This Is My Brain off Coffee

Hey, do you ever wonder if your cat is actually a highly sophisticated robot spy device?

Then again, I don’t know if you would really call Slappy White “highly sophisticated.” Also, robots probably smell better. Still, you kind of have to wonder. Why does he always insist on being in the bathroom while I take a shower? It makes me a little uncomfortable, but I have to make sure I let him in before I start, or he’ll scratch all the paint off the door. Then he jumps up onto the sink and watches me intently through the curtain. Afterwards as I’m putting in my contacts and brushing my teeth, he sometimes reaches out a paw, sinks his claws into my towel, and tries to pull it off. Why would a cat do this?

Or perhaps he was a dirty old man in his last life, and just retains some of those tendencies. This theory has good and bad points. On the plus side, this would be consistent with much of his other behavior. And it’s always nice to believe that death is not the end. On the minus side, what if you had to come back as a dung beetle, or a marketing executive?

Whereas if Slappy were a remote-controlled spy robot, that could also explain the purposeful bustling noises coming from underneath the bathroom floor every morning, which I’ve been attributing to Dave the raccoon.

I’ve seen Dave down there, or at least I’ve seen him go in. One evening as I was pulling into my driveway after a visit to Grady and Margie’s, I noticed one of the cats lumbering, in typical, disdainfully leisurely fashion, out of the way. But then I realized what I was seeing was much too big to be a cat. As he neared the house and my headlights shone full on him, Dave turned and gave me a reproachful glance, then pulled the crawlspace hatch open, with his little raccoon hand, and went inside.

You couldn’t pay me enough to crawl into there. But then, I think Dave is counting on that.

So when I take a shower in the morning, there’s nothing but a quarter inch of cast iron between the soles of my feet and the cold crawlspace air, and Dave – or someone, or something, that sounds very busy down there. What could be going on?!

I think it’s a spy, operating the remote control that makes Slappy White force his way into the bathroom and try to get my towel off. Anything is possible!

Or else Dave is also a robot. I’ve never gotten close enough to smell him.

Not As Much As Meets the Eye

Robbie and I saw Transformers the other night.

You've seen the cartoon, right? My first boyfriend in high school was totally into it. He was, in fact, so into it that I once noticed him furtively watching it while he really, really, really should have been paying attention to something else, if you catch my drift.

That's why you should never date 16-year-old boys. Well - that, and the fact that you'll get arrested, you lousy pervert. What the hell is the matter with you people?! Sheesh!

Anyway, the movie was way better than the cartoon. The plot revolves around a device - this isn't a spoiler - which converts any technological objects that are exposed to its energy into transformers. And of course Robbie and I reduced one another to tears afterwards trying to imagine what sort of havoc this device would wreak if it came to the government agency where we work.

NOAAtron would have to be the transformer overlord, of course. Created from the technology behind the only external website that employees of our agency are allowed to visit, he would mastermind the new creatures' strategy. At first we theorized that he would do this merely by watching the radar and advising when a battle should be called off due to the danger of rust. But then we realized that he'll actually control the weather. The government already does that anyway, right?

I swear, the crickets were an accident.

The second-in-command would be created from the mainframe that holds most of our data. Unfortunately, it's in another city, and although you'd feel the ground shaking from its lumbering tread, it wouldn't get to Austin in time to be in the movie.

And all the foot soldiers would be made from the technology lying around our offices, most of which is unfortunately about 30 years old, and as I've speculated before probably was transformed from old government employees to begin with. I think they would look something like this.

Being government employees, the vast majority of them wouldn't have much energy for doing battle, and would probably spend most of the time taking smoke breaks or nodding off in the elevator or burning microwave popcorn. NOAAtron would find this very frustrating, and could hardly be blamed for occasionally hitting some of his own troops with a stray weather-control laser. "Oops," he would boom.

They would all communicate via Novell Send Message.

Obsolete technology or no, the fracas that would ensue would be spectacular, and high school boys all over town would stop whatever they were doing to watch. Coming soon to a government agency near you!