no good deed goes unpunished

There is a strange cat hanging around outside the house, and it drives Pepper crazy. His tail puffs up, he carooms from window to window, doing that fast snuffle-snorting thing...

...and if the strangercatsmellsbadintruder vibe gets too much for him [especially if intrudercat is sitting right outside the window taunting him], Pepper can go into berserker mode. He forgets himself, his surroundings, and just attacks the first moving thing he sees. Once it was a pillow that I put in front of him to block his view of the intrudercat, once it was my leg [thankfully fully clothed in sturdy denim jeans], and this afternoon, it was poor, hapless, just-walking-by Bean.

So I intervened, and paid the penalty:

Owee.

Bean is fine, if freaked. Pepper is calming down. My arm is throbbing, but ice for the swelling, aspirin for the pain, some antibiotic cream, and a tight bandage will take care of it.

It's always interesting when we get these little reminders of the underlying nature of our mostly-domesticated roommates. Even humans have their berserker sides...though our claws are shorter.