Graphic descriptions of critters your pet has killed and brought in as a gift to you.
You just reminded me of the infamous "pigeon incident." This was during the starving student days in college, back around '82. It was one of the first really nice days of spring, so I'd left the door open so my two kitties could come and go at will for the day. That way I didn't have to go open the door every five or ten minutes as a kitty changed its mind about which side of the door was preferred at that particular second. They could play and I could ignore them. Kitties had come in for the last time and I'd shut the door hours earlier.
My roommate and I were finishing dinner when a friend came over, unannounced. Roger (our visitor) was a cat person. I'm a cat person. My roommate at the time was not a cat person (this is the roomie who screamed when the cat asked to sit on her lap in the bathroom).
Roger's sitting at the end of the table, talking as we finish eating, and leaned his chair back on two legs. Then he gets this grin on his face, looks at me and asks, "Did you know you have a dead bird under your chair?" I lean down to look and say, "You're right. I have a dead bird under my chair." Totally deadpan. I'm a cat person, and these things happen.
Roomie had raced to the bathroom and had lost her dinner before I even had a chance to put my fork down, poor thing.
That incident taught me a lot. Cat people and non-cat people really don't live well together. Two determined housecats can bring down a city pigeon if they work together. If you can't monitor your kitties' comings and goings, you'd best search every nook and cranny of the house before preparing dinner. And if you happen to spot a pet's "gift" that your host must have missed it's probably best to say nothing until after dinner or when you can say something quietly for only the person who can handle said "gifts" to hear.
