Keiko is irresistably attracted to math homework. I can't sit down to study without a small black cat suddenly appearing on the table and settling down in my arms. I tell her repeatedly that cats aren't allowed on the table, but she hasn't listened in five years so I suppose she's not going to now. If I sit down to do anything else like make Christmas cards or eat dinner she doesn't jump up. She's indifferent to my reading at the table. But when the notebooks and calculator come out some Prime Annoyance Opportunity detector goes off in her tiny kitty head and she wakes up yawning, sharp little teeth and nubbly pink tongue on display, and pads downstairs to insist on snuggling with me while I try to factor polynomials and remember the order for synthetic division. All of my math papers have black hair on them.
She had a scare this morning. She began investigating a paper shopping bag from a department store, the kind with stiff, twisted paper handles. Somehow she managed to get her head stuck through the handles and couldn't get it out again. I was peacefully drinking my coffee when I heard a commotion in the kitchen and looked up to see Keiko tearing towards me with the paper bag flapping behind her. She couldn't get it off so she ran through the house, faster and faster, with the bag rattling and bonking into everything. Natasha sat bemusedly watching the ruckus. I laughed so hard I thought I would rupture something. Finally she shed it upstairs, and dove under the bed where she remained throughout the morning despite all my coaxing. I felt sorry for her, but man, that was worth the price of five years of kitty litter.
I found my chili pepper lights this afternoon and amused both cats by trying to untangle them. It was part of my homework avoidance technique: study 45 minutes, alphabetize my CD collection, study another 45 minutes, answer email, study 15 minutes, get distracted by laundry, study 5 minutes, jump up in disgust and decide to open all boxes marked XMAS. I actually did meet my goal of reviewing two chapters but I couldn't have done it in one go. This way I also got laundry done, the mantelpiece decorated, and my CDs organized after a mere eight months. And speaking of homework, I'm going to be studying in the evenings for the next five days so I'm taking a week off from updating. The next time I write I'll be free from algebra forever. Halleluia!
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Border graphic by Jade Leaves Designs in memory of Ginkgo