Brown Bagging It

Here at the farm, we encourage self-sufficiency. Cubbie, one of our outdoor cats, understands this quite well.

Yes, we do feed the outdoor cats every day - but just once in the morning, and not too much. We need them to help with rodent control.

If she catches a rodent and we're around, she tends to meow to get our attention and our praise. Normally, she will wait until we skritch her and tell her how wonderful she is. Then we tell her we do not want to eat her prize - at which point, she will typically begin to eat it in our presence. Nice.

Today was a bit different. She'd just had her breakfast. She managed to catch a mouse. She yodeled for attention. She got it. I went to do something somewhere else. Some time later, she appeared there - with the mouse - and asked for more praise. She got it.

I went somewhere else and the same thing happened. I left for town to run an errand or three. I came back. She was in a new location, with the same mouse nearby.

She's been carrying this mouse around like a brown bag lunch all morning now. Never know when she might be hungry.

If she offers to share again, I think I'll still decline.