A Curmudgeon’s Viewpoint (March 29, 2026)

Papabear had a bit of a crisis…

Let’s just say up front, I am only relating this as a way for all of you to get a little glimpse into papabear’s life. (Bear with me, it gets interesting. – PapaDeanBear)

Yesterday, the house was a bit of a madhouse. My husband had volunteered to do the main course for a spaghetti dinner for our local senior LGBTQ+ organization, SAGEUpstate (link at the end.) Well, in all the madness of moving stuff from our kitchen to the car, our orange and white menace 🐱slipped out. We didn’t notice at the time.

I actually went to the spaghetti dinner later on (had to Uber, goddamnit) to help the hubby with cleanup and loading the car with leftovers and unused canned tomato products and pasta. So my darling hubby and I get back from it, unload the car, and get settled for the night.

The next day, I am looking around for my boy, and I can’t find him. I ask Dan (my husband) if he has seen the cat, and of course he says “Don’t worry about it, he’ll turn up.” (Fuck you very much for your reassurance.) So I am sick with worry. I love my furbabies, they are family.

So, I go through out the day doing things to distract myself, try to dispel my mental agony, like watching some of my favorite YouTube channels. So, I am basically trying to distract myself and failing, and my despair worsens.

About an hour ago (as of this writing,) my hubby barges into my den, and sure as shit, he has the orange and white menace in his arms. What happened was, Dan had taken the house horse (our Great Dane) outside to go potty (we have a fenced in back yard) and she went and chased away a feral cat that was stalking the birds that congregated around the bird feeder. He went to get her to bring her in, and sure enough the goddamn cat was sitting there behind the garage.

Suffice it to say, this cranky, cigar-smoking old man broke down in tears knowing that my boy is safe.

If any of you are an LGBTQ+ senior citizen, here is the link to SAGEUpstate:
https://www.sageupstate.org/

(And my boy’s name is BeBe, short for Butterball. He is a bit of a chonk. The house horse’s name is Della. – PDB)

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© 2026, Dean A. Basler Jr., all rights reserved.