I am surrounded by lunatics

The sun has returned, its warmth once again bathing the Shmoollands in the soothing light of emergent living renewal... and yet, all the world is coming unhinged.

First, there's the Rodent, who has grown so long that I wonder if he might actually be nearing a mitosis-like separation into two distinct entities. For one thing, his rear half seems no longer aware of what his front half is doing. Many times now, I've seen him lay down to slobber upon his furry spit-squeakers, yet his back legs remain standing. He'll even go to sleep like that. Like a horse. For hours.

Conversely, I've also witnessed him arising from a long nap and setting forth with his back legs trailing limply behind, still asleep, like some ludicrous miniature walrus. And on several occasions I've noted that, when at a full run, his back end will actually pull to the left and begin to outpace and pass his front half, such that he is practically running sideways. I can only imagine what will happen the day his ass beats his face to the food dish.

Then there's Fabio, my brother, my poor feeble-minded brother... his bulb is finally down to its last filament, I fear. He has started singing when he poops. Not warbling, not chittering, not meowing casually to himself, but SINGING. Really belting it out, too. From down deep. For all to enjoy.

This scaterwauling of his reverberates throughout the fortress and the neighborhood in general. The Man, the Woman, the Rodent... we all hear it, and we all know exactly what's transpiring in the bushes out front. We avoid eye contact in a vain attempt to pretend it isn't happening, but we're all thinking the same thing, and our uncomfortable silence is punctuated only by the operatic MWOOOOOOOOWs from outside.

For her part, Woman continues to billow and bulge — containment of this bizarre abdominal rotundity might be possible, if only she would stop eating everything in sight. In goes the food, out goes the belly, and there seems to be no end to it. I've started eyeing the portals, and have begun my calculations on how much longer before she actually blocks my egress from the sleeping chamber. I will have just that long to work out my contingency plans.

And then there's the Man. Here's the real winner. First, he's hearing voices coming out of his typewriter. Pretty soon, he's having regular-as-clockwork (and completely one-sided) conversations with these phantom "colleagues" of his. “Meetings” he calls them. Yeah right, buddy. Even the Rodent finds this behavior disturbing.

But nothing — nothing — could prepare us for what came next:

Now he's talking to the Woman's belly. Speaking directly into her abdomen. The Woman doesn't seem to mind this, though it's entirely possible she's merely frozen in shock and horror at the sight of the Man addressing her rotunda in overly familiar tones.

Where all this leads next is beyond me, but I shudder to think how quickly everything deteriorated from tranquility into madness around here. What I wouldn't give for the smallest dose of sanity. Or, if nothing else, consistency.

I mean, right now I actually miss the damned crows.

Improvements

Snow. It is white as the tufts that sprawl across the great expanse of my brother's underside out there today. The sun is abnormally bright, illuminating the cold, crunch-dusted ground with a refulgence worthy of Armageddon's own flash-bang. In short, it is no kind of day for a black master of shadows to be out and about.

Today, then, I conduct a thorough inspection of the fortress. After all, the last two weeks have seen a lot of traffic coming through — not one, but two Gran-hamas, both of whom set up camp in my bunker. The glitter-tree and its traditional festoonery have come and gone, the Indulgent Festival of Paper now fully concluded.

It is, I am pleased to report, a little easier to get around in here now: more floor space, considerably less clutter, severe reduction in traffic going up and down the bunker's eggressional stairpoint. Come to think of it, it's actually a little too easy to get around. The clutter-reduction process has proved exceedingly effective, and there's something... empty about the place.

My first concern is that this portends another large-scale move — one of those massive “bug-out” redeployments that the Man seems to execute every year or so. Always a time of tremendous chaos and great misery. New locations to scout, new positions to fortify, new neighborhoods to conquer and subjugate. Every time, it's like starting from scratch, and I'm getting too old for that crap.

But perhaps not. Consider:

1. There has been a marked drop in relocations of this kind ever since the Woman took command.
2. Historically, full-scale redeployments have been, without exception, preceded by a tremendous increase in clutter — boxes and crates and the like — and never by a wholesale reduction in inventory such as we have here.
3. As yet there has been no sign of the much-feared miniature coffins into which Fabio and I are unceremoniously stuffed prior to transport — either to a new location, or for a trip to the nefarious Dr. Fingerer.
4. The Man and the Woman seem... how shall I put this? Happy. Pleased with themselves, even. This is not a mental state that accompanies times of great confusion and upheaval.

So. I sharpen my investigation, and I hit upon a crucial fact: with the exception of the removal of the Shmooltide festoonery, this emptying of space has not been fortress-wide. It has, in fact, been highly localized. The Man has been systematically emptying the main sleep chamber. Boxes and shelves and whole piles of bric-a-brac have been hauled away — even the Big Luminous Box and the chambered altar from which it lorded over the room have been cast out.

Half of the sleep chamber has now been effectively cleared, giving the whole South Wing of the fortress something of a lopsided, uneven feel. The only possible explanation is that the Man has been clearing the way for something. New equipment? Is it too much to hope that he will finally be installing a state-of-the-art Listening Station and Defensive Command Center, complete with RADAR and AWACS (Rodent And Dog Aggressor Repulsion and Advanced Warning Anti-Crow System)? He never seemed to comprehend those schematics I drew up so many years ago — perhaps he finally gave that low-watt light bulb he calls an intellect the last half-twist it needed to complete the circuit.

Then again, there is another factor to consider. It seems like very long odds, but then I've learned not to invest much trust in coincidence. The Woman, it seems, has been... well, ballooning, to put it bluntly. Bulging, inflating, growing abdominally rotund. She doesn't seem concerned about this — on the contrary, as I pointed out, she seems rather pleased. So now I have to wonder: is the Man clearing space simply to accommodate the Woman's dimensions? And if so, for crying out loud, just how big is she going to get?

No, it simply cannot be. If the Woman were expected to grow into proportions that would fill the great empty space of the sleep chamber, why, that would be nothing short of ludicrous. Even Fabio would be put to shame. No, it has to be the Command Center. In fact, I'd better doublecheck my schematics and make sure they include Fenceline Squirrel Inhibitors. Because those cheeky bastards have become particularly impudent this year.