...for someone who woke up this morning with THIS deposited on the pillow next to my head:
THIS, if you can't tell, is a very dirty and careworn stuffed crab. The Crab is approximately the size of a bread plate, and is currently Tricksy's favorite toy. I say "currently" because eventually she will rip the throat and/or belly open, and disemboweled tufts of stuffing will get caught in her teeth or stuck on her tongue, and then we will have to give her a new toy.
Tricksy's first toy was one she chose herself, from a bag of items that a friend brought over for me to rummage through before she took it to the Goodwill. I didn't do any rummaging but Tricksy did, reaching into the bag with her face and plucking a stuffed sea otter for herself. My friend and I stood there with our mouths open as she carried it by the scruff of the neck down the hallway; she was still a kitten and so occasionally she dragged the sea otter rather than technically carrying it, although what was inescapable was that she was making off with it. Neither of us had seen anything like it before.
I had a cat once that would go through my jewelry box whenever I was careless enough to leave it open, select an item, and go in the other room to play with it. This was the same cat that used to sit in the recording studio during vocal sessions and lay her ears back when the singer was flat, and the same cat who begged oat bran muffins crumbs at the kitchen table and filched popcorn out of bowls on the coffee table when she thought no one was looking (before getting colitis and laying a CATastrophic trail to her litter box; we didn't know that Kittehs could get colitis from eating oat bran muffins, popcorn, and kitteh kibble but apparently this is true. Needless to say we knocked off the extra curricular eating - hers, not ours).
ANYSHESUREWASAGOODKITTEHWAY
Tricksy brings The Crab up on to the bed during the night when she is hungry and in despair as to whether or not we will ever feed her again. Is it that she's so hungry that she will eat her favorite toy if we don't do something? Or, is she trying to set us a good example by showing us what to do, "Here, look, I brought you food, now it's your turn to bring me food!" Usually The Crab ends up at the foot of the bed but somehow this morning it did not. So as I started to say before I so rudely interrupted myself with reminiscences of a Kitteh past, I really am as well as can be expected for someone who woke up this morning with THAT staring me in the face.