The time I made Jell-o Jigglers

At my same little "Archie Bunker House" in Oshkosh I was up to dinkin' in the kitchen. I was making Jell-o Jigglers for no particular reason. Now, I'm not sure how to reveal what happens in this story in a climactic type way. Here goes. My cat, he is very skilled at using his paws. He can extract a single pounce out of the canister with his paw and eat it right out of the palm of his kitty hand. He has been also know to "Scoot" food, undetected, to the edge of a coffee table, knock it off and snatch it in his gob. This little trick is amazing to watch with pizza crusts. He has been doing this crap for years. The strategy is to hide under the coffee table during a distracting movie or juicy conversation with a friend (that usually involved comfort food). Once he has been silent for a good period of time he will reach a paw out from under the table (picture the arm of a pro basketball player hanging on the hoop after he's dunked the ball) the extension is more of a HOOK than a grab. Usually, there is a moment or two of feeling his way around the table for the food. Many times at this stage he is caught. A simple, "Marten, NO!" will cause the paw to retreat and he will not try again for at least 5 minutes. Eventually though, the movie or conversation is so distracting that he manages not only to locate the food with his "hook paw", but successfully drags it to the edge where it inconspicuously falls to the floor and is devoured in seconds.

Now I feel as though I've given it away already with that set up. Oh well, it's still a fun story. So Marten decided to use the "hook paw" to find out what I was making on the counter in the kitchen that day. All I'm going to say is there were 2 full packets of gelatin mixed in with that Jell-o and it was still very warm. An entire 9X13 inch pan full of RED, super gelatin, not yet firmed up Jigglers was "hook paw"ed down on Marten. He was so surprised that he immediately darted out of the room and up the stairs, leaving a trail of RED goo behind him. I caught him in a towel, but he was so mad, violently slashing at me that I couldn't even get him cleaned off. He refused to be touched, much less cleaned. So, I just let him go.

It took him 3 days to lick that pan of Jell-o off of himself. Matted little hairball with a red tongue he was. I didn't really mind cleaning up the mess in the kitchen. I think the look on his face and all that time he had to spend licking up Jell-o were very much worth it. He occasionally will do the "hook paw" from under the coffee table, but he has never again tried it at the kitchen table or counters. Curiosity didn't KILL the cat, but the crime scene sure looked like a homicide.

Next post; Some humorous story from my journal circa 1997