Masters of the house

My parents are slaves to their two cats.
I am a slave to my parents.
My parents are in Hawaii on vacation.
So, by transitive property, I am now a slave to their two cats.

I will be living at my parents' house this week to maintain it and its contents while they're away. My parents have always been animal lovers and any pet we've owned has been spoiled rotten, but now that there are no children in the house I think it's gotten worse. These cats, Buddie and Marlie by name, have a pretty specific schedule to maintain, and who knows what kind of chaos will unleash if the schedule is interrupted.

Buddie is the sadistic one. He likes to wrap himself around your legs as you walk, trying to get you to pet him. If you take the bait and reach down, he'll chomp you playfully (but painfully) on the arm and run away, only seconds later to come back and start rubbing up against you again. He also loves to hide around the corner from Marlie as she's coming and then jump out, swat her on the tail, and then run away. You can even see the evil glint in his eye in the picture.

Consequently, Marlie has become a paranoid schizophrenic. She is rarely ever at ease, aways keeping an eye out for someone or something coming to get her, she'll jump at the smallest noise, and sometimes she'll chase and pounce on imaginary things. We call her the Sixth Sense kitty. That look of terror in her face is pretty much a constant.

My mom gently reminded me that Buddie would probably wake me up somewhere around 5:30am and yowl until he's let out, and that it would be a good idea to feed Marlie at the same time. Then sometime in the afternoon feed them a second time, making sure they're never fed the same flavor of cat food two meals in a row. Sometime that evening make sure to pet Buddie for awhile, and let Buddie out to play at night but make sure he's back before I go to bed. I "uh-huh"ed myself as quickly as possible through the instructions figuring I could fudge over the details throughout the week.

This morning I was rudely awakened rather early by Buddie yowling. I rolled over in bed to look at the clock.

5:30 exactly.

I won't lie... it gave me the heebie jeebies, like I was in a Stephen King novel or something. So, wanting to avoid Buddie putting a kitty-curse on me or somehow being licked to death (because that's what would happen in a Stephen King novel) I promptly got up and let him out, and on my way back to my bed I was stopped in the hallway by Marlie, meowing pathetically like she hadn't eaten in a week. That's when I realized that they weren't joking around. These cats mean business.

And the worst part is, I can't remember what flavor of cat food I fed them tonight. So if someone finds me dead tomorrow having been suffocated by turkey and giblets being crammed down my airway, you'll know that I have chosen poorly.