Monthly Archives: April 2008

I was going downstairs to check on the trap when I heard the snap. It had been sprung! My heart and I raced down and out to the back porch where, sure enough, I found a trap containing one very unhappy feline.

Unfortunately, it was the wrong unhappy feline.

And boy, was it upset to be in there…kicking, howling, slamming the sides of the trap. When I opened the door to let it out, it rocketed out there doing just under Mach 1 and I thought, "Well, we won't see that one in the yard again"…a prediction that held true for a good eight minutes before it was back and heading into the trap. This time, I chased it off before it got all its whiskers through the entrance.

The Kitten apparently witnessed the whole incident and I thought (again, wrongly) that it would make her less likely to go in there. Not so. A few minutes after I'd reset the thing, she walked in, got a few bites of the food in there…and strolled out, missing the triggering footplate. She's good at that.

We always make that mistake of thinking that an animal has a thought process identical to a human. They can be very smart but not in the same way we can be very smart. Well, some of us can be very smart. I, for example, am dumb enough to be up at this hour, writing a script and running downstairs every twenty minutes or so to see if I've caught anything.

Do you know I've written network television shows that didn't last as long as this whole, as-yet-unfulfilled incident of The Kitten? And some of them were almost as funny.

I'm giving up 'til the morning light and I just closed down the trap. I don't think I could sleep, worrying that some terrified, claustrophobic possum was in there being traumatized. It's bad enough The Kitten's going to have to be in there…and note that I still have an utterly groundless optimism that some day, she will be. So good night, Internet. And good night, Kitten. Wherever you are.

I'm very close to giving up on this. I've been trying since Saturday to get a probably-preggo pussycat into a humane (they assure me) trap so I can take her in for shots and fixing and whatever else a vet can do for this most feral of felines. She walks around the trap. She sits by the trap. She even feigns that she is about to go into the trap. This last is done just to get my hopes up so they can be dashed anew.

So I'm very close to giving up…and I would if I could think of any better scenario. The Kitten is homeless and fertile and will only create a whole litter of others in the same state.

Earlier today, I tried the hands-on approach again. I put on some gloves and had my assistant Tyler standing by with that plastic pet carrier I purchased. I figured it might be easier, if I just picked up The Kitten, to put her in that and then transfer her to the trap. (The vet for some reason requires that I bring her in in a trap, not in a carrier.) It took a half hour of petting and maneuvering to get her into a position where I could pick her up. She did not like it. She did not like it a lot.

She kicked and hollered and squirmed and there was no way to get her little body through the door of the carrier. I finally lost my grip and she sprinted for the adjoining zip code. I've decided this will never work, even if I throw (as some of you have suggested) a towel over her. I think it's the trap or nothing.

Obviously, I have lost track of how many parts this is running.

Still out there. Still mocking me. Last night, we danced around for a couple hours. I was working on a deadline and every time I finished two pages, I'd go down and there'd be The Kitten, hanging out on the back porch, crying and wondering where the usual food was and going everywhere on my property except into the trap.

(Memo to The Kitten: The usual food is there, you pussy. It's in the trap. You have to go in there to get it. Do you understand the concept? Get into the trap!)

More than a hundred of you have sent in suggestions and I'd send you all thank you notes but I'm too busy trying to get The Kitten into the trap. I'm doing everything I can imagine working, as well as a few things I can't imagine will work but they're the kind of things you do when you're desperate. No, I have not tried sedating her yet. Apart from the fact that I don't know what you use for that or where to get it, that just feels so wrong to me. I know the vets will dope her up but they know what they're doing and I'm determined to do this drug-free.

My big problem is that I can't just set the trap and leave it. There are too many other cats (and at night, possums and raccoons) who will get snared. I'm not sure the trap will even spring if The Kitten does wander in and I'm not there to spring it. Twice, she went in, dined and strolled out without triggering the door mechanism.

I'm going to keep at this on the assumption that eventually, she will be hungry enough to get reckless and go in. Or maybe she'll just get cocky and go into the trap just to taunt me, knowing full well she can get out.

By the way: You may recall that I "rented" this trap on Saturday for ten bucks a day, and the idea is that if you don't return it in a week, they charge the cost of buying the trap to your credit card. I think I'm buying this trap. I just wish it worked.

A tour of your new money.

Last night, I was up 'til all hours — 4:30 ayem — alternately working on a Garfield project and dealing with a cat who's almost as crafty. The Kitten, as I call her, was around the yard all evening and I actually lured her into the trap four separate times without managing to spring the door and seal her inside. I found, by the way, that chunks of tuna worked better than anything else as bait.

The trap, as I'm sure I've explained, is a long, narrow cage. You open a spring-loaded door on either end and set a rod to hold it open. Inside the cage, there's a little floor panel that's connected to that rod and when the animal steps upon said floor panel, the rod holding the door open disengages and the door comes slamming down, sealing the critter inside.

Well, that's how it's supposed to work…accent on the "supposed" part.

Twice, The Kitten managed to walk in, get the food and miss the floor panel. Her front paws were past it, her back ones were behind it and she never put her weight on it. Now I know how the Coyote feels when those shoddy, inferior Acme products fail to trap the Road Runner.

Third time she went in, I was standing as close by as I dared stand…just inside the patio door. I was poised to sneak out and spring the trap behind her once she was inside — and I came damned close. It's just that I have feet the size of Cadillac Escalades. She heard me and bolted a micro-second before the lid slammed shut. Missed it, as a certain Mr. Smart used to say, by that much.

Okay, I decided. Fourth time's the charm. I got a mop and I figured I'd use that to trip the door from a few feet away. I waited 'til my nemesis was wholly inside the trap and was nibbling Star-Kist…I slid the patio door open without a sound…I hefted my mop handle and started moving it towards the latch…

And then along came a possum.

This big, homely possum came waddling up to the porch in search of the food that's usually out there. The Kitten got distracted and I could see her getting ready to sprint from the trap. I lunged with my mop handle but it was too late. She was past the barrier when it came crashing down. Thanks, you big, homely possum, you.

By then, it was four in the morn. I was tired of it all and I figured it would be at least an hour before The Kitten forgot about the experience and could be enticed into the trap again…if she even came back at all after that scare. So I gave up. I unset the trap (if I left it open, I'd probably catch the wrong cat again or a raccoon or that big, homely possum) and I went to bed. This morning at 8:15 when I checked, The Kitten wasn't around…and soon the neighborhood was swarming with men using leaf blowers so I doubt I'll see her for a while.

I didn't mean this to take so much of your time, people. If I'd known it was going to take this long, I wouldn't have started doing it diary-style here. But thank you for all the e-mails of advice and I hope to end our long national nightmare soon.

She's still out there and she's still mocking me.

There was one season of Hawaii Five-O where it seemed like every week, about forty-seven minutes into the show, the following would occur. Steve McGarrett would be sitting in his office after hours and with the lights down. Everyone else would have gone home for the night but McGarrett, being the dedicated supercop that he was, would be sitting there, just staring out the window, wondering about that week's master criminal who had to be caught in the next thirteen minutes, not counting station breaks.

Someone would find him there…someone (say, Danny Williams) who'd come back to the office late because he forgot something. He'd be amazed to find McGarrett still there, still on the job. But he'd also be unamazed because he, like everyone, knew the kind of stuff from which Steve McGarrett was made. "What are you thinking about, boss?" he'd ask, even though he knew full well what McGarrett was thinking about.

McGarrett would swivel around in his office chair and point or otherwise indicate the window with its beautiful nighttime view of Hawaii. And with a tightening of the throat and jaw, telling us how personal this whole matter was to him, McGarrett would say in a strong but frustrated voice…

"He's out there, Danno…and he's mocking us."

Why do I bring this up? Because The Kitten is out there somewhere and she's mocking me.

I think one of you tipped her off. She keeps coming around — four times so far today and it's just past sundown. Each time, she avoids the entrance to the trap. She walks all around it. She sniffs the sardine that has been placed inside. She acts as if she even wants that sardine…

But does she go in and get it? Ha. If she'd go in and get it, would I be sitting here, resurrecting old Hawaii Five-O memories? She also won't let me get near her at all today. Runs off faster than the audience for some shows I've written.

I wanted to trap her in the morning so she wouldn't have to sit in the trap all night before I can take her in to the vet. Trouble is, tomorrow morning my yard and the neighbor's will be full of gardeners and that usually scares the animal population off for a day. So if I can't get her tonight, it may be a while.

Still, I'm not giving up. Why? Because Steve McGarrett never gave up. Then again, he only had to catch psycho mass murderers. He never had to face the treachery and craftiness of The Kitten. She's out there and she's mocking me.

Here's a scene you may remember from It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World — the demolition of a service station by Jonathan Winters and two attendants. The attendant on the right is the brilliant comic actor Arnold Stang. The attendant on the left is the also-brilliant Marvin Kaplan…and this is a plug for Marvin's appearance tomorrow on Stu's Show, the "must listen" talk show on Shokus Internet Radio.

Marvin has had a long, wonderful career, appearing in countless TV shows and movies. I'll mention two roles. One was his recurring part as a diner patron on the long-running series, Alice. Another was his expert voice work as Choo-Choo on the Hanna-Barbera series, Top Cat. (Mr. Stang, of course, played Top Cat.) He has also been a mover and shaker in actors' rights groups and a special champion of "the little guy" in actors' unions that could easily forget about such people if they didn't have a Marvin Kaplan there to speak up.

I've worked with Marvin a few times on cartoon shows and he's a wonderful gentleman who makes everything he says sound interesting. (I also saw him once give an amazing dramatic performance in a production of The Dybbuk. He can do a lot more than tear down gas stations.)

And like I said, he's guesting tomorrow with your genial host, Stuart Shostak, along with equally-genial co-host Earl Kress. It all happens live (so you can call in with questions) from 4 PM to 6 PM Pacific Time, three hours later if you're in that silly time zone that's three hours later. To access it, go during those hours to the website for Shokus Internet Radio and click where they tell you to click. The show reruns throughout the week but I know you. You'd rather hear it live. There are also other fine programs to listen to there, by the way.

Okay, I'm giving up for today. Tune in tomorrow…same cat-time, same cat-channel!