Good Morning!

What a way to start my morning.

So there I was, lying on my side in bed, half-awake as I wait for the alarm buzz. The bedside TV's on and the early news is droning softly but my eyes are shut. Sally's curled into my belly; Pumpkin's doing library-lion on my hip. All is peaceful....

Chaos erupts! Shrieking yowling exploding cats! A frantic hind paw slashes the side of my face as Sally bolts!

I jerk upright. No cats to be seen, not even the sumfabitch (Stan or Schooner, take your pick) who'd made the sudden lunge from the floor that spooked my bedmates into panicked flight.

And I'm bleeding. Oh, not very much, point-source ooze, really, and a quick lurch to the bathroom, cleanup, antibiotic dabs, and Band-Aids take care of it -- even the ding a quarter of an inch from my (shudder) eye.

The alarm goes off while I'm in there working on my face, so I get to listen to its whiny beeps while I repair the damage.

This is not how I'd intended to start my day.