It was bound to happen sooner or later, but this morning at around 10:03, Stratford Palace entered an alternate universe. Until this very day, our Saturdays have included grooming rituals that go something like this:
- The caretaker locates the basket of cat grooming equipment and extracts the super duper fur comb-ma-bob-thingy.
- The caretaker locates Bear and shows her the fur comb.
- Bear, who loves grooming time, proceeds immediately to the ottoman and jumps up on it.
- The caretaker sits down by the ottoman and begins combing through Bear’s lovely coat.
- Buddy wanders in and finds a strategic spot from which to watch Bear being groomed.
- If the caretaker gets anywhere near Buddy with the fur comb, his fight or flight instincts take over and he either bats wildly at the comb or runs away.
But on this memorable morning, exactly nothing past Step 2 happened in the usual fashion. We pick up with the alternate Step 3.
3. Bear, who usually loves grooming time, ignores the caretaker.
4. The caretaker sits down by the ottoman and beckons again, to no avail.
5. Buddy wanders in and hops on the ottoman.
6. The caretaker combs through Buddy’s fur without incident.
We offer this explanation as a sort of public service announcement to our gentle readers who may have felt a slight tremor, or some other disturbance in the force, at the time of our entry into the alternate universe. It is our goal to return to you as soon as possible, but one does not always have control over such things. Our only hope is that this does not signal the end of the world as we know it. Heaven knows, Buddy heralds that event often enough.
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