Catching Up: Okapi Machine

She has an enemy. She has never met her. She does not know her real name. She wants to play tricks on her...and steal her cat.

Basia has dubbed the girl who lives across the street, "Okapi." I cannot fathom a single reason in the universe to nickname someone, "Okapi," but Basia's brain works in ways I seldom really understand. Okapi and Basia make evil eyes at each other when they are both outside at the same time, and it is all over a cat. Basia loves the cat, and the girl owns the cat. The cat seems to make the most of the conflict by alternating favorites, but it did leave a dead mouse at our doorstep last week, so we think Basia may currently have the upper hand.

I am not allowing Basia to feed it a single morsel because I realize that it is wrong to steal another little girl's pet cat (plus I do not want a cat, plus I don't want to pay the pet deposit on a third animal when we move into a rental in a few weeks).

On one recent occasion, when tension was especially high, Basia ran into the house to gather supplies for an evil plot. She first thought she would make a trap to catch the cat, but then she hatched a better plan. She created an Okapi machine to leave on the sidewalk. She was very sure that Okapi would be very curious about it and come over and open it. That would be a grave mistake on Okapi's part, for inside the machine would be a vicious (dead) cockroach that Basia would catch just to scare her. That would teach her! How dare she have a cat that Basia wants and get annoyed whenever Basia tries to claim it and train it and name it for herself! She'll be sorry now!