Look What I Got For My Birthday!! ~ A Nice Surprise In The Mail ~ With Help From Stinky the Cat ~ Original Photography, Art, and Short Discussion ~

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My birthday came and went about a week ago. And a day or two later a large box arrived in the mail from Amazon. Pasted on the outside of the box was a little label asking: "Alexa, what are your deals? " My first thought, "ooh, someone sent me a little talking, know-it-all encyclopedic robot for my special day".

Just what I needed. A little electronic tower to set on my living room table, constantly shouting answers to the self-directed, rhetorical questions I often discuss aloud with myself throughout a normal day. Not to mention a bunch of replies and comments arising from my continuous stream of discussions with Stinky the Cat.

I can just hear the little talking cylinder now..."I don't know WHY Stinky wants you to fill her food dish again. Maybe you should ask her. That is the most direct way to receive an answer to a question. By the way, what kind of a name is Stinky for a cat?"

After about six seconds of running THAT scenario round and round in my head, I was seriously hoping the box did NOT contain a new Alexa bot. There was only one way to find out.

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The Package The Mail Person Left On My Front Porch

The big box certainly was light, so I gave it the usual 'shake the stuffins out of it', just to see what might be inside. Very little happened, except some tiny, plactic-y rattling noises from way way down within the bowls of the box. My first thought: "Hmm, if it IS a talking robot, it probably won't work too good anymore." Rattly innards are never a good sign with any electronic device.

I rummaged around in the over-stuffed 'whatever-whatnot' drawer in the kitchen, and came up with an old boning knife, and slit open my present like a big old fat, boxy carp-fish. And popped open the four, box-top lidlets to see what was inside.

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Ooh, What IS it? ~ Something To Do With Cats!

No wonder the thing was so light. There was a whole lot of well-organized air on the top, and another smaller, very colorful box down below. Some sort of game or something, with an obvious theme directed towards cats. Onward we delve, into the reaches of our present. I was beside myself with excitement. What can it be?

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Someone Else Wonders The Same Thing

As soon as I slit open the big box, I heard the pitter-patter of tiny, pink-padded feet, rounding the hardwood floor from the kitchen area beyond. Before I could turn to look, Stinky the Cat had taken up position on my recently abandoned stool, and was no doubt inquiring: "What is it? Is it for you? Is it a game? Looks like a game. Do you think its a game?" I answered back, glad now that it was NOT an Alexa in the box, with all these questions bantering about: "I don't know, but we'll soon find out".

The Stink seemed quite excited, and in no hurry to wait and see. You'd think it was HER birthday, rather than mine. (I have absolutely NO idea when hers actually is. She just showed up at the back door one day, already born, and moved right in.)

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"EXCUUUUSE ME...I Need A Closer Look"

Someone coined a phrase years ago, something to the tune of -- "Curiosity Killed The Cat" . And though I never really fully understood what that was supposed to mean, I DO now know the whole thing is a bunch of thick bologna.

As anyone who's been around a cat for more than six minutes can tell you, if that saying WAS true, there would be no cats left in the world after about ten minutes. And from my view across the fence in the back-40, this is just not so. It appears there are more cats in the world now than ever before. So I'm calling DOUBLE floor-sweeping, sandwich-toppings on that little saying about our furry friend, The Cat.

I headed to the kitchen to get a snack, to give Stinky a few minutes to decide if it was OK to continue on with this whole opening-of-the-birthday-present project. I returned after providing ample time for any normal person to make a full-on assessment.

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"I'm Still Not Done -- Go Find Some More Snacks"

"Ok..."

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I Couldn't Have Said It More Plainly Myself

[Much Later] I finally had to physically re-move the cat, because, after all, this WAS my present, and waiting for her to finish up the full perusal was not going to happen anytime soon.

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Way Cool ~ A Cat >-|||||°> Opoly Game

That little thing above [>-|||||°>], is my keyboard rendition of a little skeletonized fish. Best I can do without a week or so of major online research. Sometimes you just have to draw a line in the time-crunch sands of life. All home-made emoji's aside (or whatever that little beached fish might be called), the Cat game looked pretty cool at first glance.

I slit open the plastic-covered Cat Opoly box with my trusty, dusty fish-knife, to see what this was all about.

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This Looks Like A Whole Fish-Barrel Of Fun!

As you can read on the back of the box, this game is guaranteed to be a "Feline Frenzy Of Fun!" It's a Monopoly game, just like the one made for the last umpteen years by Parker Brothers, only based in the trials and tribulations of the everyday cat, rather than a Wall Street Tycoon. It actually looks pretty involved, and also like it will be a whole LOT of fun to play.

That little gray cat on the back of the box is doing his best to look cute and get us all involved. He looks like a tiny rendition of my cat Freeway years back, that loved to ride on my bicycle with me.

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So THAT'S Where They Come From

You might have noticed the blue arrow I added to the box above. What do you see? Cat Facts. The back of each Cat Opoly card contains all sorts of Cat Facts. I wonder if this is where my little friend the Robotic Cat gets all those Facts they're always regaling me with on the Steemit site. I'm sure you've seen it, the little bot conversations I include at the end of each of my posts. This calls for some more comparative research. Some day.

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The Playing Cards ~ With The All-Important Cat Facts On The Back

This part of the game looks like a normal, run-of-the-mill Monopoly game card. Though sadly, the Parker Brothers still haven't caught on to the benefit of Cat Fact inclusion on the back of THEIR game cards. Some things are so self-evident, yet so-often ignored by even the heavy-weight's of the game-producing industry. Their loss, our gain, I suppose.

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Bargaining For These Doohickeys Is A Full-Time Job In This Game

These are the tokens you get and little things you bargain for, or receive and have negative thoughts about, while playing the Cat Opoly game. These looked to me like stuffed pedestal fish you'd put on your mantle and some sort of tiny grocery boxes or ingots of lead.

After spending a bit more time with the directions, I learned the yellow things are fish bones, and those gray cubes are NOT grocery boxes or blocks of lead, but upside-down LITTER BOXES ! I'm not sure, but I'm guessing winning or somehow getting these kitty toilet boxes while playing is some sort of booby prize.

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"I'll Gladly Trade You My Mouse For A Nice Fainting Bench"

These are the player's game pieces. The things you move around the board as you roll the dice, to represent your movements and other personnel actions. I love these whimsical little metal castings. So creative and fun, particularly in light of the wacky cat world they represent.

So very kitty appropriate - a ball of yarn, a bottle of milk, a house mouse, a can of Friskies, an odd little kissing fish, and something that looks a lot like the fainting couch my Grandmother had in their front room. I think it's actually a can of opened sardines. Makes more sense than a soft place to pass out in the front parlor. Though your average cat would LOVE that. Particularly if the sun was streaming in through the front window.

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Is That Steemit Money They're Playing With?

The rest of the playing cards look a lot like regular Monopoly cards, only with various types of cats breeds on the front. There is also the requisite stacks of money you use to buy and sell things as you move around the board. I always liked this part of Monopoly. For once in my life I get to feel like a real Financial Fat Cat.

This game looks like it will be a whole lot of fun. I'm pretty sure I've said that more than once here. Can you tell I'm very excited about my new birthday present?

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And A (Wrinkly) Dollar To Grow On

Showing details of the game board, as well as my enclosed birthday card and an extra dollar. The thoughtful relatives that sent me the game also included a home-made card with a hand-painted image of a herd of cows, all lined up under the trees, wishing me a happy farmstead birthday. And what was included within the card? A dollar bill.

The dollar is actually a yearly birthday tradition, intended as a "dollar to grow on". I think this is a cool thing to include with my birthday wish. And it looks like this particular bill had seen a lot of action over it's many years in circulation.

So maybe besides being a bill to GROW on, it can also serve as a dollar to LEARN from. Hopefully imparting to me some of the wisdom it's gained from all the experiences it has seen while being passed from hand to hand over the many years. We can always hope.

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The Full-On Cat >-|||||°> Opoly Board

Looks like a rather complicated, yet incredible blast-of-a-game. On-wards, to the all-important direction reading and setting it up for play. Looks to me like the game may need a semi-permanent place to sit for awhile, if it is like regular, long-playing Monopoly. Pretty sure that's why someone invented the card table.

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The Queen Of The Universe (Affectionately Known As Stinky the Cat) Has Other Ideas ~ Making The Actual PLAYING Of The New Game A Bit Of A Challenge

We contemplated PLAYING the game that night, but a certain someone had other ideas. As soon as I put all the parts back in the box after taking pictures, so I could keep them together, she promptly fell asleep in "her" new box. Right on top of our evening plans. We will set it up and play another night, when she has forgotten about this new sleeping area.

And anyway, it WAS getting to be after 11:00 at night, and that's when I usually get back on Steemit and start doing things. So...we'll have to figure it all out, play, and post a review about the new Cat >-|||||°> Opoly game at a later date. Hopefully before I turn another year older ( :

And one dollar wiser...

~ Finto ~

Thanks for stopping in and viewing my new birthday present for 2018. If you have any thoughts about Cat >-|||||°> Opoly, or any of the many OTHER 'Opoly games that exist, cat's obsessions with empty (sometimes) boxes, playing board games, the art of birthdays and getting older, or anything else this post reminds you of, please feel free to comment away in the spaces below. I'd love to hear from you.

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And go to @ddschteinn -- There's a whole lot more...

_{Posted: 02/03/2018 @ 11:37}

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Excerpts From Late-Night Conversations With A Mechanical Cat

Fact Number 29