A Hunter’s Guide To Dealing With An Ungrateful Family

My family are idiots. I honestly don’t know how they’ve survived this long. They don’t have the basic life skills that I learned when I was young. I mean, I can be lazy. Sometimes I’ll even sleep the day away if I find a nice sunny spot. But my family takes it to a whole other level. So, I’ve taken it upon myself to try to show them the error of their ways. But do you think they appreciate me? Hell no. I brought them a nice juicy bird and they let it fly away. It’s like no matter how much I try to teach them how to hunt, they’re just ungrateful.

A Hunter’s Guide To Dealing With An Ungrateful Family

I NEVER see them in the yard stalking squirrels. Ever. I’m not even sure how they get food. They must be doing something because they are alive. They keep a bowl of food for me in the house. It’s tasty but dry. I don’t know why they think they are too good to hunt in the yard like me. It must be jealousy of my hunting prowess. They keep attaching louder and louder bells to my collar to try to warn my prey. They even tried one of these. It didn’t work. I’m just that good.

I consider myself a bit of a naturalist. I like to live off the land. But I can’t seem to convince my family of the merits of this lifestyle. At dinner time they leave and come back with food wrapped in thin paper skin. Sure it makes a pleasant crinkling noise when they flay their food. But to me, there is nothing more satisfying than a mouthful of feathers. They are nice enough to share their spoils, though. French fries are yummy but not very filling.

It was in this spirit of generosity, that I decided to teach them how to fend for themselves. If they are too lazy to come out to the yard, then I’m going to bring the yard to them. I started them out small. I brought them a snake. Really, it was a glorified earth worm. My lady just shrieked for a minute, then made my man remove the snake in a dustpan. (I’d pre-killed it for their convenience.) Then every few nights I’d bring them a new snake. After the third or fourth, my lady stopped shrieking and just swept the snake up and took it back outside herself. I considered this a success. There is no room for squeamishness in my survival school.

So, I moved on to phase two and brought them a mouse. I even demonstrated the proper way to break its neck WHILE playing with it by throwing it hard against the bottom of the dining room table. My lady took my mouse away. I was so happy! I thought for sure she was going to eat it. Instead she yelled at me and tossed it into the outside trash can.

I brought them a few more dead mice and rats. Some days, when I was feeling especially generous, I’d bring them half a bird. I always leave my spoils under the dining room table for them. That’s where I see them skin their paper food. But they still weren’t getting it. The other day I left them a perfectly good top-half of a rat. I even artfully pulled out its juicy entrails for a more enticing plating. But my lady just sighed, and swept up the rat-snack and threw it away.

It occurred to me that maybe I was making it too easy on them. The most delicious meals are the ones I had to work for. My mistake was bringing them pre-dead food. So, I started to capture my prey alive and release it into the house. Usually if they didn’t catch the mice within the first day or so I’d take care of it myself. I’m not one to waste food.

There was one rat, though, that slipped through my claws and made it into the walls. Finally my family decided to hunt it! They tried to stalk the rat and set traps for it. They aren’t very good at it. He’s still in the walls. Rat-dini, my family calls him. I call him “Eventual Lunch.”

Even though they didn’t catch “Eventual Lunch”, I decided to reward their efforts. Last weekend I brought them a whole bird. I didn’t even pre-kill it for them. I leapt on my prey, stunning it, then drug it into the house. It was hard controlling myself and not crushing the bird’s soft throat under my teeth. But that’s how much I love my family. It was night time, so they were all asleep.

You know who wasn’t asleep? The bird. It smacked me in the face and got away. It fluttered around the house, shedding feathers everywhere. It eventually landed in a window too high up for even an agile hunter like myself to reach. It spent the entire night trying to get out of the closed window. Seriously, birds are dumb. It pooped everywhere.

My family was going to have so much fun hunting the bird! When they finally got up the next morning, they didn’t notice the bird right away. See, the bird had exhausted itself and it sat quietly in the window, trying to not be noticed. Too late bird!

To my joy, there was a knock at the front door that bird’s window was RIGHT NEXT TO!

My man DID see the bird! He froze, staring at it. I give him a 7 out of 10 for form, but the bird definitely saw him coming. Probably because he didn’t wiggle his tail.

But then he answered the door! His Mom-lady came in and my man pointed out the bird to her. Probably to brag about what a great hunter I am and how generous I’ve been with training them, too. But then Mom-lady did the last thing I ever expected: She just picked up the bird, took it out the front door, AND LET IT FLY AWAY!

Are you freaking kidding me?! I worked so hard training my family to feed themselves and they just let a delicious breakfast fly away! I just don’t know what to do with them. But, I won’t let myself get discouraged. Maybe I just need to bring them something bigger. I wonder if I can find one of those stinky black and white things…