If you’re incarcerated in the Main House at House Kirkland, there’s something a bit off with you—you’re missing a body part, have a behavioral issue inhibiting adoption or maybe just faking it like Jack Nicholson in One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest and now Nurse Su has fallen for you and won’t let you leave. Despite being stuck on the inside, there are still choice pieces of real estate within—the heated coils in the floor of the master bedroom, the kitchen shelf with a primo view of the stove and if you haven’t sharpened your claws on the carpeted stairs…fugeddaboutit…you haven’t embraced life as a cat.
But perhaps the best kept secret in the Main House is the warm air vent at the bottom of the built-in Sub Zero (30 years old and counting) which Bran, our first paraplegic, discovered early on in his bit at Kirkland, so much so that it’s now his “spot”—there’s a standing bathmat at the base of the fridge and anyone craving a scoop of ice cream has to negotiate with that furry troll for access to the freezer drawer. He’s the closest thing we have to a diet plan, and he takes his role as Cerberus seriously. You better want those calories…you’re going to work for them.
For every yin, there’s a yang, every sweet, a sour, every bad cop, a good cop—you get the idea—and a couple of weeks ago, we welcomed Kirk, a snow-white paraplegic, who is without a doubt, the sweetest cat ever to cross the Kirkland threshold. Other than howling for food at 7:00 AM like Raiders fans over a blown call, Kirk couldn’t be a nicer add. He concedes to being expressed (Bran fights Mama Su like a honey badger), poops in controlled spots (Bran is like the Marquis de Sade pitching a tantrum) and gladly presents himself for a head scratch. Like Bran, he’s cockroach quick despite having no access to rear paw drive but otherwise a pleasure to have onsite.
As a result, it was shock to find earlier today that Kirk and Bran had reached a tentative accord to share the base of the fridge and stiffen the gauntlet to the freezer. Now, if you’re Jonesing for Haagan-Daz vanilla Swiss almond ice cream, you need to offer an ear smoosh and insincere affirmation as well as anticipate a furry Alien-esque creature savaging your ankles. On the one hand, it’s a bummer, but on the other, it is time to start thinking about summer, and it’s nice to see the pair of them working as a team. Our furry paraplegics…Bran and Kirk.
