The Cat Whisperer Breaks Up Their Business Meeting
Channel: Shelli Poole
Date: 2018-12-02

Video taken December 2nd, 2014 -- I told friends these feral cats were having business meetings. I didn't have proof until now. Some background:

I moved to the country. Yep. I still live in Saline County, but I am [cue ominous music] OUTSIDE THE CITY LIMITS. Now I know this doesn't mean diddly to a lot of folks in these parts. You've lived here all your lives. This is all you know. A city girl like me living out here is just laughable.

But for you to get an idea of what this means, imagine not owning any camo. Imagine never having hunted or even baited a hook. I have been fishing, mind you - I just didn't do the dirty parts. Oh I've been around country folks all my life. I even talk like one. It's hard not to in Arkansas. I grew up watching Hee Haw and Andy Griffith and listening to country music. But the thing is, I was forced to! Yes, all of that country culture grew on me as I matured, but that... does not... make me a country girl. Merely southern.

Now that I've moved out in the sticks - or what I consider to be sticks - there are situations I'm encountering that I have never happened upon before. For one, I have a septic tank. I have learned some of what that means and have taught my children not to put food down the sink and don't flush ANYTHING but toilet paper. I ordered cable internet and found that there had never been a cable run to this house in the 20 years that it has sat on this acre. 

Google Maps will get you lost if you type in the address. Walmart is over 10 miles away and (gasp!) I can see the stars at night. However, I am within 4 miles of three different Dollar Generals.

Here's what's happening tonight. A fire. People in city subdivisions don't light their whole yard on fire. Well except for this one guy on Northshore, but that's not for leaves, it's for weeds in the Spring, and I think that might be a pocket of county (not city) land too. Anyway, here's what the neighbor is doing right now in the dark and I don't mind telling you it scares the pee water out of me. Keeping an eye on it.
( http://imgur.com/a/5PvOooL.jpg )

But that wasn't the reason I looked out the front door. (Yes, this is zoomed to my next door neighbor!) The thing that made me undo the big lock and the little lock and the front door and the storm door was this THUMP. And then another THUMP. 
'Twern't Santa Claus, friends, I don't care if you believe in him or not. Fact is, there are several stray cats in these parts, but only one who dares to come on the deck and ask for vittles. Kibbles. Whatever you call what cats eat. I'm not cat people.

Anyway, this thump-thump turned into what sounded like a tenor choir practicing trilling their R's.

"Rarrr, rarrr, rarrr..."

I was trying hard to ignore it and get out my nightly newsletter to all the lovely members of my website, MySaline, but the choir practice got louder. It made me wonder if they needed a director. So I got up and turned on my camera and opened the door. 

This video is the documentation of an agreement I hope I have reached with the choir.

Yes, that's about right. We conversed politely and then they shut up and scrammed. I hope it will stay that way at least for the evening, so my daughter doesn't hear them outside her window and dream of ailing Mopeds revving or too-fast ceiling fans whirring out of control.