I didn't want to do this. I had no intention of telling anyone the story of The Kibb. It's embarrassing. It's violent. It's an admittance of how this cat, in all ways, has absolute control over our small family. I'm only writing this because The Kibb promised me that if I didn't there would be no sleeping in this house for a very long time--and she means it.

The Beginning: Only Half an Ear and No Tail

The ear was all my fault. I worked at a humane society that was conducting an extensive feral cat trapping program. We would trap wild cats and bring them back to the shelter where they would be tested for various diseases, given shots, spayed or neutered, and then have the tips of their ears clipped for identification. Then they would be released back from where they came; or so that was the idea.

(For the record, The Kibb says was doing just fine in the wild, thank-you-very-much, and would greatly appreciate it if I or somebody else would just put her back where they found her.)

I worked as a veterinary grunt in the medical department when she came to us. She was around three months old and had a coat of silver fur that felt like steel wool; her tail was broken at the base, and she was in a rotten mood.

(The Kibb would like to mention that if your butt was broken you'd be in a bad mood too.)

We knocked her out with kitty drugs and assessed the situation. The tail was broken in such a way that it could not be repaired. It had to go.

*WHACK!*

(The Kibb says I'm lucky that she doesn't remember any of that. I believe her.)

She was then spayed, given a selection of shots, and her ear was *clipped*.

Ok, so it was supposed to be *clipped*. Instead of the little V-shaped notch that was to be made, the vet student lopped off nearly a quarter of the top portion of her ear. For serious, it was way lame.

Now comes the fun part.

Recovery: How She Ended Up With Me

After her surgery The Kibb had to be housed in the medical department while her tail area healed. It was my job to give her daily antibiotic injections and to keep her wounds clean. She was quite a trooper--she never yowled, screeched or squirmed even when I had to do mean things to her. She endured all of my poking and prodding quietly and with incredible patience and dignity. When I wasn't poking her she stared at me through the bars of her cage. Little did I know that she was brewing up a Master Revenge.

Nearly three weeks had gone by since her disfigurement, and after so much daily handling I was starting to feel a great amount of affection for this mangled kitten. The time had come, and she was ready.

A week before she was set to be released she put her plan into action.

I came to her cage and got her out using a towel (I call this the "kitty burrito maneuver"). She didn't resist, and I began giving her the once-over. I cleaned her ears and treated her for ear mites, gave her a dose of Revolution (a wonderful topical flea/bug treatment), and then went to work at the rear.

I was busy soaking the scabs off when it came; something I would have never expected. The deepest, longest, most rumbling purr ever to come out of a cat that small. I couldn't believe it. I was so flattered to think that she liked me, and to show it when I was doing the most unpleasant things to her!

(The Kibb says: "She was hooked. My plan was working.")

I called my sweetie and told him we needed another place to live that allowed pets because we were getting a cat, and I was naming her Sylvia.

Three weeks later we had Sylvia and a new townhouse and life was great. Little did I realize that this was only the first big decision The Kibb would force me to make, nor did I foresee the slave that I would become.

My Life Now: Big Changes

I may have chopped off her ear and tail, but she has bombed my peace of mind. I have dark puffy circles under my eyes. Every night she gets me back. I cannot leave the house or go to sleep without worrying about what valuable thing she'll destroy or eat next. She hacked up my plants. She strews mice-guts all over the house. She clawed at the furniture so we built her a huge carpet tree to run up and down on. Instead she uses this to launch attacks at our dog. She and the dog fight all of the time. Once, I spied the dog running down the hallway with The Kibb dragging behind. She had her claws dug into the dog and wouldn't let go. She walks along any ledge in our house and throws whatever money or other dangerous items she might find onto the floor for the dog to eat. But the worst thing she does, the single most evil exhibition of her revenge, is what I call The Twilight Trot.

The Twilight Trot: How To Drive a Human Insane

The plan is simple: never let your captor get a whole night's rest. Ensure that they will wake up cranky and mean, and that they stay that way for the rest of the day. They'll be so unpleasant that no one they meet will like them, furthering their misery.

The Kibb has mastered this. She has perfected her trotting schedule with events occurring in three hours segments that last 45 minutes each. If I go to bed at 10:30, her trot starts at 1:30 and lasts until 2:15. It will then begin again at 5:15, then 8:15, and so on until I have to wake up.

The Kibb would like to gleefully explain this:

It's a brilliant plan and she falls for it nightly. I start in the bedroom. On the walls behind the doors are these fantastic little springs with knobs on them. I lift my paw and come down on it hard: *DOYOIYOIYOIY-ING!!* I do it again: *DOYOIYOIYOIY-ING!!* And finally, a third time: *DOYOIYOIYOIY-ING!!*

She yells at me to stop, so I do, and move on to the carpet.

Claws sprung and ears back, I rip the cheap threads with all my strength. She yells again, and again I move on. This time I go to the window and try to climb up the blinds. I hate these things--they ought to be illegal--and so tacky, too. Straight up in the air my powerful back legs launch me and down I come to the terrific sound of multiple bent slats of aluminum. My attempt to bring down these foul things is once again unsuccessful, so I try again, this time jumping higher and pulling harder on the way down. She hurls a pillow at me, which is exactly what I had expected her to do. Now she can't cover her head. Ha!

I take a break for two minutes and let her get comfortable, you know, instill some false security before I resume my mission. Now it's time to engage the dog.

Springing from the window ledge I land near the the dog and smack her in the face then immediately tear towards the head of the bed where the dog will follow, snarling viciously and trampling the heads of my captors. This event successfully lands the dog in an extraordinary amount of trouble, and in my opinion she deserves it. After that, I move to different rooms in the house making noises which keep her from falling completely asleep. After exactly forty-five minutes of this I stop and let her sleep, and here is why:

Forty-five minutes is the perfect amount of time for this type of psychological warfare because an episode under thirty minutes she can almost sleep through (with pillows and blankets over the head) and an episode over forty-five minutes will surely land my butt out on the front patio in a carrier. This way, she thinks she can sleep through it (she can't) and she's too lazy (or hopeful that she can sleep through it) to do anything about it. So I win. She wakes up every morning missing two-and-a-half hours sleep and acts like a big jerk to everybody. Nothing pleases me more.

And this is why The Kibb is a MeanKitty. After a year and a half of this I have lost all will of my own, and everything I do is with hope to placate her so she'll let me sleep. Will it ever happen? I don't know. I can only hope.