Juvenile member of the Felis silvestris catus species, also known in English vernacular as a “kitten”

According to Wikipedia (the poor person’s ultimate authority on all things that matter), cats in mature adulthood typically sleep between twelve to sixteen hours a day, the more torpid of the species spending up to twenty hours in slumber. In human world, we call that chronic fatigue syndrome or myasthenia gravis. For cats though, it is perfectly acceptable to spend most of their living hours unconscious, conserving every bit of precious energy.

My question is: what in the world could they possibly be saving all that energy for? There probably are notable exceptions to the rule, but in general, most cats are not going to be running marathons in those four to eight hours of wakefulness. In the case of my own specimen of felis silvestris, I’ve observed him do nothing more taxing than pounce on wayward leaves that blow in whenever my roommates and I go in and out, and meow in my ear at 3:00 a.m. when he is hungry.

An unusually active cat. Note the look of bewilderment observed in his companion’s expression.

Oh, yes, there is the occasional ‘freak-out,’ a phenomenon observed in most household cats. It is characterized by one or two high bursts of energetic activity, including but not limited to: dashing across the living room three times, attacking sweaters and furniture, running into walls, meowing plaintively. This episode can last up to ten minutes before the cat, remembering its primary purpose in life, settles back down into its lethargic routine.

Cat for purchase for $.10 along with monitor at flea market.

Ultimately, though, I don’t think the freakout can totally account for all the energy saved up by the feline during the course of a day. What, then, happens to all that energy? Is this a problem for the physicists, who are too busy trying to figure out whether the cat in the box is dead or alive to bother with such matters? Or is it a problem for the psychologists, who will analyze the cat’s dreams and relate them back to the suckling of the mother’s teat? Perhaps this is one of life’s mysteries that will go unsolved, as long as humans walk the earth (and cats sleep on their monitors).

So I am sleeping this morning, one of my favorite things to do, and I am having pleasant dreams about being attacked and having my wallet stolen, and being shot at with a Gatling gun, whereupon I awaken and realize that there really is a Gatling gun noise coming from outside. Bleary-eyed, I put on my glasses and reach over the boy, who would sleep like a rock through a volcanic eruption, and peer through the window. The construction workers were out there with their helmets on and their jackhammers laying our parking lot to waste. These are the workers who must have left a note on my car last night kindly informing me that my car would be blasted to smithereens if I did not move it by tomorrow morning. They weren’t kidding about tomorrow morning, it being ten minutes shy of six a.m. when I look at the clock.

I guess Lawrence has a serious concrete problem. I totally sympathize. I dislike concrete as much as the next person. It’s all non-porous and grey and rocky without having the virtues of being a rock. It keeps in the cold during winter and heat during the summer. Concrete is much uglier to look at than things like bricks or solid gold, something that the designers of Wescoe Hall did not take into consideration. Concrete is directly responsible for the blood shed and scraped knees of millions of little kids learning to ride bicycles. I agree that this concrete menace should end. These men are doing fine work, don’t get me wrong.

Couldn’t they maybe wait, though, until after the sun has risen? Like, after most of us have gotten that precious ten minutes of snooze sleep after the alarm clock has sounded? They could enlist the helpful light of the sun in their mission against concrete. The birds could sing sweet melodies set to the jackhammer rhythm, and everyone would be happy. Everyone, that is, except the people who didn’t move their cars in time.