I've never been much of one for fast-food meals. I used to quip that the McDonald's claim of how many burgers served is no indicator of how many were digested. I will admit when a McDonald's finally did open near our Flushing home I did get food there, but generally it was the fish sandwich and apple pie, such as they created it.
Before McDonald's there was a Weston's not too far from our home, on Northern Boulevard and 147th Street, having taken over a bosky corner site that contained a Hallet and Hallet funeral home. I may have gotten a burger there once in a while, but hardly regularly. The site became and still is a Burger King.
Of course the forerunner to all these places was White Castle, whose motto was to buy their greasy sliders by the sack. As a kid in the early 60s I remember someone connected with our house who brought a sackful back. It might have been the only time I've ever eaten a White Castle burger
The White Castle of that era is still there, on the corner of Northern and Bell Boulevards in Bayside. How this is possible is to me quite a mystery, but there are perpetual fans of White Castle burgers with each new generation that keep the flame broiling going. The bar crowd after closing.
We have a cat. An orange tabby who we swear thinks he's a dog. To us he's so much like a dog that we got his name stamped on a Snoopy tag on his collar. We don't purposely let him out, but he will scoot out if we've made a mistake with the doors. But we try and be careful. He is not declawed.
One of his escapes didn't go well and he got chased up a tree and came back with a bleeding leg. He recovered of course, but we tell him, quite emphatically, "Cosmo, you can't handle the outdoors." As he's gotten older, he's not quite as interested.
He pretty much acts like all cats, sleeps at least 18 hours a day, finds a sunny spot to stretch out in, and is basically interested in eating. But Cosmo does like to cuddle. He's very affectionate toward my younger daughter Susan who just got married, who first got the cat in 2007, and myself, who pretty much feeds him all the time. He purrs like a motor boat.
Some of the furniture fabric is a bit scratched up, but Cosmo gets a wide berth on discipline, because of course you can't do a damn thing about it anyway. He occasionally coughs up a hair ball, because of course they lick themselves silly and their fur comes off in their mouths. I'm the cleanup man as well as the can opener with legs.
The other night I watching 'La La Land' on cable. Not a bad movie, but too long, and short on stars who can actually sing. They did dance a bit, but they were not anywhere near the greats. Ryan Gosling swinging on a lamppost is not Gene Kelly, but Gene not with us anymore. Nor is Debbie Reynolds. But he and Emma stone make for pleasant eye candy with a story that to me should end with lyrics from Harry Chapin's song 'Taxi.'
Regardless, the living room is dark, Cosmo has been cuddling, and now he seems to be doing something else, but I'm not paying any attention whatsoever. Until I get hit pause and get up to go to the bathroom.
I don't know what gets into cats, but I do know what comes out of them. Getting up I find out that he's experienced reverse peristalsis and quietly let loose as if he's been out drinking all night, downed a sackful of White Castle burgers. and then gotten on a roller coaster, because boy, did he make a mess. And then, like anyone who that's ever happened to, he feels fine.
We still love him.
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