The Sin of Gluttony I

I baked cookies the other day. Is that a sin? They were delicious, incidentally. Dear readers, if you want, here is the recipe.

I think when your eating habits extend beyond what you need to keep riding the escalator of life, it’s what’s known as The Sin of Gluttony. If adding a little spice, a little deliciousness, un peu de jouissance to an otherwise gray and thoroughly British existence is considered sinful, then I hope there’s hummus in hell, because that’s where I’m headed, pockets loaded with re-heated croissants and chocolate syrup.

I just find it hard to accept the idea that God would view adulterers and foodies in the same light.

But I assume that he must indeed think ill of a snacker, because the whole time I was trying earnestly to make my own tasty chocolate chip morsels, I was being assaulted by the most terrible creature known to contemporary science:

Pedro, The Janky Old Cat

While he may look sad and harmless, the Janky Old Cat is a beast that only plagues people whom the Lord really wants to suffer horribly for their sins. It is a foul thing that lives to terrorize the greedy, lustful, and murderous.

Its Modus Operandi? It has several.

The Janky Old Cat is a sly beast and never attacks directly, but merely positions himself in direct line with wherever you want to walk, so as to make you either trip or jump over him. Either way, you are likely to be cursed for the next five minutes with washing the egg you just dropped from the kitchen tiles.

The Janky Old Cat loves this trick and presumably laughs quietly to himself as he watches you through his beady, merciless, cataract-ridden eyes.

The terrible animal also has the power of stealth on his side. While careful never to show his unbelievable speed to humans (by pretending to be a doddery, shuffling old fart), he is able to speed from one part of the kitchen to the next behind your back, always turning up exactly where you don’t want him: hungrily approaching the butter, nearing the flour with his feces-covered paws, or simply trying to climb into cupboards and get trapped, forcing you to locate his screaming yowls of fury in a few minutes.

The Janky Old Cat’s favorite maneuver is to sneak up behind you as you are trying to enjoy your baking and revel in your newfound adulthood, and go:

Most cats "meow," but not if they're janky.

This attack is not effective when executed just once, but when repeated 65 times in 10 minutes, it is like taking a golf-club to the sanity. And the worst thing about being attacked by a Janky Old Cat is there is no countering his assaults. If you try to appease him with an offering of food, he will merely sniff the food, pretend to eat it until your back is turned, and resume his offense.

If you try to lift him up to throw him out of the window, or into the fireplace, he will scramble your thoughts and make you think that he is nothing more than a sweet, charming, helpless, elderly, thing. Like a feline version of Betty White.

And you will take pity on him and put him back down.

THIS IS A MISTAKE. USE ALL OF THE PERSONAL CONVICTION ALLOTTED TO YOU BY GOD AND DISPOSE OF THE THING BEFORE...