I listen for my children and hear nothing so back to La-La land I go. Greg and I finally get out of bed and face our day off to find the boys tearing down the hallway...and that's normal for them except when I hear them chattering something about 'what Kindsay found.' Experience has taught us ALL that those words together spell trouble. And of course, they are in my room. I can hear Kindsay yelling at the boys, threatening them, and this perks my ears. It is when I hear Ty begin crying that I race down the hall to find one boy crying, another looking under my bed, and Kindsay standing outside my back door, probably ducking my anger. The boys tell me they were trying to get the cat out from under my bed and Kindsay wouldn't let the cat out. There were a few things wrong with that statement...one being that there was a cat, which I am highly allergic to, another was that it was under my bed. Why me? I start pushing stuff under my bed to scare the cat out, but it's not budging. I open my back door to find Kindsay with the 'deer caught in the headlight' look on her face. She knows I'm ticked and she's in for it. Hitting my children is absolutely unacceptable and goodness knows I've been over that with her a hundred times. I order the boys to get the cat OUT! which they proceed to do ASAP, and Kindsay I dismiss from the house until the red mark on Ty's back fades. This wasn't an isolated situation..oh no, we had the neighbors involved. Here's what the neighbor across the street tells us happened:
Kindsay sets out on an early morning trek. She crosses the busy street next to our neighborhood with a backpack on her back and her long skirt and tennies. What's this? A cat hanging out all alone by a light pole? Oh, it seems to like me because it's rubbing on my leg now...I guess it wants to come home with me. Kindsay then shoves the cat in her backpack and zips it up. The neighbor felt it was his duty to return the cat to its region of the neighborhood so it could find its way home, so he came over and asked for the cat. Once the cat was gone, Kindsay went across the street, opened the back gate to our other neighbor's house, and fed their dog. This dog is no lap dog--it's a large black dog that I have never even seen before. Kindsay's feeding away, doing her own thing...would probably shove it in her backpack if it would fit. Rules do not apply to Kindsay...has that become obvious yet? Oh, how my life would be different if she stayed within her limits. Kindsay is like Plankton on Spongebob trying to steal the Krabby Patty formula, and I'm Mr. Krabs, batting down all her attempts. And one day, maybe all the little critters of the world will unite and thank me. Chocolate is always a good show of gratitude.

Kindsay--Again

Ah, my favorite subject. Kindsay is a funny girl--at least 3 days later. Her passion is animals: loving and hating. I have a beta fish in my classroom and over spring break had to bring it home to care for it. Kindsay called me on my way home from McLane asking incessantly about the fish-whose is it?, why do we have it?, can we keep it?, why are we taking it?...and on and on during the fifteen-minute drive. I tried to answer, but my answers weren't what she was interested in. She was simply interested in understanding the concept of the fish and all she wanted to hear from me was that we would be keeping it. No, my answer was pretty firm coming out. We've had fish before. "I will not kill it. I will not put it on this lightbulb and kill it like the other fish." all the while I am repeating No No No. "Mom--we are fish poor!" She was scraping for anything to say to convince me that we need a fish. Oh, we're fish poor...well then we should keep this one! "We don't have a hamster and we don't have a fish! And I won't kill them this time!" When I got the fish home it took a matter of a few hours before I went back to find bread crumbs in the fish bowl and the plant that was entertaining the fish thrown in the trash can. OK--this is WHY we don't have a fish, and why we aren't keeping this one! The fish food, I told her over and over, was at grandma's and we would get it later! I say this to her as I'm scooping bread crumbs out of a very narrow opening in the poor excuse of a fish bowl. The fish is playing dead, like Nemo. She put her face right into the glass and yelled at the fish, which she named Chloe at first, then Zack, then Jack. It's dead! She screams this down the hall. I go to the fish, who has one eye open scanning the glass, and I realize its fins are moving slightly, enough to prove its not dead. In a swoop I've got the fish and whisk it off to my mom's for safe keeping. Let's hope it survives spring break, and doesn't wind up half-fried in a plastic egg in a basket filled with sugary, edible grass.