Miss Mom: Furry Alarm Clocks

Image: icanhascheezburger.com

There are some really great devices out there to help the average human being wake up in the mornings. There are the standard Big Ben alarm clocks with the bells that you wind up every night. There are clock radios that can have you wake up to the music of your choice, with snooze features. And there’s even a newer innovation, the alarm setting on your cell phone, which you can program to make any variety of sounds to get you out of sleep mode.

When traveling, you can ask for a wake-up call at the motel, and the front desk will gladly comply. For the military recruit in basic training there is the bugle call of revelry, or a drill sergeant rolling a metal trash can down the corridor right before he yells into your ear to get up. For the average, reluctant-to-go-to-school teenager, there are mom and dad, who will repeatedly shake the teen to wake them up, or, if needed, use more stern methods, such as sending a wide awake and ready-to-pester younger sibling to do the task.

Here at the Galloway house, we’ve discovered that a more unorthodox method of getting us awake and ready to face the day is quite effective. It all started with a small 6-pound, long-haired calico with the mundane name of Gloria. What Gloria lacked in size and bravery she quite made up with the sheer tenacity when she had a task that she felt needed to be completed. For her, it was a sacred duty was to make sure that she made at least one of my three children get up for school, like it or not.

Her methods were crude, but very effective. She would find an exposed section of child, grab a hold of it with both paws, claws sheathed — at first — and proceed to bathe that section until the child got up. If the child tried to retrieve their hand or toe, she’d latch on to it that much harder, using minimal claw to keep that appendage in proximity to her rougher-than-sandpaper tongue.

Gloria was quite adept at knowing which tender part of the child was best: big toes, the inside of a wrist, and, if needed, the nape of your neck.

If my children thought they could outsmart the cat by closing their bedroom doors, they were wrong. It didn’t take me long to discover that my cat was far better at waking up the kids than me. So I was not at all hesitant in opening the door and letting the six-pound alarm clock in.

Little Gloria then trained the next generation of feline alarm clock. Pouncinator used a method designed just for me. He knew I was a light sleeper, so I could easily dodge his attempts to walk on my face. So he changed tactics. My glasses make a very unique sound when being batted across my nightstand on its intended journey to the floor. Pouncie made good use of that when he discovered that I was sure to get up as soon as I heard the glasses begin the trip.

He then trained Luna-tic, who combined the glasses method with trying to use my ear as a pacifier. She’s another one I’d send into a kid’s room to wake up. There is nothing that will get a teenager out of bed pronto like 12 pounds of cat sitting on their chest while blowing into their ear canal while it happily considers their ear as the best binkie ever. Ashley, my middle child was her favorite target for a long time.

Wouldn’t you know this passing along of Galloway wake-up methods has been handed down to each new generation of felines? The three I have now — Luna-tic, Chernobyll and Andromeda — have made me the primary target, mainly because I am the one they can most easily convince to get out of bed first to feed them. They are so good at waking me up that I do not believe I have overslept in 15 years. I also have about forgotten how to set my clock radio as I have not needed to use it.

The methods may vary, of course, like the youngest addition knowing just where to place her very fluffy tail in proximity to my nose. All three use the glasses technique, one nearly killed me once by knocking off a lamp that was on the shelf above my head. It got my attention alright.

So why don’t I just close my door against all feline marauders? Because the persistent little things also think that my bed is the place to be at night. They will scratch at the door, and Chernobyll has figured out how to open latched doors. I have to fight for space if all three are in residence in my queen sized bed. The only time they make themselves scarce is when my husband is home from a trip. Then he fills in at hogging all the covers and pillows. Of course that doesn’t stop one of them from jumping off and on the bed a dozen times come morning, until I stumble out bed in direction of the food bowl.

So, if anyone has trouble getting their children out of bed in the mornings, I can rent my alarm clocks out. The price will be quite reasonable, and maybe I can sleep in past 7 a.m. for once. Heck I’d settle for past 6 a.m.

Sylvie Galloway is a Spartanburg-based writer and blogger. You can read more of her work at Sylvie is a blogger.