> Calling in sick to work makes me uncomfortable. No matter how legitimate<br />> my excuse, I always get the feeling that my boss thinks I'm lying.<br />><br />> On one recent occasion, I had a valid reason but lied anyway, because the<br />> truth was just too darned humiliating. I simply mentioned that I had<br />> sustained a head injury, and I hoped I would feel up to<br />> coming in the next day. By then, I reasoned, I could think up a doozy to<br />> explain the bandage on the top of my head.<br />><br />> The accident occurred mainly because I had given in to my wife's wishes to<br />> adopt a cute little kitty. Initially, the new aquisition was no problem.<br />><br />> Then one morning, I was taking my shower after breakfast when I heard my<br />> wife, Deb, call out to me from the kitchen. "Honey! The garbage disposal<br />> is dead again. Please come reset it."<br />><br />> "You know where the button is," I protested through the shower<br />> pitter-patter and steam. "Reset it yourself!"<br />><br />> "But I'm scared!" she persisted. "What if it starts going and sucks me<br />> in?"<br />><br />> There was a meaningful pause and then, "C'mon, it'll only take you a<br />> second."<br />><br />> So out I came, dripping wet and buck *****, hoping that my silent<br />> outraged n*dity would make a statement about how I perceived her behavior<br />> as extremely cowardly. Sighing loudly, I squatted down and stuck my head<br />> under the sink to find the button. It is the last action I remember<br />> performing.<br />><br />> It struck without warning, and without any respect to my circumstances.<br />> No, it wasn't the hexed disposal, drawing me into its gnashing metal<br />> teeth. It was our new kitty, who discovered the fascinating dangling<br />> objects she spied hanging between my legs. She had been poised around the<br />> corner and stalked me as I reached under the sink. And, at the precise<br />> moment when I was most vulnerable, she leapt at the toys I<br />> unwittingly offered and snagged them with her needle-like claws. I lost<br />> all rational thought to control orderly bodily movements, blindly rising<br />> at a violent rate of speed, with the full weight of a kitten hanging from<br />> my masculine region. Wild animals are sometimes faced with a fight or<br />> flight syndrome. Men, in this predicament, choose only the "flight"<br />> option. I know this from experience. I was fleeing straight up into the<br />> air when the sink and cabinet bluntly and forcefully impeded my ascent.<br />> The impact knocked me out cold.<br />><br />> When I awoke, my wife and the paramedics stood over me. Now there are not<br />> many things in this life worse than finding oneself lying on the kitchen<br />> floor buck naked in front of a group of "been-here,<br />> done-that" paramedics. Even worse, having been fully briefed by my wife,<br />> the paramedics were all snorting loudly as they tried to conduct their<br />> work, all the while trying to suppress their hysterical<br />> laughter.......and not succeeding. Somehow I lived through it all.<br />><br />> A few days later I finally made it back in to the office, where<br />> colleagues tried to coax an explanation out of me about my head injury. I<br />> kept silent, claiming it was too painful to talk about. Which it was.<br />><br />> "What's the matter?" they all asked, "Cat got your tongue?"<br />><br />> If they only knew!