I spent some time in an easy chair this last
weekend. Held down by a five-pound cat,
there was nothing I could do but clutch the remote.
There was a blanket involved, of course, and almost two
hours of the back-to-back viewing of my current televised fascination, Hoarders.
Willie walks through the room, backs up, and pauses.
“What are you doing?”
He says this in a tone of voice one would expect to hear if one were to
be caught, say, pulling the wings off flies or using imitation cheese: Equal mixtures of horrified and concerned.
“Hmm?” I cannot be
bothered to pull my eyes from the screen.
“These people, they have predispositions, right? And then something bad happens and flips some
switch in their head and suddenly they can’t throw away their fastfood
wrappers.”
Willie sits down on the couch. “Why are the helpers wearing gas masks?”
“Cat feces,” I say.
“What?!”
“Cat feces.”
“Cat…”
“Shhhh!”
Poor Willie. He
suffers, this one.
He stands up in disgust.
“Why are you watching this?”
“What?” I drag my
eyes from the show. “It’s the
people! They’re fascinating. See, they don’t want to be like this, some of them.
Of course, some of them are just full-fledged crabby. Like this one guy –“
Willie raises a hand, waggles it at me. “No need, no need,” he says, backing out of
the room.
“Well there’s the cat, too,” I mutter defensively. “I mean, I can’t just get up. She’s all comfortable, and I hate to disrupt
her.”
Willie shakes his head.
I am a mystery to him.
36 comments:
I understand your fascination with reality tv and the reluctance of others to share in it. I have recently become transfixed by show (much as it shames me to admit it) about a southern family that has a child who was in beauty pageants and have had a pig and a chicken living in the house with them...
Ah yes, it's road-crash TV, isn't it? Hey move over. Got a spare cat?
I once performed an eXperiment testing Kraft Single American "cheese" slices as a material of construction (primarily roofing). Ants began crawling across it even though it was seven feet off the ground on a T shaped pole structure of an ancient clothes line. Several ants died (!) perhaps by getting stuck in the cheese. Not surprisingly the ants began to stay away from the Zone of Death.
I like watching these shows. I have had clients who are hoarders, most had mental health illnesses.
It makes me feel better to see how, relatively speaking, how good my house looks!
Cheers from Cottage Country!
I once read of a woman who starved to death because her cat never let her off her chair...It can be a problem!
Whilst I don't watch television, I can understand being piined down by a cat. In my house, we call it being catted.
I love the term "road-crash tv." You can't believe what you're seeing, but you can't turn away, either!
Hari Om
...it's possible to imitate cheese??? That's surely not good news?
Meanwhile back at declutter central - I'm always too busy attending to my own level of "will I won't I" in terms of keeping it in case it turns out handy one day. It's my mother's voice. Times were hard.
Consequently I avoid hoarding to the nth degree of my ability.
The stuff around me doesn't seem to know that though....&*<
I've used the cat as an excuse before myself. I also watch that show with an equal mix of horror/pity and self satisfaction. The hubs is just like your Willie. (that didn't sound right)
You too? Hoarders makes me feel so much better about myself. And it makes me shudder because before I moved into this place, I emptied it. It had been inhabited by a relative who was a "mild" hoarder - no cockroaches, rodents or cat feces, thank god, but piles upon piles of junk. It took me a year to empty it out on Sundays. Man I loathed sundays.... On the bright side, I am now a tosser. If I don't use it or love it it's gone.
Willie and I think alike, I think.
I hoard but not to the degree that they would make a tv series ( one I have not seen yet) about me but you never know .. there might be a show coming to a tv near you about that crazy blonde who has 30 jars of Nutella in the pantry .. for "just in case".
besitos, C ... back in the USA
You; Ms.Pearl make me feel ever so much better. I had a train-wreck affair with "Hoarders" also the one where normal people are infested with bugs etc. Now I am a "Tree House" junkie.Why is there not a Cat Reality Show? ( cuz I know animals are going to take over North America) Your Alabama fan/lurker...
Hey now, those fast food wrappers can come in handy!
I haven't found out for what yet, but I will.
And stay away from my house. . .
A novel way to keep the mystery in your relationship!!
I keep coming back to Antique Roadshow for my reality. I think those people must have normal lives; where do they keep that old, ugly, delicate, huge, dust catcher.
"I am a mystery to him."
Good. The universe will not remove mysteries. It's in your best interest to remain one.
I used to watch Hoarders, it was rather riveting, sort of like a huge pimple on a friend's nose - you don't want to stare at it but you can't help yourself.
When the show went from extreme hoarding to catastrophic hoarding. . . where there was only a 12" crawl space left between the garbage and the ceiling. . .that's when I started to freak out. Maybe I felt that there could be that dangerous switch within myself that would take me over the edge. That razor thin edge of being a "collector" and becoming a die hard "hoarder", I just couldn't risk that possibility and so ceased watching the show.
Have you caught the latest episodes of Duck Dynasty ?
I'm with Willie. Too much reality--TMI. Feel like I have to disinfect the television if it hesitates too long on shows like that. But I understand the cat weight. Mine was well over five pounds and could cause paralysis.
I wish I had a five pound cat. Not one of ours is under eleven pounds. Some days - after feeding, watering, brushing, vacuuming, and changing litter boxes - I am less than thrilled over the constant transforming of inputs into outputs!
Hoarders ... brrr ... it's a strange mixture of deterrent and reinforcement. I watched a few shows but had to stop. Like Yamini, my family of origin kept things because times were hard. It becomes a habit that stays with you even after there's no longer a need for it. So I try not to think about it except to keep my own stuff sorted out.
I have the type of job that has occasionally placed me in the home of a hoarder. Not pretty. Years ago nobody knew what to call it...however, crazy seemed to be the most apt description.
Now hoarders are featured on TV, paid to let someone go into their home, drive them bonkers, and get hoed out. Can't watch it...nope. I still get itchy just "thinking" about some of my past hoarder houses. But I do understand the draw...looney is fascinating.
I still think TV is missing the boat with not having a Cat Hoarders show. The ratings for it would be through the roof.
I watch Hoarders and that other show, "how clean is your house" and thank all the deities that people don't need to wear a Hazmat suit to visit me. On the other hand, you've now reminded me that I must do something about my dust bunny collection. Where's that broom....and why do I still have that stack of....
Dont't watch this show when you are eating along with CSI and a few other shows, well if you want to lose weight it might be a good idea.
Merle..............
I always use the cat as an excuse. It's much harder to heft a 16-pounder off your lap. Hoarders reminds me of a number of relatives. Fortunately they were not cat people.
Haven't seen the show - but still somehow I just know it would suck me in and creep me out all at the same time.
It would probably also cause me to cast an even more wary eye at Hubby and his tendency to "save things; just in case....
I love "Hoarders." It fascinates me how the human mind can snap and then you are saving your own pee in a jug.
My favorite part: When they ask the hoarder if she had a cat. "Yeah, but it ran away." The reply always includes a flat, furry thing held up for her to see..."No, it didn't."
Ewwwwww!
have never gotten to have live with a cat...hubs is allergic.
I have vision of you sitting with the cat on you not fighting to get up unless you have to pee.........lol
I haven't ever watched "Hoarders', but I have caught a few episodes of "My Cat From Hell". Liza Bean might like it.
Your cat only weighs five pounds? Jazz is around three times that weight.
I remember when TLC showed Hoarders and then followed it up with Extreme Couponing, which somehow seems counter-productive, donchathink?
That show inspires cleaning and de-cluttering frenzies in me, so I keep my watching of it to a minimum. There is only so much energy for such activities, especially when me and my 16 pound cat have to hold the sofa down.
My daughter had a best friend whose mother was a hoarder - so often it seems to be triggered by a grief episode, and she was so sad.
I offered to help - even went as far as suggesting a skip - and she picked a fight with me so she never had to speak to me again.
Don;t you want to just smack 'em silly and say toss it out? I'm thinking they might be some of your bus riders.
That show can get pretty gross. I stopped watching after one of people brought in to help clean, ran out of a room and full on yakked in front of the camera. Not quite projectile, but close...
You're an enigma wrapped in a conundrum, Pearl! :D
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