Those @#$%& cats again!

That's the title of a 2005 thread I posted on a firearms forum about my cats and their sometimes annoying attraction to firearm parts and accessories.  My first thread, from 2002, aroused a fair bit of amusement;  this added to it.  Fortunately, I kept a copy in my archives, so by reader request, here it is.  (Remember, it's from 2005.)

You may recall my earlier misfortunes with my gun-lovin' cats... see here if you didn't read it before.

Anyway, in celebration of my recent (and so far successful) back surgery, which will hopefully allow me to get back to shooting by mid-year (after being banned by my doctors from shooting anything except .22 rimfire since February last year), I decided that tonight would be a good night to sort out a couple of batches of shootin' ammo from my locker. Everything's packaged in ammo cans, boxes, etc. in the locker, and I wanted to get out several hundred .223's, .308's and 12ga. shells to load into magazines and/or bandoliers.

So, I started out by removing the ammo cans, putting out some plastic containers on the kitchen counter, and dumping out the rounds into the plastic containers. 500 .223's in this one, 200 .308's in that one, and so on. So far, so good. My cats were most curious about all this, of course, and were investigating the open-topped plastic containers, sniffing away furiously and generally being cats.

I was putting the open plastic container of .308 on a shelf in my ammo locker, prior to loading up magazines, when I heard this clinking sound from the counter. Looking around, I saw CJ, my ginger cat, squatting in the pile of .223 rounds, seemingly about to do No. 1 or No. 2 right in there! (I can't for the life of me see any resemblance between kitty litter and Federal XM193, but perhaps it's a cat thing...) Needless to say, I yelled at her, and she jumped guiltily and leaped from the counter.

Unfortunately, in jumping and leaping, she imparted a certain acceleration to the plastic container, which was already half-off the countertop (my fault, that, for pulling and pushing at it while dumping rounds into it). So, the container fell off the counter, turning neatly inverted on its way down, and depositing 500 rounds of .223 all over my kitchen floor.

I sort of roared in anguish, and stepped over to the counter - but I'd forgotten that I'd left a container of .308 perched half-way onto the shelf in my ammo locker. Do I have to tell you what happened next? No, I don't, you've guessed it - the container of .308 also fell to the ground, and I now had 200 rounds of .308 on my floor to add to the 500 rounds of .223 already there!

To add insult to injury, the cats' litter box is next to my ammo locker, and several dozen .308 rounds ended up in the litter box. Since this was due for cleaning later tonight, it was a bit ripe... and after fishing out the cartridges with my trusty litter scoop, so were they! Funny to have Hirtenberger military surplus ammo smelling like kitty pee... I don't know what they're going to say at the range.

An hour later, I've just finished picking up all 700 rounds of ammo (except for a couple that seem to have lost themselves under the dishwasher... I'll get them in the morning!) The cats have had a wonderful evening batting rattly, rolling cartridges all over the kitchen floor, to their daddy's despair and rude commentary, and I still have to load up magazines...

Ah, well... Smile, they said, things could get worse - so I did, and they did!

Peter