Run...Rabbit...Run!

So I've been thinking about what Sopheava said about her cat and his quirky antics a lot lately.
As you already know, I have three lovely kitties, who like to hunt and kill (though they spend most of their time indoors).
The event that pushed this idea back into my head was my neighbor's cat, Mork, seen here hiding in my lilacs, brought me a squirrel today. I knew he liked me, as he has entered my house on many occasions, but I never thought that he liked me enough to bring me "a kill." It seems that during this lovely hot day, Mork went out, killed Rocky, and instead of bringing him to his owners, he brought him to me. As I contemplated what my side dish should be (no, I didn't end up eating it. For God's sake, it's a city squirrel...not even remotely fat enough to eat...uh...I digress), I realized that cats, rodents, and myself have had an interesting history. I also have a side story about "products" and animals similar to Margaret's.
Step into the way back machine. When I was six years old, my family's cat attempted to eat a chipmunk. Being the good lad I was, I decided, "I need to SAVE this animal." So, I grabbed the chipmunk away from the cat, thinking, "Hey, I'm a her...OWWWW!"
It's at this point that I learned that Chipmunks are not like Alvin, Simon, and Theodore. No, they bite...hard.
This chipmunk bit down on my right index finger. It didn't matter that I saved it from certain death, this little fella was going to get away from everything. So, he latched on to my finger. Imagine a six year old, shaking his hand with a little brown blur at the end of it. That was me.
The sad part? After saving the little guy and having him bite me, he let go, took about three or four steps, and then the cat grabbed him again.
There was a look in her eye as she ate him in front of me. It was if she was saying, "I am ALWAYS right. Don't forget it."
I would later send a card to my sister as she was at camp that read: "Beware the chipmunk." I was six, folks.
Fast forward seven years. I am in bed one night, when I suddenly feel something wet by my head. It had been raining, and I had left the window open, but this didn't feel like water. It was...sticky. As I fumbled for the light, I heard a noise next to my pillow. It almost sounded like twigs snapping. The light clicked on, and my horror began. Almost straight out of The Godfather, there the cat chewing on a rabbit head she had brought me. It was on my pillow, and the sticky wetness I was feeling was its blood. Again, the cat did this because she loved me, but her execution was...not so good. The sheets, unfortunately, were ruined.
When I was in college, I adopted the cats that I have now. I like to let them go outside. This leads to two incidents of hunting.
The first occurred when Oscar (the orange cat) decided to catch a cardinal and take him (it was a male cardinal) into the house. All I saw was a flash of orange (as Oscar jumped up into the air to catch the bird) and then a flash of red as the bird was let go in the house.
If you don't know, cats like to play with their food before eating it. In this case, he wanted to play with the cardinal. Everytime I would get close to the bird, Oscar would swoop in, grab the bird, run to another part of the house, and let the bird go.
After going through this three times, I finally got to the bird with Oscar nowhere in sight. I thought to myself, "Finally. I can save this bird." There was a window right there. All I had to do was open it, and the bird was free. I opened the window, held out my hand with the bird in it...and watched in horror as Oscar appeared from out of nowhere and devoured the bird in front of me. All that was left was part of a wing that was still in my hand.
Ah, but the second time was even more traumatic. It was my senior year of college. Sam, the black cat, had only days before scratched the hell out of a Doberman Pincher. The cats and I were out in the yard when I saw Sam dive on to something. However, after catching whatever it was, he walked away. This is because my cats never learned the killing stroke. You see, cats are trained by their parents to kill. If they do not learn the killing stroke, then they can hurt an animal, but will leave it alive. It's not the same with a bird as it is with a squirrel or rabbit. Mork knows the killing stroke, which was evident by the squirrel he brought me.
Back to the point. What Sam had found was a baby bunny. After landing on the bunny, Sam had slit open its stomach, but he was unsure of what to do next. So, here I have this baby bunny dying in my backyard. I have no clue what to do. I know it can't be saved as its intestines have spilled out on the grass.
With no other choice and with adivce given to me by my wife (only my girlfriend then), I grabbed a brick and crushed the rabbit's head. Let's just say that I felt terrible for the next few days.
As for now? Well the cats pretty much only eat bugs. It's how my house stays so nice and bug-free.
The story that rivals Margaret's "feminine product" story? Easy. My mother used to have a dog that like to eat out of the trash. He would roam the house from can to can looking for good stuff to either play with or eat. In one instance he brought a large chocolate wrapper to my mother from my father's trash can. As he was not supposed to be having chocolate, this led to a fun confrontation.
In his best move, however, Beau (the dog's name) went dumpster-diving into the guest bedroom's trash. Of course my lovely sister and her husband were staying at the house at the time, and, after making the beast with two backs (or dancing the Horizontal Mambo...your choice), my brother-in-law threw his condom out in the trash can. Of course the dog decided that he wanted that, so he paraded around the house with this Magnum condom hanging out the side of his mouth. I could hear my sister screaming from here.
Yet another reason why I still haven't owned a dog. As for toys? My cats still play with the first toy I ever bought them: a catnip-filled dinosaur we call Dino. They ignore almost every other toy...except crumbled up paper. If only children were that easy to please.
Of course what do I know? I once rolled on to an unsuspecting cat while in the middle of flagrante de licto. I could be wrong.
Namaste.