Crude and Anonymous

My wife believes Facebook is the realm of terrorists. There is very little accountability and too much opportunity for users to be crude and anonymous. This is her idea of evil – someone’s being “crude and anonymous.”

I think that’s a heavenly turn of phrase despite, for her, its diabolical leanings. It’s versatile, able to serve as the title of a buddy-cop film or the name of a book. I’d kill to be in a band with that handle.

But none of this wordplay means a thing to her. She lives in a world less lyrical. Be accountable, she demands. Man up. If you’re going to send her a note suggesting she show you her girls, save the keystrokes. Do it in person.

Lucy’s cat, Guinevere, appears all too happy to see others in the crosshairs like this, for it means her own reign of terror is able to fly under Lucy’s radar. What else is it but terrorism when the animal leaves a steaming pile of vengeance at the foot of the bed because you’ve given it dry food instead of wet at 3 a.m.?

Later, the creature looks at you with innocent eyes and mews. She has no idea how that sickening mess got there, officer. Perhaps you left it there yourself, she suggests with a cock of her head.

The bungalow we all inhabit is almost 100 years old. The cold winter air seeps easily through its bones. Last night, instead of holding the cat close, Lucy clutched an electric blanket to her chest. This morning, I found the device on the floor, topped by a drying brown exclamation mark of what used to be Fancy Feast Seafood Surprise. I’m a man who enjoys punctuation, but this was well beyond any rule cited by Strunk and White.

I brought the offense to Lucy’s attention.

“Well, did you clean it up?” she said testily.

“Me? Why should I clean it up?”

She shot me a look.

“What?”

She held her gaze.

“Wha -- I certainly hope you don’t think I did this,” I said.

“Just clean it up."

Reaching under the kitchen sink for the Resolve I noticed Guinevere, crude and anonymous, waiting beside her bowl. I wanted to give her a piece of my mind. The little evildoer stared back at me with black eyes full of threat.

Then I picked my clothes from the bedroom floor.