Hokey Pokey

Now that we have a dog outside and cats inside my family are getting to be very skilled at the hokey pokey. You kick your leg one way to stop the cats then kick it out the door to stop the dog. The neighbours must be finding it all very entertaining. Apparently the dual direction attack while walking out the back doors has made me a bit lazy when going out the front door. I went out the front door today to take out some bottles to the recycling bin. Angel was running decoy sitting to the left of the door. As I opened the door and swung a leg to keep her in Zeuss gets down low and charges out the door. Special Ops could take lessons from my animals. He avoids early interception (picture me dropping armfuls of recycling while trying to run and stoop to catch a fast, thin, slippery cat) and runs through the lavender bush and straight under my car. Jewel used to go straight under the car also, although fortunately she was stupid enough to be tricked everytime by me rubbing my fingers together and saying "biscuits". Zeuss just sat in the dead centre of under the car and sniggered at me. I ran around the car trying to scare him out one side but he just sat there looking at me. I did try pleading, I tried threatening, I tried coaxing. None of these worked so I thought it was time to use a big stick. I found a piece of dowling that Ben had been using to mark where he should stop when parking on the drive way and pushed it under the car. Not quite long enough. I had to lie down on my stomach to get it to go far enough in to make contact with the cat. At this point I am reasonably cerain my neighbours were all standing watching "the mad lady across the road". I poke the stick in at the cat and he takes a step sideways. I try sweeping the stick across the ground and he just jumps over it, possibly sniggering. Feeling less than friendly at this point I am ashamed to say I decided to sweep the stick under the car at head height. That cat has the most amazing talent for flattening himself. Still no success. Tempted to get the dog and throw him under the car to get the cat out. Ran through the possible endings and decided against it. While sitting wondering what to do next the cat runs out from under the car and heads straight towards the crazy cat killing neighbours house. Ohshitohshitohshit. Good news, he decides to go left and jump the side fence. Bad news, dog is in backyard and cat doesn't like dog. Set new Olympic speed record while bolting back to the front door (quick shuffle to keep second cat in house) through house to back yard, grab dog and chuck him inside the house so that he can't scare cat over any side fences (second cat will just have to deal with him and serves her right for running decoy in the first place), stealth mode down side passage so as not to startle cat. It is very hard to stealth mode while trying to get a visual on your target and not stand on any land mines. Cat is slinking towards back door. Managed to get behing the target and grab him. Cat suddenly turns into an octopus. I am now standing at the back door trying to get in while the dog is jumping up and down trying to great me and cat two is working on getting out. If I open the door too far cat two gets out. If I don't open it enough I can't get my octopus back in the house. After much antiseptic and bandaging I have the situation under control.