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Caturday Pootie Diary: The human at home [1]
['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.']
Date: 2025-09-20
I fetched the sprinkler from the front porch where I tended to keep it, and reentered the house, closing and locking the door.
Freddie was jogging over to me. “Outside?” he asked, his face open and hopeful.
“Wanna go explore the backyard?” I asked him. “I need to water but that’s not the whole yard.”
In answer, he turned and trotted to the back door.
A gentle reminder of how we do things: 🐱🐶🐦 Do not troll the diary. If you hate pootie diaries, leave now. No harm, no foul.
Please do share pics of your fur kids! If you have health/behavior issues with your pets, feel free to bring it to the community.
Pooties are cats; Woozles are dogs. Birds... are birds! Peeps are people.
Whatever happens in the outer blog STAYS in the outer blog. If you’re having “issues” with another Kossack, keep it “out there.” This is a place to relax and play; please treat it accordingly. There are some pics we never post: snakes, creepy crawlies, any and all photos that depict or encourage human cruelty toward animals. These are considered “out of bounds” and will not be tolerated. If we alert you to it, please remember that we do have phobic peeps who react strongly to them. If you keep posting banned pics...well then...the Tigress will have to take matters in hand. Or, paw.
I opened the screen door to the backyard and left it open, walking outside with Freddie close on my heels. I’d leave the door open while we were outside. I’ve learned that he tends to get scared if he loses easy access to the house.
I looked down at him. “Don’t eat anything and stay in the yard,” I said.
“Roger that,” he answered, meandering over to the planter that was closest to the back door. It was usually his first stop.
I went the other way, toward the hose. I connected the sprinkler to it and walked to roughly the middle of our small patch of grass. Laying it flat, I walked back to the hose and turned it on.
It takes a little time to get the water just right because this particular sprinkler doesn’t require much water pressure for it to go a long, long distance. It was why I liked it so much; I could water the whole yard in one go. The downside was that it took some careful work to set it so the water reached all the plants without going over the back and side fences to the neighbor’s yards.
Once the sprinkler was working as I wanted, I stepped back and looked around for my cat. He was at the edge of the pool, leaning in like he was trying to smell the water.
"If you fall in, I’m not going in after you,” I lied.
He ignored me completely, very busy with what he was doing.
Shaking my head, I walked into the house long enough to grab my coffee, then walked back out.
He watched me as I did this, then went back to his inspection.
“What does it smell like?” I wondered.
“Good,” he said, sitting up again. “I want to roll in it.”
I nodded. “That’s the chlorine. You can’t roll in it, though.”
“Yeah,” he said, sadly.
We have a small table and two chairs set up on the far side of the pool and I sat there, drinking my coffee and watching Freddie as he carefully smelled the wooden fence that closed off the pool motor and equipment.
One small section of the fence, anyway.
He seemed very interested in it and had been there for a while.
“What do you smell?” I called out to him. “Possum? Racoon? Squirrel?” I lowered my voice a little. “Rat?”
He didn’t answer, too busy analyzing whatever it was he was smelling.
“This is really nice,” I said with a contented sigh. “We should do this every week.”
Freddie was walking around the pool along the slightly darker line of rock that outlined the pool. It was a nice little catwalk for him, but it seemed awfully close to the edge for my comfort.
“Should we do this again next week?” I asked him.
“Yes,” he said, walking past me, his tail high in the air. Now he was so close to the edge of the pool that the slightest nudge would send him over the edge. I reminded myself that he was very graceful and had excellent balance.
Nevertheless, I found myself repeating myself: “If you go in, I’m not coming after you.”
“Yes you will,” he said, not even looking up.
I sat back in my chair. “Yes. I will.”
I finished my coffee and checked my watch. It was just about time to turn off the water.
Freddie was in that part of the yard, trying to explore the planter on the edge of the grass. This was an ill-advised idea, and he squawked and jumped out of it as the edge of the water struck him.
He sat at the edge of the grass, just out of reach of the water and howled in outrage.
“That’s on you!” I called out.
He quieted down and sat, calmly watching the sprinkler.
I watched him watch it.
It was an oddly peaceful moment.
"What is that?” Freddie asked. He was sitting next to me on the couch, watching as I unboxed my most recent purchase.
“It’s a mop for the hardwood. It requires a little assembly before I can use it.”
“Boxes,” he murmured, his eyes big.
“Don’t get attached,” I said, stuffing the smaller pieces of cardboard into the larger box and pushing the bits of plastic in even deeper. I didn’t want him chewing on any of it.
I snapped the last piece into place and looked at my new mop. “It’s heavy,” I said with a frown. “I’m going to be tired when I’m done cleaning.”
“Take a nap instead,” Freddie suggested.
I looked over at him and smiled. “You can nap for both of us.”
"Oh, she shouldn't do that,” I told Freddie around the bite of red vine in my mouth.
“What did she do?” he demanded. He was watching the screen, but I wasn’t sure how much he understood.
We were sitting on the couch much as we had been before, but now I was fully reclined and he was stretched out beside me. We were watching a horror movie together. The house around us was clean and as I predicted, I was tired.
I swallowed the licorice in my mouth and put the edge of the vine in my mouth to suck on.
A loud bang onscreen made us both jump, Freddie’s ears going flat against his head. “That was a good jump scare,” I said.
“Humans are so weird,” he answered.
I grinned at him and petted him. “I’m glad we spent the day together,” I told him.
“Me too,” he said, his ears straightening again.
Happy Caturday, Peeps! This was basically our Monday this week. It was a lovely day, actually, and I think taking my coffee outside while Freddie explores might become a regular thing.
[END]
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