FOR THE WEEKEND, WARM UP YOUR THANKSGIVING GRATITUDE

For our pre-Thanksgiving 2019 weekend edition of Let Sleeping Dogs Lie & Napping Cat Nap, we will attempt to solve a mystery of life. 
In a house full of racket from TVs, radios, lumbering humans, kitchens tools, an impatiently barking dog and phones that play dramatic musical ring tones, how can sound-sensitive cats ignore it all and nap?
Answer: They live in a "mystic feline field of existence” — it is a plane of being that is above the clamor created by humanity. Might be on the back of a couch, on a table, under a bed, on a sleeping human — cats know where to find it. 
O! To have the napping power of a housecat. 

I was going to describe the cat's life as a "mystic plane of felinial existence" but I'm pretty sure "felinial" is not a real word. I like it, though, and may try to persuade the Oxford English Dictionary to consider making it the "New Word of the Year" for 2020. Probably will be nicer than the other words we'll encounter on the 2020 campaign trails. But, skip politics for now and get back to napping cats.

Our living room may be like yours. It has photos of kids, loved ones, friends, dogs, cats and a Chihuahua picture we bought at a roadside thrift shop in dusty West Texas on our honeymoon 28 years ago. 
You don't have a thrift shop Chihuahua photo? Those things are rare. 
Haven't seen one since we got this one. No idea who this dog is or where the picture was taken. The photo has a calming effect -- our cat Deputy Chief Kittie Leigh Johnson sometimes snoozes under it.
Now, let's move to the napping cat photos. You see that Kittie Leigh, the cat we’ve had longest, is napping atop the table behind our couch — if I’m on that couch, she is on me. We’re melded.

On the lower shelf you can see Simon. He's the former palm-of-the-hand-sized kitten we bottle-fed after he was abandoned. He learned to nap from cats AND dogs -- you never know what he'll be doing — he’d bark when the mail arrives if he could reach those octaves.
A few minutes after the duo photo, it was time for a Napping Shift change. And you see that Kittie Leigh moved — keep reading. Simon, also, moved and his spot was quickly filed by readlarrypowell.com's administrative director and financial management specialist, The Senator. 
Where did Kittie Leigh go? She moved to one of her favorite places -- she saw my slumberspouse Martha snoozing in her recliner, so Kittie Leigh joined her. (Not sure where Martha learned to catnap, but she is adept.)
We have no idea where Simon went. Sometimes he pops open a cabinet door under the TV and steps inside to curl up. He’s Adventure Cat.
We all have lots of reasons to be thankful this year -- for example I have the benefit of looking at my funspouse Martha as she grimaces at one of my ill-advised punch lines about politics. 
For this pre-Thanksgiving weekend, we're focusing on reasons to celebrate the American Holiday. Join in. Make a list of things. Or, if it makes you happy, don't make a list -- freedom to not make a list is another reason we celebrate the American Thanksgiving.
That photo of the dear little Chihuahua and the handsome cat? It's probably 20 years old -- that’s my first Chihuahua, a rescue who came to us named “Star.” We wanted to honor the rescuer, but we wanted a different name, so her full name became “Belle Starr Carmelita del Vera Cruz.” What a wonderful little girl Vera was. 
She’s about to snooze on the bed with her pal, our wander-up kitten Griffin Oliver Powell. The orange and white kitten grew from spindly handful-size to be around 25 mammoth pounds.
He and Vera were with us for many, many years. 
I am so thankful that I have them living in my heart. This Thanksgiving, when I bite into a dinner roll with extra butter, I'll be thinking of Vera. When I try to fasten the button on my jeans on Friday morning, I'll think about how much Griffin the Kitten seemed to grow overnight! Yeah, maybe I should take more Felinial Catnaps and lay off the Rolls of Thanksgiving.

Happy Thanksgiving to all of you. Watch a parade, watch a ballgame, laugh with the kin, laugh with the neighbors, call an old friend and remind them of your childhood Thanksgiving playing football or helping in the kitchen or … well, we have our own Thanksgivings. 
Celebrate them with love and gratitude. Then walk 5 miles and swear you’ll never butter-up another roll. Vera loved Thanksgiving an rolls. She’d have tried to take down a parade balloon if she’d been a little bit taller.
[REMEMBER, SEND US YOUR PHOTOS of your sleeping dogs and napping cats and we'll tell their stories in a weekend edition of readlarrypowell.com. Email larry powell at [email protected]. You'll be helping people understand how much dogs and cats add to happy lives. And you'll be helping insomniacs realize they can get some sleep if they can just figure out how to lay on a narrow table without rolling off onto the floor in mid-snore.]
— Offer advice or reasons to be thankful by clicking on ‘comment’ below or by emailing me at [email protected]. We are THANKFUL for our readers and all the rescuers. And for the right six numbers on Wednesday’s drawing of Lotto Texas. —-