Some Kids Never Learn

I have a two-foot terror in my house. No, it’s not a toddler; it’s my 20-pound male cat, Pepper. I spent most of my Christmas vacation chasing this guy away from my refrigerator. Last week, he figured out how to open the fridge. My husband and I used to joke that the cats would love to be able to open the fridge. “Oh, if they only knew how to open the fridge, ha, ha! They would be getting into it all the time!” We don’t find this joke funny any more.  

It started the day after Christmas. As I lay on the couch in a post-holiday sleep haze, Pepper was crying in the kitchen and making a loud scratching noise. I pulled my tired ass off the couch to investigate. The little guy was standing in front of the fridge with the door wide open.  

“What the heck? Did I forget to shut the fridge earlier?” I thought to myself as I shut the door. Ten minutes later, I heard the same noises and alas, the door was open again. Only this time, Pepper had jumped onto the first shelf and was chewing at the edge of a packet of ground beef. I pulled him out of the fridge and shut the door. I watched as my little terror stuck his paw in the door’s plastic seal and pulled and shook it until the door swung wide open. He looked at me this time and meowed three times. I imaged he was saying, “Ha, ha, sucker! And you didn’t think I could do this?”

I had to do something. In an hour, I was supposed to be downtown to meet friends. I pictured poor Pepper opening the door while I was gone and getting trapped inside the fridge. I called my husband. He gave me what is every man’s solution for a problem. “Use duct tape,” he said. “Put several rows of it on the door.” I put three long pieces of duct tape around the door opening and pushed a chair against it.  

The next several days, Pepper stood in front of the fridge and cried. He looked under the fridge and beside it, as if he was looking for another opening. Every time my husband or I needed to eat, we had to pull the chair out and peel the layers of duct tape off. Half the time, I would not bother getting into the fridge. Opening the fridge was such a hassle, it didn’t seem worth it.  

Finally, one night we figured out why he was so obsessed. As I came downstairs after a long day of work, my husband warned me not to go into the kitchen as there was a “crime scene” he had just mopped up. The suspect, Pepper, had caught a mouse that had darted out from behind the fridge. It clicked in my head then. No wonder he was looking around and under the fridge. The cat probably thought he could get to the mouse by opening the fridge.  

The next day, I went to Toys R Us to get a baby lock for the fridge. Being that I’m seven months pregnant, I am sure the clerk assumed that I was buying this for my unborn. I pictured her saying, “Ah, stocking up for the baby?” “Well, yes but not for this baby. I have a two-foot furry terror at home that can’t stop getting into the fridge. Some kids never learn.”