#63 - Spicy

Todays Prompt:

#63 - Spicy

Spicy can be used to describe: food, language, sensuality, literature, recipes, personalities, smells, or just the Bloody Mary you drink by the pool. Whatever flavour you choose to share, make sure you add a little spice to our lives (sorry, couldn't resist!)

This weekend has been and continues to be one of the premier , perfect summer weekends ever. It is cool, cool, at night for restful slumber, and mid 70's F. to low 80's F. with moderate humidity during the day. Spectacular sunrises and sunsets have bracketed both ends of the days. The river is like a sheet of glass with the only ripples being man made. So what does this have to do with spicy? Nothing really, except that I wanted to share with you why I've been away from the computer and not blogging. Continuing in that vein, I've had a devil of a time trying to get my thoughts around anything remotely worth posting in reference to today's prompt.

Having recently adopted Zaccharias as my muse from The Shameless Lions Writing circle. I was a little disappointed that he was not inspiring me with some ideas on how to spice up my post for today. By the way, For those of you who are clamoring to find out why I named my mentor lion Zaccharias....I named him after Zacharias Janssen who has been given credit by some for inventing the first compound microscope.

I gave up on him and set out to accomplish some chores...mainly finish spading my garden and getting the plants in the ground and then back to the river for some kayaking.

First light brought temperatures in the high 40's, just right for some rigorous labor. So I set about my task and as is common for me when doing mundane repetitive tasks, my mind wandered. Today It began to wander to possible avenues to take for the prompt; spice.


A warren of hares has taken up residence nearby as well as a large variety of birds. I glanced up the hill in time to see a neighbor's Siamese kitty stalking. I think he was stalking a hare but after a cat bird swooped down on him and sent out a loud warning I'm wondering if there is a bird nest near by. In either case the hare took the warning seriously and left the area as quick as a bunny (sorry). Said kitty finally noticed, after 3 or 4 minutes, that brunch had disappeared. He proceeded to search the area diligently, but to no avail. While he was sitting there pondering what had just happened, I was reminded of a cat and mouse scenario I witnessed quite a few years ago, shortly after moving into our current home.

At that time we cohabitated with 2 cats. One, a female Siamese, named Ginger, and a recently acquired barn cat, named Tinker, from a relative who operated a dairy farm. Ginger was the color of ginger root when we purchased her, hence her name. Tinker was named by my son and I'm at a loss to remember how he arrived at that name.

One evening as I rounded the corner from the kitchen to the living room I saw Ginger playing with , eeekk a mouse! Egads it was a real live mouse. The mouse was as big as a husked butternut, and was sitting as still as a stone. Cats live for the chase and have little interest in stark still prey. They engage in a ploy to give the prey hope of escape.... they turn their head away from the unmoving object of desire in the hopes that the mouse, seeing that the monster is no longer interested, will think, if I'm quick enough, I can make a hasty escape. Just as the mouse makes a move, the cat looks back and seeing movement pounces on the mouse. Mr. mouse freezes. While this back and forth game of "cat & mouse" was progressing, I notice Tinker, the barn cat, watching the scene with rapt attention from a vantage point under the oak rocking chair.


Ginger looks away for the umpteenth time.....before the mouse can even contemplate moving, Tinker streaks like a lightening bolt to the mouse, scoops it up and swallows it whole in one fell swoop and continues to the other side of the room unseen by Ginger. Ginger makes her turn to catch the moving prey only to discover that it was gone. Gone? Where could it have gone? Compulsively she begins a search of the entire living room try to locate the mouse. Tinker meanwhile licks her paw, wipes her mouth, licks her paw, wipes her mouth.

Sometimes a bland meal beats a spicy one!

Leave it to Zaccharias to come up with a cat story.

P.S. Our current Siamese's name is Cinnamon.