The State of the Straight

So what’s the BIG DEAL about owning cats?

I often hear people say things like, “I’m fine with people owning cats, but why do they have to make such a big deal about it?”

It’s important for us to make “a big deal” about it because we live in a society that does. It is still too common to hear news stories of cats being physically attacked by dogs. People complain that last fall saw a string of cats playing with string. In some cases, the cats weren’t even outside, which resulted in the owner’s living room getting covered in string. But we cat owners didn’t really mind; it helped decorate our houses.

Visibility is very important to the cat-owning community right now because we want some credit for all these allergies. We won’t make a big deal about it because everyone already knows cats are better than dogs. We won’t make a big deal out of it because you already know we’re special.

But we will make a big deal out of it if you keep acting like we’re responsible for wasting the fire department’s time. Sometimes our cats want to climb trees, and they have the same right to do that as any other animal.

-C(at lover)

8: Titanic. That is when I knew I liked girls. Jack is painting Rose. And even though I don’t think Kate Winslet is that attractive now, at the time, my eyes were ensnared by her perfect…necklace. 

10: My friends wanted me to play house but I told them I’d rather play sports. 

13: I went out in the woods with my friend John and we hunted for squirrels with our beebe guns.

16: Winter Fest 2004, Gatlinburg TN. I was way more interested in getting a Youth Rally girlfriend than listening to Jeff Walling. Becky was sitting next to me. I brushed my teeth. She was like “Why are you brushing your teeth right now?” And I was like “All I’ve had to eat or drink since we left home is gushers washed down with Mountain Dew.” And she was like “Okay. I’m attracted to how responsible you are.”

17: Someone said “You should come to the movies with us.” So I came. When I got to the movies I realized they wanted to see an R-rated movie, so I punched everyone in the face and prayed for forgiveness.

18: Freshman year at Harding I met a greek god. His name was Percy Jackson. It’s a great book series I think you should all read.

20: I did the Mabee challenge in the snow but took the time to check my pulse afterwards. It was sparingly slow. 

21: I was bummed out about the situation in the Middle East, so I emailed Jason David Frank, who played Tommy in Power Rangers. He was no help at all. 

22: Wrestled with the caf pizza. It won. 

-Zebra

How I Realized I Like Girls

When I was 13 I liked almost every girl my age, especially one girl (we’ll call her Belle). Her dad was an inventor, named Maurice. I tell you that to assure you that I didn’t just like her for her money. Maurice was a pretty bad inventor. One time, he was going to show some people his new wood-chopping invention, and got lost in the woods and kidnapped by a beast. But that’s a different story altogether.

Anyway, I liked Belle because she wasn’t like the other girls. She loved to read and was a huge Disney fan. One might even say she couldn’t live without Disney. At first I thought I just liked Belle as a friend, but I began to realize throughout Junior High school, that every time Belle had a boyfriend (and she had A LOT of them,) I got extremely jealous. I wanted to kiss her the way her boyfriends kissed her. I did get to kiss her. Several times, actually, when I paid my friend Cogsworth $5 to dare me to kiss her over and over when we were all playing Truth-or-Dare at my 16th birthday party. 

After that, she was like “I’m just not sure if I’m looking for a long term relationship. Don’t get me wrong, this feels super biblical.”

And I was like “You are beautiful as you are. You can be happy as you are. You can be loved as you are.” 

And she was like “Woah.”

And I was like “Right?!”

And we’ve been together ever since. 

-EEVEE