Guanajuato, Mex -- A Tale of Two Bunnies

Night had finally fallen. The air was still. The days have been hotter than I can recall for May and the darkness finally capped off the burning of a dreadfully hot day offering a small, sweet respite.

I had to go to the bathroom. I had the urge for hours but the awful heat, in non-air conditioned Mexico, prevented me from doing what I had to do: I had to do #2. Moving one's bowels is not so terrible of a subject to broach when one has Irritable Bowel Syndrome or IBS. I've learned to face it that it is something not only with which I have to live but to talk about it often finds fellow sufferers who end up being friends. Just think about it: A Fellowship of #2'ers.

But, I digress....

I settled on the porcelain throne in the downstairs bathroom of the house we were house sitting. I thought it cooler and more conducive to better evacuation (If you know what I mean.).

Suddenly, and without warning, when an unexpectedly smooth egress was upon me, I hear a screech and a high pitched squeal coming from upstairs.

The screech came from my wife.

The squeal came from Yani, one of the feline charges we were "watching."

The wife screamed for help. I hollered as loudly as I could, "What is wrong?"

She replied in an uncharacteristically articulate screech, "Yani has something in his mouth and it's wiggling." (Death throes, no doubt.)

I could do nothing at that moment. I did what I came to do.

I pooped.

When finally done I didn't even flush but pulled up my britches and ran out the bathroom door.

By that time, every one was in the downstairs bedroom to which the bathroom I was in was attached. The cast of characters were my wife, Nuit, the black female cat, and two poodles, Katie and Chole Marie. All were facing the walk-in closet were Yani the bunny killer was adding the finishing touches to his murderous campaign of bunnycide.

(As an aside: The dogs were staring at the whole affair and exchanging knowing glances with one another as though to say, "We knew cats were a murderous bunch.")

I opened the louvered doors to the closet and proceeded cautiously. I wanted to extricate what looked to me to be a quite dead bunny (barely able to hop age) from Yani's death grip. Rabbits carry, at the very least, tape worm and I wanted to be fully responsible in my pet watching duties in this house sitting gig.

But, there would no disburdening Yani of his catch. I did try stepping on his his tail, ever so lightly, hoping that would freak him out into dropping his prize but it didn't work. He went deeper into the closet where I could never hope reach him.

We sat on the bed listening to Yani crunching the skull of his little bunny meal. Then he walked calmly out of the closest, licking his bloodied, bunny-killer lips, and shot out the window into the back yard.

I gave pursuit.

I saw him whip up a tree and over a wall at the speed of light. Within seconds he was back in his yard with a second bunny in his homicidal maw. We closed the window to prevent him from going back into the bedroom with his kill. He jumped to the window sill and upon realizing his entrance to the bedroom was thwarted, he leaped into the garden whereupon I saw the bunny was still alive and tried escaping Yani's killing grasp.

But, each time the bunny would try to run (hop) Yani would leap upon it and toss it into the air. He jumped on the the poor, helpless creature, he flopped on it, he laid on it, he rolled on it, and did God only knows what else to it. I don't know what else he did because I went to bed.

When I reentered the house the wife was hovering over the bed with a wash cloth to clean up the bunny blood that was deposited on the sheets. Apparently, Yani began devouring the thing on the bed before crunching his way merrily through the house.

The smell of death eventually filled the bedroom making sleep difficult, no, impossible. We did what we've seen on a zillion CSI television shows reruns: We applied a generous glob of Vic's vapor rub under our noses.

Sleep came, eventually and fitfully, but it came.

When morning finally came, Yani came through the window and into the bedroom singing his little chirpy meow as though nothing was wrong. With not a thought as to his nighttime savagery, he went full of gaiety to the upstairs and into the kitchen and begged for his morning ration of canned cat food.

I asked him if he wanted a little bunny with that to which he only chirped.

Moral of this story: Unless you have a farm with crops to protect from rats, mice, and yes, rabbits, a modern cat does not need to go outside. Studies from the University of California at Davis's vet school has shown that cats live longer and healthier lives as indoor cats only. Their outdoor brethren live much shortert lives with predation-induced parasites being a major cause of a shortened life span.

Think about it,