Santa Gets Fired!
It wasn’t that Josephine the calico cat meant to nominate Santa Claus as head of Homeland Security. The entire incident was an accident and if truth be told, mainly the fault of her mistress who considers herself one of those Blogger people.
Josephine, now a dignified elder calico of over 14 years, did know how to operate the computer keyboard. An interesting feat of intrigue caused by the feline’s calico genes that also made her able to comprehend human speech. Although all of the other animals in Josephine’s house world could also understand human speech as well as, Josephine knew, all birds, reptiles and mammals in the surround that are exposed to the tones and sounds of human beings with whom they share an eco-system.
A chickadee understands “you guys are hungry?” question tossed by the mistress as she fills the seed feeders. It might be the act of actually filling the feeders that the chickadees understand but however it’s done, the animals know by facial expressions, body language and tone of the words most human language of concern to them.
The difference between Josie the calico and the five other cats and two dogs that share her household is that Josephine is actually able to translate the human language back at them. With her long claws and due practice Josephine learned how to use the humans’ computer keyboard.
Though it might sound strange, perhaps unbelievable, it’s true and documented in a book. somewhere on the Internet .
The calico, in the incident documented in the book written by the mistress, also caused quite a bit of national fuss and had since been banned from all computer keyboards by something the humans called a password.
Except the mistress began this Blogging thing that Josephine did not understand at all, Blogging being a human activity that does not affect the cats of the house one bit. What Josephine DID know was that what with all this Blogging going on, the mistress was forever at the keyboard and at times, well the mistress left the thing on and Josephine really only wanted to crawl onto the keyboard for a nice computer-warmed nap.
“Thank God she’s a bit older and more mature,” Josie often heard the mistress say to the master. The calico knew such conversations were often about her own cat self.
The master, in response to his wife’s comment cast a stern eye down at the sleeping Josephine, the memory of her long ago foray into national politics still not completely healed in his psyche.
“Just be sure to keep that password active,” the master warned.
At the time Josephine decided to tool around with the keyboard, the calico had no idea that the new director of Homeland Security was about to be announced. In fact, Josephine paid little attention to politics anymore. She’s learned her lesson that time she almost got the President of the United States impeached.
Josephine also did not know that her mistress had a Blog page all set up and ready to go just as soon as the announcement was made. All the calico knew was that there were Christmas songs flavoring the sound system and that big human man wearing the red suit could be seen upon the TV screens constantly on in her household.
The calico did understand the Santa Claus man, having fourteen years experience with the fellow’s comings and goings although Josie understood he only came one night of the year, the cat didn’t understand why.
All of the other pets in the household were restless with each day closer to Christmas. They too understood that Santa would be coming again to their house and it was quite an exciting thing in the framework of their somewhat mundane lives.
Santa’s visits were always mixed affairs in Josephine’s household. At times the dogs would give the jolly man a fit, dogs being rather stupid animals that think fat men in red suits shouldn’t be coming down human chimneys into the house domain the dogs were expected to protect. Josephine knew that when that jolly man visited her home, the next day there were cat treats, cat toys, even catnip! The dogs also got gifts but as Josephine already noted, they were stupid animals that hadn’t yet figured out the connection.
“Well it doesn’t look like Bernie Kerik is going to be the next head of Homeland Security,” the mistress would say to the master. Both humans would regard yet another handsome human head discussing the matter on the TV screen, something Josephine never could quite understand. What the humans didn’t see also flittering across their TV screen was a banner announcing that Santa Claus would be in a parade scheduled somewhere. The calico only noted the words Santa Claus. She’d seem them enough to know what they meant and it was small matter for her to figure out the keys on the keyboard that would match the ones she’d seen so often.
Like Josephine was not able to tell her human owners, she had no idea about all the brouhaha over the Director of Homeland Security and could have cared less. All the calico really wanted to do was to send Santa Claus a quick email.
Josie had no idea that while she did manage to type the words santa claus, it wasn’t into the heading of an email. The cat managed to fill in the blank left by the mistress as the next nominee for Director of Homeland Security. Josephine typed the name where she thought it should go then tapped the “send” key with an extended claw.
The calico quickly jumped down from the mistresses’ keyboard lest she get caught. She found a bright sunbeam and took a long nap, dreams of the jolly human dancing through her head and visions of catnip piles prancing past her sleeping eyes. She was glad she’d sent Santa Claus the email, lest he forget to visit or worse, forget the catnip.
“What happened to my Blog?” the mistress said, words that stirred the happily dreaming calico. Josephine crossed her toes that the mistress would think it was her error. The calico had no idea what the words meant in the email she sent Santa but Josie did know that the mistress always included her address in her email signatures.
The mistress glanced down at Josephine. The calico was sleeping soundly in the handsome sunbeam.
“This is a Fox News Alert,” the handsome announcer shouted from the TV. Force of habit made the mistress turn her attention to the incoming news.
“A bulletin has been sent out to all news outlets in the entire country that Santa Claus is the nominee for Director of Homeland Security,” the Fox announcer said, turning to another handsome human head for more pundit input.
“What’s so strange about this, John, is that the email hit EVERY media outlet in the country. The newspapers, radio stations, news magazines, major web sites. And it hit all at once.”
The mistress felt a pit of dread hit her stomach. She’d been all set up to send out the announcement from her Blog just as soon as it was announced. The mistress had carefully cultivated a source in the White House press office and with dreams of being the biggest Blogger on the block for once, the mistress got her source to promise to tell her first, BEFORE the news hit the air waves. In anticipation of being the first to know, the mistress had created an email list that was three pages long. It included all of the media outlets in the country, the big newspapers, the hot Blogs, all of the media web sites.
Somehow, someway, the mistress knew her email hit the media outlets and the missing name of the new Director of Homeland Security had been filled in with Santa Claus.
The mistress didn’t know how this could have happened but she couldn’t help but suspect the contented calico ostensibly sleeping in the sunbeam.
“John, the only source of the email addresses on this massive a scale is the White House. Which is why we are announcing here at Fox news that Santa Claus has officially been named the new Director of Homeland Security by the administration.”
The mistress grabbed the channel changer and scanned the news channels. All of them were announcing Santa Claus as the new Director of Homeland Security, all of them noting that the email notification had to come from the White House as very many of the email addresses were restricted only to White House email. The mistress sighed. She’d gotten this email list from her White House source. And now the entire country was convinced Santa Claus would be the new Director of Homeland Security.
“What the hell have you done?” a voice screamed from the other end of the line.
The mistress winced at the anger in her high school friend’s voice phoning her from the White House.
“Every news outlet in the country is reporting Santa Claus has been nominated by the administration for Director of Homeland Security. For crying out loud,” the mistresses’
friend continued to shout over the phone lines. “Santa Claus hasn’t even been vetted. And already the Democrats are out shilling about this poor choice by the administration.”
The mistress flipped the channel to MSNBC. To her dismay, the shrewish Susan Estrich was on, already in possession of the Democratic talking points and yelling them lustily.
“That man crosses our borders with impunity every year. He doesn’t have a Visa, not even a driver’s license that the Republicans complain about,” Estrich was shouting. “Yet he rides around international skies with reindeer of all things. Who knows what diseases those reindeer carry.”
“There’s something strange about those little elves,” Terry McAuliffe was smirking on CNBC, much to the mistresses’ dismay. “And what is going to happen on Christmas Eve every year. The man is busy! I’m telling you, the President ought to be impeached for this decision.”
Another President about to be impeached. And all because of a certain calico cat that couldn’t keep her paws off of the keyboard.
The debates raged on for hours. When the master returned from work he couldn’t wait to ask the mistress if she’d heard the news about the new Director of Homeland Security.
“I think Santa Claus would make a great Director of Homeland Security,” the master told his wife. Then the mistress told her husband the story of her Blog and the mass email sent by their very own calico cat.
“Santa Claus not only should NOT be Director of Homeland Security,” yet another Democrat political pundit was shouting on Fox news. “He should be fired from the job he does have. In this age of terrorism fat men in red suits shouldn’t be flying around on sleds pulled by reindeer.”
“For the record, folks,” the handsome Fox news announcer informed the viewing audience, which included Josephine’s distressed master and mistress, “the White House has vehemently denied nominating Santa Claus for Director of Homeland Security. But as you can see,” the handsome announcer shrugged as the camera panned past a whole host of Democrat shills, all of them angry and by this time worked into such a frenzy that they were demanding nothing less than the complete termination of Santa Claus from his job.
“Well, Josephine, you’ve managed to get Santa Claus fired,” the master scolded the calico cat. Josephine cowered at her master’s words but could not deny it or even give her side of the story. All of the other cats listened to the master and mistress rant at Josephine. Most of them had, through the years, met Santa Claus. They all also knew that Josephine, that silly calico that won’t stop playing with computer keyboards, somehow managed to get Santa Claus fired. Visions of catnip piles were fleeing their collective pet minds.
To Josephine’s despair, the political debates raged for days over the humans’ TV air waves. Jon Corzine demanded an investigation into every one of Santa’s elves. Al Sharpton demanded reparations for the damage done by an exclusively Caucasian Santa Claus. Harry Reid said that Santa wrote very poor lists.
The American public was too busy to pay much attention to the Santa Claus brouhaha and the Democrat shills took advantage of this. They didn’t want to see Santa Claus fired but they did want to keep hammering away at the administration that originally nominated him for the position of Director of Homeland Security.
“Well let them have their fun,” the master said one night a few nights before Santa was scheduled to make their rounds. “We know who nominated Santa Claus for the position,” he continued, casting a stern eye at the calico Josephine.
“If Santa Claus gets fired Josephine, it’s your fault!” the mistress scolded her errant cat. All of the other pets of the household heard this scold and all shunned their pet mate Josephine who would deny them Christmas catnip and juicy rawhide bones.
“For once I’d love to see the administration actually respond to the Democratic nonsense. They ought to put out a press announcement stating that as a result of Democratic complaints, Santa Claus is not only not nominated for Director of Homeland Security, he will be terminated from the position her currently holds. This would make the public pay attention, Santa Claus getting fired by the Democrats.”
A pretend-sleeping Josephine heard her master’s words and knew what she had to do.
“This is a Fox News Alert!” the handsome announcer fairly shouted the next day. “It’s official. Santa Claus has been fired. The administration has just sent out a mass press release stating that due to Democratic complaints and concerns they have fired Santa Claus. Again, Santa Claus has been fired.”
Josephine heard the handsome announcer make this statement and watched as the mistress furiously clicked the channel changer to all the news cable stations. All were broadcasting the same bulletin.
“Josephine, what did you do now?” the mistress scolded her calico cat.
The calico simply turned over in the sunbeam and stretched her paws. Josephine knew she’d done only what her master had said should be done. It took some time and it wasn’t easy trying to work the mistresses’ computer in the dead of night lest she be caught. But the cat managed to find that old Blog log of the mistress. Josie couldn’t spell all that well and sometimes she got her human language tenses mixed up, but she managed to compose a small missive about Santa Claus, the Democrats and a regretful administration.
As the master predicted, the American public went ballistic. Children cried openly in public that Santa Claus had been fired because of the Democrats. Handsome pundits tried to quell the uproar by announcing the White House press release that stated firmly that Santa had NOT been fired. Susan Estrich screeched that this action by the administration was a vengeful act to make the Democrats look bad.
There was only one day left until Christmas Eve when Santa was due to make his rounds. Rallied by concerns of Santa’s termination, millions of Americans dressed in a jolly red Santa suit to finish their shopping or attend to their employment. A group of Republicans in New York organized a million Santa march that took place in the center of the nation’s capitol.
On Christmas Eve, Terry McAuliffe appeared on Dan Rather’s show and announced his sincere regret over the Democratic response to what had obviously been a mis-sent White House Press release. He was dressed in a Santa suit as he made the announcement, also begging Americans to please forgive the Democratic party. Susan Estrich was a guest on the same show, only she sported a jolly red gag that made her unable to screech.
On Christmas day all the cats in Josephine’s household enjoyed sweet piles of catnip while the dogs munched on rawhide bones. Santa had come the night before, greeted personally by a purring Josephine and two stupid barking dogs.
“And she managed to stick it to the Democrats as well as saving Santa,” the master said that Christmas morning as he cast a broad smile to his calico, then enjoying her own special extra large pile of catnip.
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