The kitten will not stay off of the counter

Our youngest animal is no longer a kitten.

She is however small and the youngest. As such, my nickname for her is “Kitten.”

Super original, I know.

If kitten were a character in Dungeons and Dragons, her alignment would be chaotic and neutral. She is not lawful. She is chaotic. She is neither good nor evil. She is merely neutral. She does not observe rules. Sometimes, she causes shit with the other animals just because she is bored.

She’s a textbook example of chaotic neutral.

I have a simple rule for my cats: No cats on places for human food.

This includes the kitchen counter, the stove and the dining table.

There’s a small problem here.

The cats eat on top of a sideboard next to the dining table.

We do this so that their food is not accessible to the dogs. The dogs, if given the opportunity would eat themselves to death. We protect these small brained, large appetite creatures from themselves.

Today I tried an experiment with her.

I attempted to keep her off of the counter. I did this while attempting to feed her and Trevor their delicious grits for breakfast.

(they do so love their delicious grits)

Kitten did not like this experiment.

She would jump up, then I put her down. This went on for half an hour. Still she persisted. I persisted. This went on half the day. She persisted. I persisted.

Sure, I had creative writing to do. I had a project that I was working on, but I was going to insist on the standard - No kitten on the counter.

Six years of my career went by, the whole time I just kept trying to get the kitten off the counter.

Now?

Now I ignore the kitten. I ignore the pressing emails from the people I work for. Now, I let my messages go without reply. I let the kitten on the counter. 

It’s the only way that I can get anything done it seems. 

Inbox zero?

Naw.

That’s trying to keep the kitten off the counter.

Invoices on time and daily?

Again, a kitten on the counter.

Instead?

I’m telling you a story about my kitten and inviting you to ignore the distractions from what’s really important and not urgent. Unlike the unimportant, urgent kitten on the counter.