# Cats



## yaxomoxay

Let's start a cats thread.

My youngest cat pissed in my shoes last night. Not around it. Not over it. In them. When I went to pick 'em up to get ready for work, it was a pool of cat urine. That's how my morning started.


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## Alli

yaxomoxay said:


> Let's start a cats thread.
> 
> My youngest cat pissed in my shoes last night. Not around it. Not over it. In them. When I went to pick 'em up to get ready for work, it was a pool of cat urine. That's how my morning started.




Oh dear. What did you do to, erm, piss him off? My black cat went through a phase where he peed on the stove any time I left something on it. He was fine if it was clean, but if I dared leaving so much as a frying pan...bam! He’s, thankfully, decided it’s no longer an affront to felinehood if I leave something there.

The kitten is just insane. I had groceries delivered yesterday, and they came in brown paper bags for a (welcomed) change. Butterball Dingleberry really liked them, and this is where I found him when I headed to bed last night.


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## Alli

Not sure why he’s sideways, but this is Jet. Jet the Timid. You will never see him unless you stay the night and he can’t avoid you.


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## Alli

And this is the old man, Shadow. He fell out of the ceiling in the library at school, scaring the shit out of the library aid and about a dozen high school students. I brought his lil feral ass home, and he’s been the best cat ever.


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## Chew Toy McCoy

My friend’s cat. Zero fucks given.


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## Renzatic

They're not cats, but here's a picture of some Cobra Ducks I came across while riding my bike a little while ago.


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## lizkat

yaxomoxay said:


> Let's start a cats thread.
> 
> My youngest cat pissed in my shoes last night. Not around it. Not over it. In them. When I went to pick 'em up to get ready for work, it was a pool of cat urine. That's how my morning started.




Is it part Siamese?  When I was an au pair in SF for a year after I finished college and was at conservatory, the man of the house kept his bedroom and dressing room doors sealed against one of the three Siamese whom he otherwise adored.  The one had this thing about peeing in his shoes.  He didn't trust the rest of them on that score then either.

My cats never messed with anyone's shoes as far as I know, but my elkhound managed to destroy half of several different (of course!)  pairs of expensive Brazilian leather shoes, and the same dog spent an evening first licking and eventually chewing on the sheepskin in a friend's jacket that had been dropped on a piano bench.  As such things always go, that dog, although purebred,  had been free to me...  but ended up costing me a bundle now and then, gee.


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## Alli

Renzatic said:


> They're not cats, but here's a picture of some Cobra Ducks I came across while riding my bike a little while ago.




Ducks are agressive! Cats are merely aloof.


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## Renzatic

Alli said:


> Ducks are agressive! Cats are merely aloof.




I dunno. I've seen some pretty mean cats in my day.


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## lizkat

Renzatic said:


> I dunno. I've seen some pretty mean cats in my day.




Cat next door at my in-laws was named Killer, and I thought it was bc she was emphatically rude and threatening to other cats that encroached on her turf (like my then little kitty next door).  She also went after rabbits,  leaving the paws and tails on my in-laws' back patio as proof of more than just concept.    But it was actually because she used to get up on the shoulders of any stray dog and ride its terrified ass back down the driveway it had been incautious enough to explore.   She was some piece of work.


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## Alli

Renzatic said:


> I dunno. I've seen some pretty mean cats in my day.




Me too, but ducks are bad.


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## Alli

lizkat said:


> She also went after rabbits, leaving the paws and tails on my in-laws' back patio as proof of more than just concept.




Those are the best gifts you can get from a loving cat!


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## Yoused

Alli said:


> Ducks are agressive!



It is one of those joke names: those are Canadas. Never mess with those things, all geese are obnoxious. Make for good guard dogs, though, if you can put up with them.


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## Alli

You said:


> It is one of those joke names: those are Canadas. Never mess with those things, all geese are obnoxious. Make for good guard dogs, though, if you can put up with them.




Canadian geese?


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## Eric

You said:


> It is one of those joke names: those are Canadas. Never mess with those things, all geese are obnoxious. Make for good guard dogs, though, if you can put up with them.



True story.


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## Renzatic




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## Edd

Alli said:


> Me too, but ducks are bad.




I live in a small town with a river running through it. It’s a total bird show out there and I’ve observed much duck behavior. Compared to other birds, that quack they utter really sells a sense of personality. It’s good marketing. 

Also, a parent duck with a row of tiny ducks following behind is just too endearing. If ducks didn’t exist, you’d have to write them.


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## Yoused




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## Alli

Edd70 said:


> Compared to other birds, that quack they utter really sells a sense of personality. It’s good marketing.




Maybe they can loan their PR guys to doves. Those are the dumbest creatures ever. I watch them walk between the peanuts so they can peck a random seed and then jump when another bird flaps its wings. I’m never sure if they’re really dumb or just stoned.


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## Yoused

Bird, you say? _*this*_ is a bird


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## Thomas Veil

I think cats are cute. I don’t want one as a pet, I’ve got nothing against them...I’d just rather have a dog who jumps up and down when I come home than a cat whose default attitude is Fuck Off. 

In fact if somehow I ever came into possession of a cat, that’s pretty much what I’d name it: Fuck You.


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## Alli

Thomas Veil said:


> I think cats are cute. I don’t want one as a pet, I’ve got nothing against them...I’d just rather have a dog who jumps up and down when I come home than a cat whose default attitude is Fuck Off.
> 
> In fact if somehow I ever came into possession of a cat, that’s pretty much what I’d name it: Fuck You.




Our cats pout if we leave the house, and are generally watching out the window for our return. They all race to the door when they hear us coming.

They definitely like their alone time, but they don’t like it as much as other cats. I usually have 2 of the 3 in my bed at night, and always for naps. 

Yesterday I went for a tub, and as I was sitting in the semi-dark up to my neck in the perfect temperature water, one of them decided it was the right time to have that conversation. This is the cat that almost never talks. But boy howdy, was he in the mood to chat while I was in the tub. I think he mostly wanted to make sure I was alright since he knew I was in there, but couldn’t see me. I had to get up and look over the side to assure him I was alright and that could leave. That was, of course, when one of the other cats came in to check on me.


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## lizkat

Alli said:


> Our cats pout if we leave the house, and are generally watching out the window for our return. They all race to the door when they hear us coming.
> 
> They definitely like their alone time, but they don’t like it as much as other cats. I usually have 2 of the 3 in my bed at night, and always for naps.
> 
> Yesterday I went for a tub, and as I was sitting in the semi-dark up to my neck in the perfect temperature water, one of them decided it was the right time to have that conversation. This is the cat that almost never talks. But boy howdy, was he in the mood to chat while I was in the tub. I think he mostly wanted to make sure I was alright since he knew I was in there, but couldn’t see me. I had to get up and look over the side to assure him I was alright and that could leave. That was, of course, when one of the other cats came in to check on me.




It's called getting quality time.  It's always on their terms somehow.




​


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## Alli

lizkat said:


> It's called getting quality time.  It's always on their terms somehow.
> 
> View attachment 241​​




Cats believe that bathroom time is communal time.


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## lizkat

Thomas Veil said:


> I think cats are cute. I don’t want one as a pet, I’ve got nothing against them...I’d just rather have a dog who jumps up and down when I come home than a cat whose default attitude is Fuck Off.
> 
> In fact if somehow I ever came into possession of a cat, that’s pretty much what I’d name it: Fuck You.




Snoopy may also have come to more or less that conclusion.


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## Renzatic

From my experiences with cats, they have three moods they'll show when they first see you: "meh", "sup", and "U GOT FOOD?".


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## Scepticalscribe

Renzatic said:


> From my experiences with cats, they have three moods they'll show when they first see you: "meh", "sup", and "U GOT FOOD?".




You forgot the fourth: "Bow down to me, and worship me, my human slave, which I shall abbreviate to "my human" because it is well known (among educated cats) that humans cannot master - let alone understand or begin to comprehend - instructions of more than two words."


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## lizkat

Renzatic said:


> From my experiences with cats, they have three moods they'll show when they first see you: "meh", "sup", and "U GOT FOOD?".




Yep.  Or once in awhile  they get that "yep, you're the one" idea in their cat brain and it's game over, you are in fact the one.

A black and white kitty that I came home with from the shelter once after I went there looking for another tiger-striped one, she kept putting her paw through the bars of a shoulder-high cage to make contact with me when I walked by looking at all the cute critters.

 First time I said something like "aw aren't u cute but i'm looking for a tiger kitty this time... "

2nd time I said "aww.... aren't you the persistent one!"  but then asked about the two tiger striped siblings in a cage at knee level...   turns out they'd been adopted that morning... 

3rd time the black and white job not only put her paw through the cage again to touch the side of my neck but also performed a silent meow to make sure I got the message.  Yep.  Game over.  She owned me for the next 20 years.


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## Renzatic

Scepticalscribe said:


> You forgot the fourth: "Bow down to me, and worship me, my human slave, which I shall abbreviate to "my human" because it is well known (among educated cats) that humans cannot master - let alone understand or begin to comprehend - instructions of more than two words."




That mood probably exists among the more upstanding, purebred cats, but my doof tabbies aren't able to muster the requisite aloofness to pull that off. 

Though Pete does have one extra mood, which is "I'll just roll over, and stretch my legs out here so you can pet my belly, I swear I won't bite you...HA I LIED!"


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## Renzatic

lizkat said:


> 3rd time the black and white job not only put her paw through the cage again to touch the side of my neck but also performed a silent meow to make sure I got the message.  Yep.  Game over.  She owned me for the next 20 years.




Yeah, that's pretty much guaranteed to make anyone go D'AWWW, OH OKAY.


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## Citizenzen

Long story (ends with piss) ...

We had a neighborhood cat that hung around regularly at our house.  He disappeared for years and we had long assumed he was dead.  He showed up again, emaciated, deaf, with a quarter-sized "brain" growing out of the back of his neck.  We thought he was surely on the brink of death and gave him a spot in our garage.  We scheduled to get him in to see a vet, had the carcinoma removed (no sign of it in the lymph) and just last week had the stitches removed.  After weeks of care, he was whole again and starting to get a little belly back.  He's very needy, loves attention and a lap, and we started introducing him to the house and our other six cats.

Today for the first time he was in my computer studio where I now work remotely doing graphic design for a university.  I saw him walk under my desk, and immediately I hear the sound of water trickling.  I looked down and the bugger was peeing right into my surge protector!  I quickly bumped his boney behind away, and immediately unplugged the device.  A good portion of my afternoon was spent buying a new protector, and cleaning up all of my cords and my carpet.  And old Grandpa was back in the garage.

If anybody wants to buy a used surge protector ...


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## Thomas Veil

lizkat said:


> Snoopy may also have come to more or less that conclusion.



Do you remember the first cat they had in Peanuts?
















​


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## Thomas Veil

Player7592 said:


> If anybody wants to buy a used surge protector ...



...and a cat with _really_ straight fur?


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## lizkat

Thomas Veil said:


> ...and a cat with _really_ straight fur?




A "free" cat at that...  wow.    No one ever taught that cat a scrap of gratitude that it managed to hang onto,  but then that's a sometime thing with most kitties anyway. 

(cartoon from The New Yorker,  2011 Oct 10)


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## Renzatic




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## lizkat

Now if they could make a small cata-llama (?), I could go for that.

Kinda like a goat only fuzzier and less likely to eat the laundry off the line than just curl up and take a nap on it after the stuff has been brought into the house and folded by the homeowner servant...


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## Renzatic

lizkat said:


> Now if they could make a small cata-llama (?), I could go for that.




If I had to take a guess on what that is, I'd say it's an Australian Longneck Boonzercat.


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## lizkat

Renzatic said:


> If I had to take a guess on what that is, I'd say it's an Australian Longneck Boonzercat.




I suppose there are parts of Australia so far into the outback that nobody really knows for sure what might be evolving out there.   But then I used to wonder about that right in this county after I had first bought a place up here and was learning where the (then all unpaved) back roads would take you as a shortcut to this or that town...  or... eerily sometimes...  definitely NOT.

Ran into a T in the road one time and took the left instead of the right that someone had told me would take me to a little place owned by someone whose wife made and sold spring rolls there...    but the left turn was a dead end thing that kept getting narrower and finally had pieces of bedrock sticking up, but strangely enough had ditches on both sides.  Eventually had to back out of it and all the while I kept seeing the tall grasses rippling and hearing a half whining chuffling sound like a bunch of baby boars or some such following along,  I dunno, trying to hitch a ride or else make me pay for rousting them out of a nap?   By time I got back to the T intersection, I just wanted to get the hell outta there. 

Whenever I think of spring rolls now, I think of that weird road and those little piglets or whatever they were.   Meanwhile I got more lost trying to retrace my original approach to that T stop, taking another couple wrong turns, everything was dirt roads then and not marked.  It was a deeply overcast day and I couldn't hang onto where the sun should be...    Long short I ended up somewhere down near a body of water I finally recognized as the backside of a reservoir I more or less knew the location of...  about 40 miles and a dozen bridges south of where I meant to have ended up.  What can I say.  I couldn't have duplicated that trip with a map in front of me.  Finally found a paved road that ran into a state one I knew, and so made my way north again, meanwhile realizing there sure weren't many gas stations in the area and I was lucky I didn't have to ask a farmer or worse someone definitely not a farmer for a loan of fuel to get home on.

Well it was more scenic than being back in NYC and getting lost in a part of the Bronx,  seeing the same Burger King drift in and out of my focus while trying to find the end of a detour to the Cross Bronx Expressway.  I must have passed that fast food joint five times before I finally spotted a patrol car and got a clue out of my loop.  And the thing about the Bronx then,  when you heard a whiny chuffing noise it was not gonna be baby boars, it was some guy wanted to wipe your windshield with a dirty rag at a red light,  and you to roll down your window and give him money. I wouldn't have minded having an Australian Longneck Boonzercat along for the trip that night. 

So endeth the shaggy cat story.


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## Thomas Veil

Renzatic said:


> View attachment 286




 
Hello Muddah. 
Hello Faddah. 
Check this crazy
Kitty-llama.


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## Renzatic

This place needs more cats!


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## Yoused

Thomas Veil said:


> In fact if somehow I ever came into possession of a cat, that’s pretty much what I’d name it: Fuck You.




or,


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## Scepticalscribe

Renzatic said:


> This place needs more cats!
> 
> View attachment 331




Why not share some shots of your herd/pride/gang/tribe of cats?


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## Alli

Renzatic said:


> This place needs more cats!




There is no place existing that does not need more cats!

First up, a bag of Oreo, cause everyone loves that. Following is the extremely photogenic Shadow. He’s the one who receives all the packages. Finally, my heart of hearts, Jet. So named because of the way he jets around as though he carries jet propulsion packs. Oh, and because he’s jet black.


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## Renzatic

Scepticalscribe said:


> Why not share some shots of your herd/pride/gang/tribe of cats?




The nerd herd? I guess I could do that.


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## Alli

Renzatic said:


> The nerd herd? I guess I could do that.




Looks like some lazy cats!


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## Renzatic

Alli said:


> Looks like some lazy cats!




Yeah, they're pretty much yard ornaments these days.


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## lizkat

Alli said:


> Looks like some lazy cats!






Renzatic said:


> Yeah, they're pretty much yard ornaments these days.




Looks like a warm day. Cats can get amaaaaaaazingly long in hot weather.


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## Renzatic

lizkat said:


> Looks like a warm day. Cats can get amaaaaaaazingly long in hot weather.




True, but they're like this in winter too.

They've become really lazy cats over these last couple of years. It used to be that when I let them out of the garage in the morning, they'd scatter off throughout the yard, only popping up when it was time to put them up in the evening. Now? They mostly stick around the breezeway, only occasionally going out to explore.

Cap Cat is the only one that still bugs out more often that not, but even she sticks around the house a lot more than she used to.


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## Alli

My boys wouldn’t know what to do if they went outside. They’re strictly indoor cats.


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## Renzatic

Alli said:


> My boys wouldn’t know what to do if they went outside. They’re strictly indoor cats.




I used to have indoor cats. Got tired of stepping on wet hairballs with my bare feet.


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## Yoused

Alli said:


> lazy cats



Must you be redundant?


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## Alli

Yoused said:


> Must you be redundant?




They don’t see it that way. They see it as doing their job.


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## Scepticalscribe

Next door's cat was surprised at the front door (that is, my front door, not its own front door), when I returned from the farmers' market clutching several bags of organic produce (earlier, I had seen it sunning itself on our garage roof, where the angled roof meets the sun), and favoured me with that indignant and outraged stare bestowed by cats on humans when you dare to disturb the splendour of their self-regarding existence.


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## User.45

Thomas Veil said:


> I think cats are cute. I don’t want one as a pet, I’ve got nothing against them...I’d just rather have a dog who jumps up and down when I come home than a cat whose default attitude is Fuck Off.
> 
> In fact if somehow I ever came into possession of a cat, that’s pretty much what I’d name it: Fuck You.



I have a dog who licks himself all day, ignores you unless he's hungry or thirsty, but the moment you leave home he destroys the furniture. At least we have to walk him in exchange.


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## Scepticalscribe

PearsonX said:


> I have a dog who licks himself all day, ignores you unless he's hungry or thirsty, but the moment you leave home he destroys the furniture. At lease we have to walk him in exchange.




Perhaps a dog nurtured and/or raised with cats?


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## Alli

PearsonX said:


> I have a dog who licks himself all day, ignores you unless he's hungry or thirsty, but the moment you leave home he destroys the furniture. At lease we have to walk him in exchange.





Scepticalscribe said:


> Perhaps a dog nurtured and/or raised with cats?




Exactly what I was going to suggest.


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## User.45

Scepticalscribe said:


> Perhaps a dog nurtured and/or raised with cats?



We adopted him. He absolutely HATES cats. The only thing that ever pissed him off more than cats was a fox...(in the city).


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## Scepticalscribe

PearsonX said:


> We adopted him. He absolutely HATES cats. The only thing that ever pissed him off more than cats was a fox...(in the city).




His sense of himself could have been influenced by cats before you adopted him. 

I remember the very best student I ever taught - we were discussing Nature versus Nurture - giving me an excellent example of the possible influence of Nurture over Nature by explaining how she suspected that her dog may have thought himself a cat, for, he had been raised with a group of domestic cats with a semi-feral streak - they lived in the countryside.

She described (hilariously) how her dog used to sit in the sun with the languidly stretched cats, who were basking, glorying in the heat, and would end up panting, and needing to seek the refuge of shade, how he would attempt to leap - in pale imitation of the balletic, fluid and graceful motion of the cats - onto a window sill, where the cats were already stretched, only to fall off, paws scrabbling madly for a purchase on the window sill.  

This morning, on my return from the farmers' market, it struck me that a dog would firstly, have greeted me, perhaps with pleasure, and secondly, would have sought to investigate the (organic produce) contents of my bags (or, maybe the investigation would have preceded the greeting). 

Next door's cat (despite the fact that the bags also contained fish) treated me with utter disdain, and outraged majesty, that it was compelled to move, so that I could gain access to - and entry to the house - at my own front door.


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## Renzatic

Here's some more cats, doing what they love to do the most: SLEEP!


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## Scepticalscribe

Renzatic said:


> Here's some more cats, doing what they love to do the most: SLEEP!
> 
> View attachment 351View attachment 352




What can I say, but aaaaawwwww........


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## Yoused

Teaching possums how it's done


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## Renzatic

Don't you hate it when you're looking at your cat, and he suddenly perks up, and starts bobbing his head around like he saw something mean and scary? Kinda makes you wonder what's out there in the dark, waiting to eat your face.

Probably coyotes.


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## lizkat

Or maybe just something a kitty is thinking to maybe nail and bring inside... on the hoof.

I sure coulda used one of these Raspberry Pi scanners back in the day when my indoor-outdoor cat decided to bring a live grass snake up onto my bed at 3 in the damn morning.









						Raspberry Pi Scans Cats for Caught Prey
					

Keep out unwanted guests with this Pi project.




					www.tomshardware.com


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## Scepticalscribe

lizkat said:


> Or maybe just something a kitty is thinking to maybe nail and bring inside... on the hoof.
> 
> I sure coulda used one of these Raspberry Pi scanners back in the day when my indoor-outdoor cat decided to bring a live grass snake up onto my bed at 3 in the damn morning.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Raspberry Pi Scans Cats for Caught Prey
> 
> 
> Keep out unwanted guests with this Pi project.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> www.tomshardware.com




And then, doubtless, it sat back on its haunches on the bed, preening with pride at its hunting prowess, expecting a delighted reaction, ecstatic gratitude, and lavish praise from you.


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## Renzatic

lizkat said:


> I sure coulda used one of these Raspberry Pi scanners back in the day when my indoor-outdoor cat decided to bring a live grass snake up onto my bed at 3 in the damn morning.




And that's why I will never invest in a cat door. If they want in, they can wait on me to let them in.


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## lizkat

Scepticalscribe said:


> And then, doubtless, it sat back on its haunches on the bed, preening with pride on its hunting prowess, expecting a delighted reaction, ecstatic gratitude, and lavish praise from you.




Oh yes she was very excited and proud of herself....  made that little chirping noise cats make when they have some prey in their mouth...  that's when i turned on the light to see what exactly made that sound seem so muffled.   Wow.   OK then.   Grass snake well over 15" long, and not very happy. 

Uh...  so I tried to praise the kitty because it was after all quite an accomplishment,  but meanwhile I had her by the back of her neck and the snake by a place an inch or so behind its head and I was saying "ok let me have it... let me have that now...."  and meanwhile thinking all kinds of things in my half-asleep stupor,  like was I really sure it was just a grass snake and where were my glasses?

Anyway she let go (meaning to get a better grip I think, or maybe even to nip me in her annoyance), but I was waiting for that and grabbed the snake out of harm's way.  So we all went downstairs together, a squirming cat propped against my hip and the snake in my other hand thrashing its tail like mad and fascinating the goddamned cat trying to free up a paw and grab at it.  Snake was put back outside and was apparently not really the worse for wear, wasted no time getting the hell away from the back door.  The kitty was left grounded inside with the cat door shut for the night, and I headed back upstairs leaving the stairwell door shut in case that wasn't the FIRST thing she'd thought to bring in that evening. 

She was quite the huntress, and was my last indoor-outdoor cat...  but I think that was the only time she ever grabbed up a snake.  Not for lack of trying.  There was a ground water well next door we used for watering our gardens sometimes, and the pump was set into a big ledger rock with some pebbles underneath, accessible by grass snakes,  so they loved that place in the early spring and fall: the rocks held the warmth of the sun all night.  I used to see the babies once in awhile.  Always laughed then to remember that crazy night when a grown one briefly ended up in the house.


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## lizkat

Cat does a "crossing the road because" maneuver near finish of a 100-meter track race.

https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1307310979034697730/​


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## Alli

lizkat said:


> Cat does a "crossing the road because" maneuver near finish of a 100-meter track race.




If that had been my cat, he would have gotten directly in their path and plopped.

This morning while on FaceTime with my mother, I heard the curtain rod come crashing down. I looked up to see Oreo just sitting in the window like nothing had happened. I got up to put the rod back up, but by then he’d straddled it and was trying to go back to sleep. I managed to get him off of it, and then holding the rod in one hand and the cat in the other, got it back where it was supposed to be. 

In my next life I want to come back back as a house cat.


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## Scepticalscribe

Alli said:


> If that had been my cat, he would have gotten directly in their path and plopped.
> 
> This morning while on FaceTime with my mother, I heard the curtain rod come crashing down. I looked up to see Oreo just sitting in the window like nothing had happened. I got up to put the rod back up, but by then he’d straddled it and was trying to go back to sleep. I managed to get him off of it, and then holding the rod in one hand and the cat in the other, got it back where it was supposed to be.
> 
> In my next life I want to come back back as a house cat.




A house cat where you are suitably worshipped.

Next door's cat keeps trying to colonise my back garden; I see her on the garage roof when it is sunny in the mornings, or in the driveway, where I receive an indignant glare if I venture out, and the cat then turns, flcking its tail at me, and saunters off down the driveway, somewhat aggrieved.  Earlier this week, I spotted it curled up in bushes, beside one of the bins. 

And it adores the bushes and shrubs with ambitions to become trees; lots of places to explore and hide.


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## Renzatic

I can't remember if I posted this on MR or not back in the day, but anyway...

Back when my cat wasn't quite so lazy, he used to regularly scale trees to get at the birds. It was the most amazing thing to watch. Never saw a cat do this before in my entire life.

No one believed me, of course, so I grabbed my phone and went out to grab some proof.

So here it is. My cat Pete scaling a tree.


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## Scepticalscribe

Renzatic said:


> I can't remember if I posted this on MR or not back in the day, but anyway...
> 
> Back when my cat wasn't quite so lazy, he used to regularly scale trees to get at the birds. It was the most amazing thing to watch. Never saw a cat do this before in my entire life.
> 
> No one believed me, of course, so I grabbed my phone and went out to grab some proof.
> 
> So here it is. My cat Pete scaling a tree.




Norwegian Forest Cats (and, I suppose, Maine Coons) are supposed to be able to do that, too.

Next door has always had cats, for the past twenty years, at least, and they have always turned up in our garden, well, the wonderful wild wilderness, a suitably untamed altar to fecundity, and growth, and life, at the rear of the house.

In theory, and, until recent years, - kids grow up and move away, after all - and, in practice, the cats always belonged to the younger daughter - now a dedicated teacher, something she has always wanted to become since she was a child, that, or a vet - of the couple next door, who are lovely people.

Their first cat, who was a large, mostly white, male, named Tricks, used to sun himself in a sun-trap at the side of our garage; he didn't bother us, nor we, him, not least because for the last two years of his life, my father was ill with the cancer that subsequently killed him.

Tricks (who was adored and loved and cared for) and my father died within a matter of weeks of one another; his owner, then a child of around nine or ten, announced - with that earnest mien, that deadly serious air of sweet gravity, that you find in decent kids who take their responsibilities seriously, to her parents, (who told us) that, "This has been the worst year of my life, so far.  Granny has died, Tricks has died, and Charlie (my father) has died."  My mother, quite rightly, was impressed and moved and proud that her husband's death was ranked as a tragedy of equal importance as the death of a beloved cat (and that of her grandmother) by the young daughter of our next-door neighbour.

Tricks was followed - within a month, my mother & I were brought in to meet these two tiny kittens - by two long-haired cats, gorgeous creatures, initially assumed to have been two sisters, and litter mates, who were given the names Abby and Phoebe.

Phoebe turned out to have been a boy, a discovery that only came to light when they were both taken to the vet for That Visit.  But, since he knew his name, or seemed to know it, or respond to it, they decided to leave it, and Phoebe he remained, for the rest of his life.

Phoebe and his sister Abby - as mischievous  kittens, and young cats - spent many happy hours exploring our garden, climbing the walls, walking on the walls, in focussed single file, climbing the sheds and garage, peering in at window-sills (it was not unusual to look up at 1.a.m. to find Phoebe prowling around, or seated on the window sill of my study, looking in at me), sometimes following my mother around when she was pottering around, or working on, her garden.

Whenever we had visitors, if they parked in the driveway, Phoebe in particular thought that the still warm engines were his own personal hot water bottle.  In their own house, sky lights were a delight, especially the skylights on the kitchen extension - you'd see them peering down into the kitchen - and that extension also allowed convenient, and unfortunate, access to the window sill on the upstairs bathroom, and the windows and window sills of the upstairs bedrooms, and they were completely at home, sprawled on sofas, in their own living room.

While they were exceptionally close, for they were both litter mates and siblings, Phoebe was more outgoing, as he was a chatty and inquisitive cat, and he discovered - not that I knew it was there - catnip, or something similar - in our commodious garden, where I saw him proceed to lose himself in a state of oblivious and insane bliss.  My mother - laughing - gave that plant as a gift to his owner.

A car put an end to Phoebe, whose explorations (despite the attentions of the vet, years earlier), had became more extensive as he aged, and Abby, by now ageing, - and always more reserved, - was on her own for a while.  Their owner, meanwhile, was still at school, and later, was away at university, hence her mother looked after them much of the time.

Then, they got George, from the same people who had given them Abby & Phoebe.  George was a young male, completely black, and Abby was most put out when he arrived - she kept smacking him, and scratching his nose, even though he tried hard, ceaselessly, endlessly forgiving and insanely friendly, to make friends with this ferocious matriarch.

I have to say that George was one of the most engaging cats I have ever met.  His personality was wonderfully warm and - yes, - irresistible.  He was very friendly, inquisitive, chatty, companionable and affectionate; by then, my mother's dementia was in its early stages, and somehow, she and George bonded.

He used to visit her faithfully every day, coming into the kitchen to chat with her in the morning; he followed her around the garden, on her prowls, stopping when she stopped, waiting for her to resume her walks and inspecting her work with interest, all the while cheerfully keeping her company; when she went out, he sat on the wall waiting for her, (he used to visit the neighbour who lived three houses away on the other side of his owners, as well, calling in daily, to him, too).   Now, his actual owner was still at school, mid to late teens by then - and his owner's mother was out at work, but still, he sought out my mother, and she loved him.

It even got to the stage that school-kids would call into my mother with George, having spotted him on the wall, or outside the door, assuming that he was hers.

That autumn, I was away in Kyrgyzstan for several months on election based work, and when I returned, I noticed that George wasn't around; a car had done for him, and my mother was really upset; she had liked the other cats (especially Phoebe) but she had loved George, and he, in turn, seemed to have developed an attachment to her - I have never met a cat with such an appealing and engaging and friendly personality.

Abby, meanwhile, who had survived all this, was still an ageing matriarch (though one without kittens), and, while she had missed Phoebe, she was entirely indifferent to (if not, perhaps, privately pleased about - for she had never accepted him despite all of his entreaties) the passing of George.

My mother's dementia became more pronounced, Abby, in turn, went to the great cat-basket in the sky, and the current pair - and this is a telling detail - I don't even know their names, and my mother (who loved George) never bonded with them, while their owner wasn't there much as she was away at university, and was subsequently away, working as a teacher - seek to claim the garage roof, patrol the driveway, and find refuge in all of those wonderfully hidden corners of our large garden.  I greet them, and they flick their tails at me.  But, it is not the same.


----------



## Alli

Renzatic said:


> My cat Pete scaling a tree.




I’ve discovered that forward momentum is a wonderful thing. Cats are able to get places that seem unlikely, but there is no such thing as backward momentum, and they’re frequently stuck wherever that forward momentum took them.


----------



## Renzatic

The cat stares back...


----------



## Yoused

Renzatic said:


> Back when my cat wasn't quite so lazy, he used to regularly scale trees



My Nefurtari was not exactly a tree climber, but she liked to come in my bedroom window. There is nothing near my window, just a flat wall that cannot be climbed (metal). It is about 7' from the ground to the sill. It startled me the first time she made an appearance there, but I got used to it and left the outer slider open so she could have a place to wait for me to open the inner slider. Cat doors, who needs them if you can have a cat window?

This was a smallish girl cat (probably about 10" fore-chest to butt), and I never really saw her doing other impressive jumps, but she could do that one. You can tell a strong jumping cat by the loose-hanging folds of flesh between their knees and chest. That was her.


----------



## lizkat

Biden campaign weighs in w/ an ad for cat lovers...

https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1317465638953168899/


----------



## lizkat

Surely the world's largest picture of a cat has now been discovered in Peru among the ancient drawings at the Nazcas Lines site.









						A giant cat picture was just discovered among the Nazca Lines
					

Archaeologists haven’t yet located an accompanying giant meme caption.




					arstechnica.com
				





tbh when I look at it for awhile, it kinda reminds me of the unusual cover for the Roger Joseph Manning Jr. album _*Catnip Dynamite*_.


----------



## Scepticalscribe

Two nights ago, - not far off 1 a.m. - I heard a noise - something had crashed into, or moved, or attempted to explore - one of the bins, that is tucked into a corner beside the outside wall directly outside my study, adjacent to, but not quite beneath, yet near the window.

About to investigate the noise, I looked up; there was next door's cat, sitting on the window sill, looking in at me.   The cat had clearly used the bin as a sort of spring-board to gain access to the intriguing and inviting ledge of the window sill.

Now, that was a first, although (as mentioned in an earlier post), two of that cat's predecessors, Phoebe and Abby used to do that regularly, as young cats.


----------



## Scepticalscribe

Next door has two cats; I learned today that my nocturnal visitor was one cat, whereas the animal that suns itself on the angled garage roof is the other.  

So, it would appear that I receive visits from both of them, not simply one.....


----------



## Huntn

I’ve related this at the other place...
In the 90s we had a long haired cat that did not appreciate being left alone and started not using the litter box when we were gone, and then even after got back. We worked with this cat trying to get him back to using the litter box but it did not work out. We took her down to the vet to put her down but the vet volunteered to take her as a clinic cat.

Then sometime later, we adopted 2 barn kittens who were sick and blew snot all over the walls of the laundry room while we got them litter trained and over their sinus issues. Then 6 months later my wife saw a Persian mix kitten at a pet store so we now had 3 cats, Jethrow, Jane Doe, PeeWee.

Having 3 cats was not  much more work than 1 cat and most importantly they kept each other company when we traveled and they were left at home. The caveat here of owning cats is that  you have to keep their litter boxes reasonably clean or there will be hell to pay, i.e. your house becomes a large toilet. We know people who house smell of cat urine and it‘s hard to deal with on a rare visit.

They were also  left in the basement which had concrete floors and a sliding glass door (for light)  so I did not worry so much if they got mad at us and stopped using the litter boxes. They never did cause they kept each other company when we were gone. After 17 years they all passed away through euthanasia which was very sad for us.

Of note, I am convinced these cats had good longevity because these were exclusively indoor cats. At most they would be put out on our elevated back deck so they could enjoy the breeze and sun, but Jethro would sit at the door and mew to come back in.

Since then, we have not had a desire to take on more pets. No desire for the responsibility, although I admit there could be a teacup Yorkie in our future at some distant point when we are too feeble to travel.


----------



## Alli

Huntn said:


> Of note, I am convinced these cats had good longevity because these were exclusively indoor cats. At most they would be put out on our elevated back deck so they could enjoy the breeze and sun, but Jethro would sit at the door and mew to come back in.
> 
> Since then, we have not had a desire to take on more pets. No desire for the responsibility, although I admit there could be a teacup Yorkie in our future at some distant point when we are too feeble to travel.



Our 3 cats are all indoor cats. I don’t understand people who have outdoor cats. I’m afraid for the cats, and the birds in the area. We also recently decided that we would make terrible dog parents. But I think once these cats are gone, that’s going to be it.


----------



## lizkat

Alli said:


> Our 3 cats are all indoor cats. I don’t understand people who have outdoor cats. I’m afraid for the cats, and the birds in the area. We also recently decided that we would make terrible dog parents. But I think once these cats are gone, that’s going to be it.




Yah, my one and only indoor-outdoor cat connected w/ a motorcycle at age of nine months and turned from a freebie barn kitty into a fully mobile vet bill of approximately what I would have shelled out for the average winter rat car. 

She did regain that full mobility though --indeed she was the one who brought me a live grass snake at 3am once--  but after she passed away at ripe old age of 16, my next kitties were indoor ones except for Porch Kitty.  The latter character had other hangouts too,  but she liked the way I served up breakfast on the deck so that was our arrangement until her untimely death at the hands of some idiot who had shot her up with a pellet gun --talk about vet expenses, which I went for, since she had managed to get back onto my deck, but we could not save her--   and I never knew who in the area may have served up other meals.  She was a great demo of how a wily domestic cat can manage to run several households in a sprawling neighborhood.  She was plump enough I figured she didn't even have to bother with harassing songbirds.

My two indoor kitties passed away from great old age (20 and 22) within months of each other a couple years ago, and I've figured that's about it for me, they are a lot of work and potential expense,  so unless another porch cat barges onto my deck in a blizzard sometime,  I'm content to live with fond memories of a dozen or so cats who were great companions over the years...  and major pains in the behind once in awhile.


----------



## Arkitect

Alli said:


> Our 3 cats are all indoor cats. I don’t understand people who have outdoor cats. I’m afraid for the cats, and the birds in the area. We also recently decided that we would make terrible dog parents. *But I think once these cats are gone, that’s going to be it.*



I have the same dilemma. Our remaining moggie is just shy of 20 years age… still doddering along. Absolutely no trouble, incredibly talkative and just the best companion. 
But when she dies we've also decided that'll be it no more adoptions… and yet… and yet… who knows? I am such a sucker for their wiles. So we shall see. Though I do the sums and look at our age and think… hmmmm, so how many cat lives can I still fit in? Probably only one… at the most.

On the subject of Indoors and Outdoors cats:

Both our cats we got while living in Hong Kong. She from the SPCA and Rufus the only survivor of his litter born in a multi story parking garage… to his dying day he always had a bit of the feral in him. 

Anyway! While we were in Hong Kong they were both indoors cats — never set a foot outside. 26th storeys up they just had windows to look out of.
Then we moved to Cape Town for a couple years — and obviously the two moved with us. 

One hot summer's night I was woken by the cats scrabbling and scratching about next to the bed. I shood them away and went back to sleep.
The next morning I found the remains of a dead scorpion next to the bed. Instinctively they knew what to do… They had never seen one before, but I guess instinct kicked in and it was addios scorpion!

After we moved back to London they spent 6 months in quarantine. Fortunately that ridiculously outdated law has been scrapped. Freed from prison they had a suburban garden to roam about in…  most days they'd have breakfast and then disappear, over the back fence into the adjoining properties. I always wondered what a collar cat cam would have revealed.

But yes, with foxes about at night I was always worried when it started to get dark and they weren't back. Though usually I just had to ring on their feeding bowls and they'd come scrabbling over the fence and zooming across the lawn.

They also lived on a wine farm in Chile, in suburban Florence and for a few months in the French countryside (Which is where she acquired her love of cheese). Each time they adapted perfectly. 

Now in Bath she is an indoors cat again. Though she still loves to sit in the windows and stare at the goings on outside.


----------



## Alli

Arkitect said:


> I have the same dilemma. Our remaining moggie is just shy of 20 years age… still doddering along. Absolutely no trouble, incredibly talkative and just the best companion.
> But when she dies we've also decided that'll be it no more adoptions… and yet… and yet… who knows? I am such a sucker for their wiles. So we shall see. Though I do the sums and look at our age and think… hmmmm, so how many cat lives can I still fit in? Probably only one… at the most.
> 
> On the subject of Indoors and Outdoors cats:
> 
> Both our cats we got while living in Hong Kong. She from the SPCA and Rufus the only survivor of his litter born in a multi story parking garage… to his dying day he always had a bit of the feral in him.
> 
> Anyway! While we were in Hong Kong they were both indoors cats — never set a foot outside. 26th storeys up they just had windows to look out of.
> Then we moved to Cape Town for a couple years — and obviously the two moved with us.
> 
> One hot summer's night I was woken by the cats scrabbling and scratching about next to the bed. I shood them away and went back to sleep.
> The next morning I found the remains of a dead scorpion next to the bed. Instinctively they knew what to do… They had never seen one before, but I guess instinct kicked in and it was addios scorpion!
> 
> After we moved back to London they spent 6 months in quarantine. Fortunately that ridiculously outdated law has been scrapped. Freed from prison they had a suburban garden to roam about in…  most days they'd have breakfast and then disappear, over the back fence into the adjoining properties. I always wondered what a collar cat cam would have revealed.
> 
> But yes, with foxes about at night I was always worried when it started to get dark and they weren't back. Though usually I just had to ring on their feeding bowls and they'd come scrabbling over the fence and zooming across the lawn.
> 
> They also lived on a wine farm in Chile, in suburban Florence and for a few months in the French countryside (Which is where she acquired her love of cheese). Each time they adapted perfectly.
> 
> Now in Bath she is an indoors cat again. Though she still loves to sit in the windows and stare at the goings on outside.



Sounds like you and your cats have lived in some wonderful places. I miss that kind of moving around.


----------



## Scepticalscribe

Arkitect said:


> I have the same dilemma. Our remaining moggie is just shy of 20 years age… still doddering along. Absolutely no trouble, incredibly talkative and just the best companion.
> But when she dies we've also decided that'll be it no more adoptions… and yet… and yet… who knows? I am such a sucker for their wiles. So we shall see. Though I do the sums and look at our age and think… hmmmm, so how many cat lives can I still fit in? Probably only one… at the most.
> 
> On the subject of Indoors and Outdoors cats:
> 
> Both our cats we got while living in Hong Kong. She from the SPCA and Rufus the only survivor of his litter born in a multi story parking garage… to his dying day he always had a bit of the feral in him.
> 
> Anyway! While we were in Hong Kong they were both indoors cats — never set a foot outside. 26th storeys up they just had windows to look out of.
> Then we moved to Cape Town for a couple years — and obviously the two moved with us.
> 
> One hot summer's night I was woken by the cats scrabbling and scratching about next to the bed. I shood them away and went back to sleep.
> The next morning I found the remains of a dead scorpion next to the bed. Instinctively they knew what to do… They had never seen one before, but I guess instinct kicked in and it was addios scorpion!
> 
> After we moved back to London they spent 6 months in quarantine. Fortunately that ridiculously outdated law has been scrapped. Freed from prison they had a suburban garden to roam about in…  most days they'd have breakfast and then disappear, over the back fence into the adjoining properties. I always wondered what a collar cat cam would have revealed.
> 
> But yes, with foxes about at night I was always worried when it started to get dark and they weren't back. Though usually I just had to ring on their feeding bowls and they'd come scrabbling over the fence and zooming across the lawn.
> 
> They also lived on a wine farm in Chile, in suburban Florence and for a few months in the French countryside (Which is where she acquired her love of cheese). Each time they adapted perfectly.
> 
> Now in Bath she is an indoors cat again. Though she still loves to sit in the windows and stare at the goings on outside.




While I don't doubt that your cats adapted perfectly to each new location, these splendid spots (suburban Florence, a wine farm, or vineyard, in Chile, the French countryside...) are the sort of places that make adapting to someplace new a lot more congenial and far easier to cope with.


----------



## Arkitect

Scepticalscribe said:


> While I don't doubt that your cats adapted perfectly to each new location, these splendid spots (suburban Florence, a wine farm, for vineyard in Chile, the French countryside...) are the sort of places that make adapting to someplace new a lot more congenial and far easier to cope with.



This is true. 

I sometimes think they don't know how good they had/have it!


----------



## Scepticalscribe

Arkitect said:


> This is true.
> 
> I sometimes think they don't know how good they had/have it!




Agreed: Actually, I think that anyone who subscribes to the theory of reincarnation (on the Hindu model) could do a lot worse than come back to this planet of ours in order to live a (very fulfilled, most congenial and exceedingly pleasant) life as one of your cats.


----------



## Alli

Finally! After almost a full year of adopting Oreo, I finally caught him and Jet cuddling together in my bed. They are both, of course, humiliated.


----------



## lizkat

Alli said:


> Finally! After almost a full year of adopting Oreo, I finally caught him and Jet cuddling together in my bed. They are both, of course, humiliated.
> 
> View attachment 1072





Only way that ever happened with Grace and Tevvi is one of them fell asleep first and the other was verrrrrrry verrrrrrrrry careful cuddling up.


----------



## Arkitect

While searching for a photo I happened on this one of our cat being helpful on my desk.

This dates from 2008 — she was such a sprightly young thing back then. Nothing like the old lady she's become with age.

Apologies for the messy desk… I have managed to get a bit better lately.


----------



## Alli

Arkitect said:


> While searching for a photo I happened on this one of our cat being helpful on my desk.



It’s amazing how cats can get comfortable in the most uncomfortable-looking positions. Remind me again why we believe they have bones?


----------



## lizkat

Alli said:


> It’s amazing how cats can get comfortable in the most uncomfortable-looking positions. Remind me again why we believe they have bones?




Yeah and managing even to get into what they regard as suitable place to fit in a catnap while homeowner's on a java break.  A pal sent me this shot one day with a note claiming she was "only gone for two minutes."


----------



## dogslobber

Don't feed your cat human food. Especially cheezits.


----------



## lizkat

dogslobber said:


> Don't feed your cat human food. Especially cheezits.




... and nor onions, garlic, chives...   anything in the allium family harms a cat.  The thiosulphate compounds naturally occurring in those plants kill the red blood cells of felines.   This goes for stuff made w/ onion powder as well, which is sometimes in broths or baby food that people may give to elderly cats when they can't eat crunchy foods.

Tunafish meant for consumption by humans  isn't good for cats either, as more than an occasional spoonful for a treat -- it lacks taurine and some vitamins cats need, plus the mercury in tuna is as bad for them as for us if ingested too often.


----------



## lizkat

Gotta get some non-political follows into the Twitter mix...

https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1330360457669062660/


----------



## Chew Toy McCoy

My friend's cat.  If 2020 was a cat, this would be it, disheveled disapproval.


----------



## lizkat

Chew Toy McCoy said:


> View attachment 1698
> 
> My friend's cat.  If 2020 was a cat, this would be it, disheveled disapproval.




Looks like managed to vote in person in one of those states where that can be tough for cats.


----------



## Renzatic

Chew Toy McCoy said:


> My friend's cat.  If 2020 was a cat, this would be it, disheveled disapproval.




Hello, my name's Wilford Catley, and I have diabeetus.


----------



## Yoused

Watch Erwin Schrodinger's head


Spoiler: ASPLODE


----------



## lizkat

Yoused said:


> Watch Erwin Schrodinger's head
> 
> 
> Spoiler: ASPLODE
> 
> 
> 
> View attachment 1725




I can't stop laughing.  Not sure if it's the "cat, um catsum mechanics" or just losing it over the darkness and the 2020 elections.



Spoiler: But for sure



going to need more boxes.


----------



## thekev

Renzatic said:


> Hello, my name's Wilford Catley, and I have diabeetus.




You never saw the original diabeetus cat?


----------



## Renzatic

No, but I did see this!






...which doesn't have anything to do with cats, but I'm still posting it here, cuz I'm a rebel.


----------



## Renzatic

Now I'll post a cat picture.

Fun fact: she ended up falling into that bush about 3 seconds after taking this. Don't know what she was after, but she was pretty hardcore about getting it.


----------



## Chew Toy McCoy

Renzatic said:


> Now I'll post a cat picture.
> 
> Fun fact: she ended up falling into that bush about 3 seconds after taking this. Don't know what she was after, but she was pretty hardcore about getting it.
> 
> View attachment 1776




She spotted missing ballots.


----------



## lizkat

Renzatic said:


> Now I'll post a cat picture.
> 
> Fun fact: she ended up falling into that bush about 3 seconds after taking this. Don't know what she was after, but she was pretty hardcore about getting it.
> 
> View attachment 1776




Maybe a cricket.  They like to hang out in shrubs like that close to a house for some reason.


And the kitties like to climb trees, of course.  Gotta love this one, wasted no time getting into the holiday spirit.

https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1336728596774313992/


----------



## Yoused

Don't need no stinkin' angel, we gots a cat.


----------



## Alli

My husband has always put up a Charlie Brown Christmas tree in his den. This year I suggested he go ahead and get a full-sized tree. He just looked at me. Last night he came to me with the string of lights that no longer works because a cat chewed through it. Ok, so maybe homes with cats should not have Christmas trees. Or anything nice.


----------



## Chew Toy McCoy

Alli said:


> My husband has always put up a Charlie Brown Christmas tree in his den. This year I suggested he go ahead and get a full-sized tree. He just looked at me. Last night he came to me with the string of lights that no longer works because a cat chewed through it. Ok, so maybe homes with cats should not have Christmas trees. Or anything nice.




You can get a Festivus pole.


----------



## lizkat

Yoused said:


> Don't need no stinkin' angel, we gots a cat.




Surely this cat buys into that.

https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1336889673403293697/


----------



## Renzatic

I had my sound up, and holy crap at the bass on that video.


----------



## Renzatic

Also, here's a video of some real fat cats.

Chonkies!! - GIF - Imgur


----------



## thekev

lizkat said:


> Surely this cat buys into that.
> 
> https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1336889673403293697/




Video is more cat walk than cat diva.


----------



## lizkat

thekev said:


> Video is more cat walk than cat diva.




Definitely has that walk down.


----------



## thekev

lizkat said:


> Definitely has that walk down.




It's a very confident kitty. If I ever get a cat, and it happens to be female, I'm naming it Clawdia.


----------



## Yoused




----------



## lizkat

Yoused said:


> View attachment 1813​




I have so been there...  came home from a weekend away once and walked into the bedroom in my city place and thought for a minute I had been robbed or something.    A sewing machine ( the kind housed in a cabinet, so it swings up for use after a hinged table extension is lifted up off it and swung out onto supports to hold fabrics and tools) was lying on the floor, cabinet tipped sideways.  Nothing else seemed "off" or missing...   

So it was a mystery....  until I picked up the kitty that usually hung out on my bed when I was home and watching TV,  but  that night and ever after,  each time as I approached that bedroom with him in my arms,, he would start to squirm...  and before I could actually enter that room from the hallway he'd be frantic and would even scratch me, desperately trying to get down and run the other way. 

Finally realized the two of them had been roughhousing and the cabinet with an unstable center of gravity had somehow tipped over, scaring the living daylights out of the one who almost got smashed because he'd apparently left the scene first.   The other cat apparently rode the table down and walked away figuring o_k that's broken, what else is there._ 

The scaredy-cat never did hang out with me on "TV movie nights"  after that  without spending a few minutes  standing on the threshhold eyeballing that sewing machine cabinet.  Whenever I went to set that thing up for sewing and he was in the room, he took off like the hounds of hell were after him.  The other cat would do a very cat-like thing if he was also in the room then:  sit up straight for a minute and then turn his head and groom his fur over one shoulder, like he was embarrassed to have been caught out at something but was pretending nothing had happened and he was so cool.

*"Guilty!!"  -- the both of them.*


----------



## lizkat

This is so cat.


----------



## Yoused

a case of not looking in the right place


----------



## lizkat

Christmas is never over on social media until you get tired of it really.

https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1342914217184264193/


----------



## Yoused

Ever had one-a them kinda days?


----------



## lizkat

Yoused said:


> Ever had one-a them kinda days?
> 
> View attachment 2196​




The mark of the head of household!

Once as my then BF and I had just settled in for a supper off the coffee table, he stood up again and stepped out to the kitchen to get a forgotten basket of bread.  Like a lightning bolt, the orange tabby then reached up from under the coffee table with the longest arm I'd ever seen any cat deploy, swiped the BF's quarter-chicken right off the unattended plate across from me.


----------



## The-Real-Deal82

My wife dropped the bombshell we are getting a cat soon and the children are now hugely excited. Didn’t mention it to me prior but knows I’m not really keen on cats lol. I like watching other people videos of them but I’m more of a dog person. I guess i’ll have to get used to the idea but won’t be feeding it out of protest


----------



## Alli

The-Real-Deal82 said:


> My wife dropped the bombshell we are getting a cat soon and the children are now hugely excited. Didn’t mention it to me prior but knows I’m not really keen on cats lol. I like watching other people videos of them but I’m more of a dog person. I guess i’ll have to get used to the idea but won’t be feeding it out of protest



Just remember, people don’t choose cats, cats choose people. So there’s a good chance it could choose you. You won’t have to feed it. 

We have 3. The oldest is my husband’s cat (according to my husband). He dotes on the cat. The cat can do no wrong, even when he breaks expensive collectibles or knocks things off the work table. He loves that cat. And yet, every day, that same cat will get in the chair with me and sit as long as I’ll let him. Husband complains that he won’t sit that way with him. Cats do their own thing.


----------



## The-Real-Deal82

Alli said:


> Just remember, people don’t choose cats, cats choose people. So there’s a good chance it could choose you. You won’t have to feed it.
> 
> We have 3. The oldest is my husband’s cat (according to my husband). He dotes on the cat. The cat can do no wrong, even when he breaks expensive collectibles or knocks things off the work table. He loves that cat. And yet, every day, that same cat will get in the chair with me and sit as long as I’ll let him. Husband complains that he won’t sit that way with him. Cats do their own thing.



Your first comment is one of the reasons I’m not keen on them. This process where the cat thinks you’re lucky to be living with them where it’s actually the other way around lol. I love that dogs just love you and love your attention. If I had my way though I wouldn’t own either as we go away a lot normally and it’s a bit unfair leaving a cat for a couple of weeks I think. We’ll see, still hoping we won’t go through with it lol. 

I don’t hate other peoples cats though


----------



## leekohler2

The-Real-Deal82 said:


> Your first comment is one of the reasons I’m not keen on them. This process where the cat thinks you’re lucky to be living with them where it’s actually the other way around lol. I love that dogs just love you and love your attention. If I had my way though I wouldn’t own either as we go away a lot normally and it’s a bit unfair leaving a cat for a couple of weeks I think. We’ll see, still hoping we won’t go through with it lol.
> 
> I don’t hate other peoples cats though



If you are away a lot, do yourself a favor and get a female. They typically need less attention than males and can tolerate you being gone. Males are more prone act out if they don't get enough attention. Trust me on this, I have had both. On the flip side, male cats tend to be more affectionate. 

Also, regardless of which you get, do not close doors in your house. Let your cat sleep with you as well if they want. Do these two things and your life with a cat will be much easier and actually very pleasant.


----------



## The-Real-Deal82

leekohler2 said:


> If you are away a lot, do yourself a favor and get a female. They typically need less attention than males and can tolerate you being gone. Males are more prone act out if they don't get enough attention. Trust me on this, I have had both. On the flip side, male cats tend to be more affectionate.
> 
> Also, regardless of which you get, do not close doors in your house. Let your cat sleep with you as well if they want. Do these two things and your life with a cat will be much easier and actually very pleasant.




That’s interesting, thanks for the advice


----------



## leekohler2

The-Real-Deal82 said:


> That’s interesting, thanks for the advice



No problem. Just giving he best advice I can to a potential new cat owner. A lot of people make these mistakes and can't figure out why their cat is pissed at them and acting out.


----------



## iMi

The-Real-Deal82 said:


> That’s interesting, thanks for the advice




All good advice here. I would add that if you have young kids, consider getting a kitten. First, kittens are a lot less inclined to "choose" you. They will be much more likely to assimilate into a new family without major issues. Two, they will be much more tolerant of the kids wanting to play with them all the time. They still need lots of sleep, so boundaries are important. They are easy to train. Yes, train. We haven't been training our kitten, but our older cat knows how to sit, come when called, and play fetch. Kittens come without bad habits/behavior issues you'll have to work to correct, so you can teach them where to scratch safely, etc. 

They come with factory-original nine lives. Super important, especially with young kids around. 

The downside is that you'll get a child-like mind, except this one will become possessed by the devil himself about every six hours, until she matures. They don't have bad habits you need to work to correct but they also haven't learned positive behaviors either. They will do cat things. She will get into trouble and climb into places you didn't think were even possible. She'll chew on things just like a puppy. She'll go from dead asleep to running in random directions knocking things over. She will discover and tirelessly test the concept of gravity. Whatever is most precious to you will become the most desirable test subject. She will assume your feet under the covers are a pray she must hunt. At night. When you sleep. Preferably south of the two o'clock in the morning timeframe. You will have to pay more attention and you will have to take the time to teach her proper manners, assuming she lets you. 

The best thing you can do, with either a kitten or an older cat, is to find a "bush dweller." Trust me. They will be far less likely to climb that Christmas tree and will mostly prefer to scratch horizontal surfaces, like carpet, instead of vertical ones like your favorite chair... or your leg. Google it. You'll thank me. Whatever you do, remember... in time, she will be a full fledged member of your household with all the privileges a feline is entitled to... you'll just pay the mortgage and offer premium food. It's totally worth it.


----------



## lizkat

^^^  Not laughing at you, just laughing to remember how I too figured some of that out.  The hard way, of course, but it was fun!


----------



## Yoused

My best story is when two young'uns adopted us. My roommate, leaving for work, told me "I don't want them in my room while I’m gone." So I went in there on my hands and knees to talk to them about this issue.  They looked at me, figured out what the deal was, and jumped on my back. So I ambled out of the room with two adolescent cats sitting on my back, closing the door on my way out.


----------



## lizkat

My best story is one about a friend who was in law school at Columbia and lived not too far from me.  He was away up home in New England for Christmas though and during that time his roommate in NYC phoned me to say he had let a cat into their ground floor flat because it had been in their courtyard crying in the snow. 

So I said aw that is sweet of you and I'm sure Peter won't mind.   The guy said well ok see the problem is the cat just had babies on the shirts in Peter's bedroom, and I'm not sure what to do now.   Heh.  Yeah.

I eventually ended up with one of the kittens, natch.  He looked sorta like he was wearing a tux  (or possibly the remains of a dress shirt?)  so we named him Thorndyke.





​


----------



## DT

Why are photos of this [type of] cat showing up in my Messages ...






I mean, I know why, but I won't be swayed!!


----------



## Scepticalscribe

DT said:


> Why are photos of this [type of] cat showing up in my Messages ...
> 
> View attachment 2326
> 
> 
> I mean, I know why, but I won't be swayed!!




Famous last words, as my mother would have said.


----------



## thekev

DT said:


> Why are photos of this [type of] cat showing up in my Messages ...
> 
> View attachment 2326
> 
> 
> I mean, I know why, but I won't be swayed!!




Who wouldn't want a miniature leopard?


----------



## Yoused

DT said:


> Why are photos of this [type of] cat showing up in my Messages ...
> 
> View attachment 2326
> 
> 
> I mean, I know why, but I won't be swayed!!




How, exactly, have you been voting, again?


----------



## Clix Pix

leekohler2 said:


> If you are away a lot, do yourself a favor and get a female. They typically need less attention than males and can tolerate you being gone. Males are more prone act out if they don't get enough attention. Trust me on this, I have had both. On the flip side, male cats tend to be more affectionate.
> 
> Also, regardless of which you get, do not close doors in your house. _*Let your cat sleep with you as well if they want.*_ Do these two things and your life with a cat will be much easier and actually very pleasant.




Many, many years ago friends of ours were going through a medical crisis where the husband was diagnosed with a serious, inevitably terminal illness.  They realized that they were going to need to part ways with their beloved Siamese cat, who was about 12 years old at that time.   I had quick conversation with my husband and we agreed that we would take Chula to live with us, and one day shortly thereafter my husband and  I came from the friends'  house with Chula in a carrier, a box or two of his various toys and accessories, and introduced him to his new home.   My husband, who hadn't spent as much time with the cat as I had, was not as enthused about this whole idea, but of course didn't want our friends or Chula to have to deal with ahem, other options.  He stroked Chula and admired him,  and we both spent a lot of time that first day watching the cat exploring this new household but my husband clearly wasn't 100% into this sudden adoption of a new family member.

That evening when it was bedtime, as we were going upstairs to our bedroom my husband informed me, "we're going to have to shut the bedroom door so that cat doesn't come in here!"  I murmured, "but he'll be lonely and scared his first night in a strange house."  My husband was adamant.  "That cat is NOT going to be sleeping with us!"  He firmly closed the bedroom door.

The next night when we went upstairs the bedroom door remained open.....   As we were lying in bed in the darkness,  a warm, furry presence quietly arrived in the room and joined us.   Yep, in just one day Chula had already wrapped my husband around his paws and the two of them were inseparable after that.....


----------



## DT

I'll just leave this here ...


----------



## SuperMatt

What did this drone do to them?


----------



## Yoused

DT said:


> I'll just leave this here ...
> 
> 
> View attachment 2395



Well, uh


----------



## User.168

.


----------



## Clix Pix

Jennifur has a lovely coat of fur!   What breed is she?


----------



## User.168

.


----------



## Clix Pix

Really pretty girl!


----------



## Alli

We put up a cat climbing wall today. Two of the boys really like it. The third may need some time before he’s comfortable with it.


----------



## Arkitect

New Year's Day started off well for our cat.

After years of trying she finally popped the lid on the stash of Catnip…

A good start as she heads into her 21st year.


----------



## User.168

.


----------



## Runs For Fun

These are my two kitties. They're brothers and they are inseparable.


----------



## Alli

RunsForFun said:


> These are my two kitties. They're brothers and they are inseparable.
> 
> View attachment 2851



They look like my baby. The one not pictured above with the new wall cause he’s too chicken to climb.


----------



## Yoused

Alli said:


> We put up a cat climbing wall today.



You can always spot an ideal cat house by the hardwood floors and the floor-to-ceiling carpeting.


----------



## Alli

I’ve taken to walking Oreo. He’s perfectly happy in the harness. He just wants to go outside for a little while. Ten minutes is enough for him...less if a neighbor is walking a dog within sight.


----------



## Arkitect

No idea who to attribute this to, but it made me smile.


----------



## Scepticalscribe

Arkitect said:


> View attachment 2936
> 
> No idea who to attribute this to, but it made me smile.




Brilliant, and witty, and very clever.


----------



## shadow puppet

Alli said:


> I’ve taken to walking Oreo. He’s perfectly happy in the harness. He just wants to go outside for a little while. Ten minutes is enough for him...less if a neighbor is walking a dog within sight.
> View attachment 2890



What a perfect name for him!  He is beautiful! 

But where is the DOG thread, hmm?!


----------



## Runs For Fun

Please ignore my dirty pants. The iPhone 12 Pro Max is too good at catching all the little details!


----------



## iMi

Our new kitten has been growing and she is something else. Follows me around the house everywhere I go. If the door to my office is closed, she'll just sit right outside the door and meow. If ignored, she'll go find her favorite toy and drop it right by the door. I don't know if that's supposed to be a gift or an invitation to play (she plays fetch with it). She has so much personality.


----------



## Alli

Oreo is getting good at the harness thing. He demands to be walked every day now, and is every bit as good as a dog when it comes to understanding the order of things. He races over when I pick up the harness, allows me to put it on him, and happily prances out the door on the leash. If only he would go somewhere instead of just meandering around the yard.


----------



## Runs For Fun

iMi said:


> Our new kitten has been growing and she is something else. Follows me around the house everywhere I go. If the door to my office is closed, she'll just sit right outside the door and meow. If ignored, she'll go find her favorite toy and drop it right by the door. I don't know if that's supposed to be a gift or an invitation to play (she plays fetch with it). She has so much personality.



Sounds like my two kitties. They follow me everywhere. They have to see what I’m doing.


----------



## lizkat

RunsForFun said:


> Sounds like my two kitties. They follow me everywhere. They have to see what I’m doing.




Yeah my kitty Grace was a serious sewing studio supervisor.  I had to remove her from the room when I was cutting fabrics, for fear she'd end up meeting the cutter or shears.  Irrepressible "student" of every other damn thing I ever did too, not just in the studio.  I was only half joking when suggesting to a friend that she was paying attention to an origami video intently because her next move was going to be to grab some paper and give it a shot.


----------



## Joe

I don’t have a cat


----------



## lizkat

JagRunner said:


> I don’t have a cat




Hah, then you have "NO IDEA !!"  what you are missing.    There are upsides and then there are the three a.m. drape climbing episodes.   Or in my experience once, being gifted a live grass snake in my bedroom one night by a lilttle huntress who was very proud of herself.   Yeah.  Downside, definitely.


----------



## Runs For Fun

lizkat said:


> Hah, then you have "NO IDEA !!"  what you are missing.    There are upsides and then there are the three a.m. drape climbing episodes.   Or in my experience once, being gifted a live grass snake in my bedroom one night by a lilttle huntress who was very proud of herself.   Yeah.  Downside, definitely.



AKA 3AM zoomies


----------



## Joe

lizkat said:


> Hah, then you have "NO IDEA !!"  what you are missing.    There are upsides and then there are the three a.m. drape climbing episodes.   Or in my experience once, being gifted a live grass snake in my bedroom one night by a lilttle huntress who was very proud of herself.   Yeah.  Downside, definitely.




I’m more of a dog person. I just don’t have the time right now. Maybe a cat is in my future LOL


----------



## Alli

JagRunner said:


> I don’t have a cat






JagRunner said:


> I’m more of a dog person. I just don’t have the time right now. Maybe a cat is in my future LOL




Now is the time then. Cats are super low maintenance. You are there at their convenience.


----------



## Runs For Fun

Alli said:


> Now is the time then. Cats are super low maintenance. You are there at their convenience.



Yep cats are pretty low maintenance. They mostly take care of themselves and definitely don't mind being left alone while you're at work or whatever.


----------



## Yoused

If they get to the point of being territorial, though, uh, ick. You can only fix that with fire.


----------



## Alli

RunsForFun said:


> Yep cats are pretty low maintenance. They mostly take care of themselves and definitely don't mind being left alone while you're at work or whatever.



While you're at work, or on a week-long holiday. Leave them plenty of food, water, and an extra litter box, and you'll hear no complaints upon your return.


----------



## Runs For Fun

Alli said:


> While you're at work, or on a week-long holiday. Leave them plenty of food, water, and an extra litter box, and you'll hear no complaints upon your return.



You'll probably get a lot of meows and cuddles though!


----------



## Alli

RunsForFun said:


> You'll probably get a lot of meows and cuddles though!



Only after they acknowledge that you have returned.


----------



## Renzatic

Alli said:


> Only after they acknowledge that you have returned.




If you haven't fed them in a couple of hours, they'll let you know.

...by god, they will go out of their way to let you know.


----------



## Pumbaa

It‘s snowing outside. Five plus inches of fresh white fluffy cold snow. Pretty as a picture, like a postcard.

Cat sits by the window, looking out.
Cat begs to go outside.
Door opens. Cat goes outside.
Cat does not even touch the snow.
Cat begs to be let in again.
Cat is let in again.
Rinse, repeat.

Think I’ll adapt it into a book for my nephew. ”Based on a real story” and all.


----------



## Clix Pix

I miss my two Siamese boys, Harry and Tali......  Both of them have now long since crossed "the Rainbow Bridge," but, yeah, they were definitely unique personalities living in this household!  From time to time I've briefly entertained the notion of doing the cat thing again, but I always shy away from the idea in the end.  Great fun and fond memories of my boys, and I still think of them often,  but times have changed and at this stage of my life I really don't want to also have to deal with the responsibilities which come along with having pets in a household.


----------



## Yoused

Pumbaa said:


> Cat sits by the window ...



singing to the birds.


----------



## Clix Pix

Yoused said:


> singing to the birds.



Both Harry and Tali used to make this interesting chit-chit-chittering sound when they spotted a bird or two out the window....


----------



## Pumbaa

Yoused said:


> singing to the birds.



Why yes, he‘s a big fan of bird watching. How did you know?   

There is another story involving birds, singing and a tree. Saving that one for the sequel if Nephew likes the first book about the cat and the snow. Not to mention the adventure when a cat, that shall remain nameless, brought home a mouse as a gift for mummy. A mouse that when released from the cutest jaws on earth decided to run and hide below the wardrobe floor...


----------



## Scepticalscribe

Pumbaa said:


> Why yes, he‘s a big fan of bird watching. How did you know?
> 
> There is another story involving birds, singing and a tree. Saving that one for the sequel if Nephew likes the first book about the cat and the snow. Not to mention the adventure when a cat, that shall remain nameless, brought home a mouse as a gift for mummy. A mouse that when released from the cutest jaws on earth decided to run and hide below the wardrobe floor...




If memory serves @lizkat has an even better story....


----------



## Pumbaa

Scepticalscribe said:


> If memory serves @lizkat has an even better story....



Awesome! Good thing it isn’t a competition. The more (and better), the merrier! Will try to remember to check out all posts.


----------



## Scepticalscribe

lizkat said:


> Oh yes she was very excited and proud of herself....  made that little chirping noise cats make when they have some prey in their mouth...  that's when i turned on the light to see what exactly made that sound seem so muffled.   Wow.   OK then.   Grass snake well over 15" long, and not very happy.
> 
> Uh...  so I tried to praise the kitty because it was after all quite an accomplishment,  but meanwhile I had her by the back of her neck and the snake by a place an inch or so behind its head and I was saying "ok let me have it... let me have that now...."  and meanwhile thinking all kinds of things in my half-asleep stupor,  like was I really sure it was just a grass snake and where were my glasses?
> 
> Anyway she let go (meaning to get a better grip I think, or maybe even to nip me in her annoyance), but I was waiting for that and grabbed the snake out of harm's way.  So we all went downstairs together, a squirming cat propped against my hip and the snake in my other hand thrashing its tail like mad and fascinating the goddamned cat trying to free up a paw and grab at it.  Snake was put back outside and was apparently not really the worse for wear, wasted no time getting the hell away from the back door.  The kitty was left grounded inside with the cat door shut for the night, and I headed back upstairs leaving the stairwell door shut in case that wasn't the FIRST thing she'd thought to bring in that evening.
> 
> She was quite the huntress, and was my last indoor-outdoor cat...  but I think that was the only time she ever grabbed up a snake.  Not for lack of trying.  There was a ground water well next door we used for watering our gardens sometimes, and the pump was set into a big ledger rock with some pebbles underneath, accessible by grass snakes,  so they loved that place in the early spring and fall: the rocks held the warmth of the sun all night.  I used to see the babies once in awhile.  Always laughed then to remember that crazy night when a grown one briefly ended up in the house.






Pumbaa said:


> Awesome! Good thing it isn’t a competition. The more (and better), the merrier! Will try to remember to check out all posts.




@lizkat's story is far too good to miss.

Here it is, still superb, if a little distant in both time (from several months ago), and space (it was posted a good few pages back).


----------



## Yoused

My cat caught a small bird and showed it to me. I told her "That's awesome." She took it over by the laundry room and ate it. I was sitting is the living room, reading the paper and listening to the very most disgusting sound of a cat enjoying her prey-gnosh. I mean, eww, and protracted ick. When she was done, I went over there to clean up after her. There was a bone and three feathers. It was a pretty small bird, perhaps a chick, but damn that thing must have been tasty through and through.


----------



## lizkat

Clix Pix said:


> Both Harry and Tali used to make this interesting chit-chit-chittering sound when they spotted a bird or two out the window....




Larsen to the rescue here.   Love this cartoon.


----------



## Scepticalscribe

In his last book, That They May Face The Rising Sun, the Irish writer John McGahern had a somewhat similar story to @lizkat's, told from the perspective of the husband of the wife who was the person who commanded the cat's affections, love and loyalty, and who watched, silent, rapt with fascination but utterly spellbound, while relaxed in bed one morning, as the cat - having entered via the bedroom window - dragged a kill (a young rabbit, or hare, if memory serves) up the duvet under which his wife soundly slept, to deposit it proudly, while waiting for her to awaken and praise it.

The description was so exquisitely detailed, and so meticulously recorded, that I have absolutely no doubt that this story was something that had actually happened to - or, was experienced by - the writer in life.


----------



## Runs For Fun

A cuddle puddle


----------



## Yoused

Great Valentine’s Day. My best friend learned that her little* sister went to bed and did not wake up. She is quite upset at being the last of her generation in the family (though she does have spawn of spawn).


*considering that "little" means born in the '50s


----------



## Scepticalscribe

Yoused said:


> Great Valentine’s Day. My best friend learned that her little* sister went to bed and did not wake up. She is quite upset at being the last of her generation in the family (though she does have spawn of spawn).
> 
> 
> *considering that "little" means born in the '50s




Commiserations; that's tough.

Was it Covid, or cardiac, or something else?  More to the point, was it entirely unexpected?  

Why not post this in the "what are you doing today" thread?


----------



## Clix Pix

Scepticalscribe said:


> Commiserations; that's tough.
> 
> Was it Covid, or cardiac, or something else?  More to the point, was it entirely unexpected?
> 
> _*Why not post this in the "what are you doing today" thread?*_




I agree;  I have to admit I was a little confused here, given that this is the pets and animals subforum, as to whether the "little" sister were actually a human or a beloved pet cat.....


----------



## Yoused

Scepticalscribe said:


> Commiserations; that's tough.
> 
> Was it Covid, or cardiac, or something else?  More to the point, was it entirely unexpected?
> 
> Why not post this in the "what are you doing today" thread?



Oops, I must have hit the wrong link. That was where I meant to put it.

Yes, it was completely unexpected.


----------



## Scepticalscribe

Yoused said:


> Oops, I must have hit the wrong link. That was where I meant to put it.
> 
> Yes, it was completely unexpected.



Perhaps you should think of posting this - what you posted when you introduced this topic - there, (what are you doing today?) instead.


----------



## Yoused




----------



## leekohler2

Yoused said:


> View attachment 4193​



That is really cute!


----------



## The-Real-Deal82

I saw this and remembered this thread, made me chuckle.


----------



## Renzatic

Despite having sworn never to do so again, I have a new indoor housecat. Had to bring Polly in, because she kept getting beat up by Pete.

The couch is now covered in fur...


----------



## Scepticalscribe

Renzatic said:


> Despite having sworn never to do so again, I have a new indoor housecat. Had to bring Polly in, because she kept getting beat up by Pete.
> 
> The couch is now covered in fur...




I thought that they were all good friends.

What is this?  Shifting alliances?


----------



## Renzatic

Scepticalscribe said:


> I thought that they were all good friends.
> 
> What is this?  Shifting alliances?




Apparently, there was a falling out...

Pete's always been a fairly jealous cat, always butting in the way when anyone dares pay attention to the other three. Recently, we've had this invasion of stray cats entering the yard, and as a result, Pete's also become very territorial. Now, if you pet the other cats, he'll develop a grudge, and start attacking them.

Now Fuzz is very fat, and probably the most laid back animal I've ever owned. When Pete jumps her, she'll smack him off, and be no worse for wear. Polly is a much smaller and more sensitive cat. She started becoming stressed out just being around Pete, always fearing he'd jump her. She quit eating, and started using the cat box constantly. I decided to let her inside because of this.

It worked. After a couple of days, she started relaxing, acting more like her old self. The only downside is I now have fur everywhere.


----------



## Scepticalscribe

Renzatic said:


> Apparently, there was a falling out...
> 
> Pete's always been a fairly jealous cat, always butting in the way when anyone dares pay attention to the other three. Recently, we've had this invasion of stray cats entering the yard, and as a result, Pete's also become very territorial. Now, if you pet the other cats, he'll develop a grudge, and start attacking them.
> 
> Now Fuzz is very fat, and probably the most laid back animal I've ever owned. When Pete jumps her, she'll smack him off, and be no worse for wear. Polly is a much smaller and more sensitive cat. She started becoming stressed out just being around Pete, always fearing he'd jump her. She quit eating, and started using the cat box constantly. I decided to let her inside because of this.
> 
> It worked. After a couple of days, she started relaxing, acting more like her old self. The only downside is I now have fur everywhere.




I think you may have metioned (in an earlier post) that Pete is also a very large cat, so, I daresay, that he can pack a feline punch when he decides to attack or hit someone.

Is he neutered, or has he been neutered? Is he the only male of the gang?  

He is not young, so why has he become more possessive and jealous of atention paid to the others, and more territorial now - invasions of strays notwithstanding?


----------



## Renzatic

Scepticalscribe said:


> I think you may have metioned (in an earlier post) that Pete is also a very large cat, so, I daresay, that he can pack a feline punch when he decides to attack or hit someone.
> 
> Is he neutered, or has he been neutered? Is he the only male of the gang?
> 
> He is not young, so why has he become more possessive and jealous of atention paid to the others, and more territorial now - invasions of strays notwithstanding?




Yeah, he's the only male among the 4, and he has been neutered. Thank god for that, because if he weren't, he'd be less a cat, more a puma. 

He's always been a jealous cat, and he always has played rough with the other two, so that isn't new behavior. It escalated when the strays regularly started showing up in the yard, when it went from an occasional thing, to almost daily attacks.

It's not like he's trying to hurt the other cats. More like he's constantly bullying them. He'll run up to them, knock them over, smack them a few times, then leave them be for awhile. There's always a lot of hissing and screaming while it's happening, and you'd think it was a fight to the death from the sound of it, but there's never any injuries sustained beyond lightly scratched noses.

Guess you could say it's like he suddenly felt this need to establish cat dominance among the herd. Fuzz acclimated to this new change. Polly didn't.


----------



## Scepticalscribe

Renzatic said:


> Yeah, he's the only male among the 4, and he has been neutered. Thank god for that, because if he weren't, he'd be less a cat, more a puma.
> 
> He's always been a jealous cat, and he always has played rough with the other two, so that isn't new behavior. It escalated when the strays regularly started showing up in the yard, when it went from an occasional thing, to almost daily attacks.
> 
> It's not like he's trying to hurt the other cats. More like he's constantly bullying them. He'll run up to them, knock them over, smack them a few times, then leave them be for awhile. There's always a lot of hissing and screaming while it's happening, and you'd think it was a fight to the death from the sound of it, but there's never any injuries sustained beyond lightly scratched noses.
> 
> Guess you could say it's like he suddenly felt this need to establish cat dominance among the herd. Fuzz acclimated to this new change. Polly didn't.




In a way, it is a pity that they are litter mates and/or that he is the sole male.

An older female cat wouldn't have allowed him to have established such dominance.


----------



## Alli

My baby, who has always been scared of everything suddenly realized if he got up to the "penthouse" that nobody could bother him. So he's had an extended nap up there today.


----------



## Yoused

Renzatic said:


> Apparently, there was a falling out...



of fur, obviously


----------



## leekohler2

Renzatic said:


> Apparently, there was a falling out...
> 
> Pete's always been a fairly jealous cat, always butting in the way when anyone dares pay attention to the other three. Recently, we've had this invasion of stray cats entering the yard, and as a result, Pete's also become very territorial. Now, if you pet the other cats, he'll develop a grudge, and start attacking them.
> 
> Now Fuzz is very fat, and probably the most laid back animal I've ever owned. When Pete jumps her, she'll smack him off, and be no worse for wear. Polly is a much smaller and more sensitive cat. She started becoming stressed out just being around Pete, always fearing he'd jump her. She quit eating, and started using the cat box constantly. I decided to let her inside because of this.
> 
> It worked. After a couple of days, she started relaxing, acting more like her old self. *The only downside is I now have fur everywhere.*



There's this thing called a vacuum cleaner.


----------



## Renzatic

leekohler2 said:


> There's this thing called a vacuum cleaner.




...the Great Equalizer. :O


----------



## Runs For Fun

Been meaning to post some more pictures here.


----------



## leekohler2

RunsForFun said:


> Been meaning to post some more pictures here.
> View attachment 4236View attachment 4237View attachment 4238View attachment 4239View attachment 4240View attachment 4241View attachment 4242View attachment 4243



Beautiful cats!


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## Alli

RunsForFun said:


> Been meaning to post some more pictures here.



Few things better than a void. I have always loved black cats. (Not that I don't love every cat....)


----------



## Yoused

We took care of my friend's black cat for a few months. She was pregnant at the time (the cat, not the friend) and my one cousin ended up adopting two of the kittens (one was black with the cutest white mustache). What I remember distinctly was when I first met the cat, she smelled like a girl's bedroom. I want to believe that it was just environmentally absorbed, because the idea of someone perfuming their cat sounds like cruelty.


----------



## Alli

Yoused said:


> What I remember distinctly was when I first met the cat, she smelled like a girl's bedroom. I want to believe that it was just environmentally absorbed, because the idea of someone perfuming their cat sounds like cruelty.



Cats have distinct scents. Our ginger smells like baby powder. He always has. We have no baby powder in the house. The floof smells less like powder and more like some exotic spice. The black one just smells like his CBD collar so we can all mellow out.


----------



## Yoused

Well, my cat smelled like a cat, and guest cat stopped smelling like perfume in less than a week. We had my dad's ancient seal point after he passed on, and she smelled like a cat (but holy crap, that voice, we considered renting her out to remodelers for stripping wallpaper). I have never really noticed a distinctive non-cat smell from any of our cats.


----------



## Clix Pix

Siamese cats definitely have distinctive voices and they are quite vocal a lot of the time!  To this day I have never forgotten the time when I needed to transport my two Siamese boys to our new home and the entire journey (thankfully wasn't a long one) was me at the wheel of the car, trying to keep my attention on the road while being serenaded by a _very_ loud chorus of protests -- I think they anticipated that we were going to the....ahem....V  E  T  but of course that was not the case this time.  Longer drive, for one thing.  That didn't matter to them.  They protested anyway.  Needless to say I was more than relieved to finally arrive at the destination and bundle them, each in his own carrier, into their new home and finally have some peace and quiet!


----------



## Runs For Fun

My cats don't really have a smell. They just smell clean. Like a fresh clean scent.


----------



## leekohler2

Clix Pix said:


> Siamese cats definitely have distinctive voices and they are quite vocal a lot of the time!  To this day I have never forgotten the time when I needed to transport my two Siamese boys to our new home and the entire journey (thankfully wasn't a long one) was me at the wheel of the car, trying to keep my attention on the road while being serenaded by a _very_ loud chorus of protests -- I think they anticipated that we were going to the....ahem....V  E  T  but of course that was not the case this time.  Longer drive, for one thing.  That didn't matter to them.  They protested anyway.  Needless to say I was more than relieved to finally arrive at the destination and bundle them, each in his own carrier, into their new home and finally have some peace and quiet!



I loved my siamese. She lived 19 years. Thankfully, she went quickly when it was time.


----------



## Clix Pix

Siamese cats are quite intriguing, with distinct personalities and at times they can be almost like a dog, with liking to play "fetch" and such....


----------



## Runs For Fun

Clix Pix said:


> Siamese cats are quite intriguing, with distinct personalities and at times they can be almost like a dog, with liking to play "fetch" and such....



One of mine loves to play fetch. He'll bring his toy back and drop it right in front of me every time.


----------



## Alli

RunsForFun said:


> One of mine loves to play fetch. He'll bring his toy back and drop it right in front of me every time.



My black cat does that. He loves his jingle balls. He also loves to talk while he has them in his mouth and the sound can bring all other activity to an abrupt halt.


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## Renzatic

Now that I have a cat indoors, I've come to realize that she makes some really weird noises I've never quite heard from another cats. It's hard to explain. It's mostly trills, but also these "pleurp-pleurp-pleurp" and "thoooo-thoooo" sounds that are just odd.


----------



## Alli

Renzatic said:


> Now that I have a cat indoors, I've come to realize that she makes some really weird noises I've never quite heard from another cats. It's hard to explain. It's mostly trills, but also these "pleurp-pleurp-pleurp" and "thoooo-thoooo" sounds that are just odd.



Cat speech is wonderful. We had the floof for a year before he decided to start talking. Now he does it when he wants attention. Jet does it when he’s playing fetch, or in the middle of the night when he feels you should wake up cause he has something important to say (or when he feels the food bowl is empty enough that he risks starvation before the sun comes up), and the old man usually just makes meep sounds as if to agree with whatever is going on in the house. 

I really don’t understand how people can live without a cat (or two) in the house.


----------



## Renzatic

Alli said:


> I really don’t understand how people can live without a cat (or two) in the house.




Well, not having to vacuum every 6 hours is pretty nice.


----------



## lizkat

Alli said:


> Cat speech is wonderful. We had the floof for a year before he decided to start talking. Now he does it when he wants attention. Jet does it when he’s playing fetch, or in the middle of the night when he feels you should wake up cause he has something important to say (or when he feels the food bowl is empty enough that he risks starvation before the sun comes up), and the old man usually just makes meep sounds as if to agree with whatever is going on in the house.
> 
> I really don’t understand how people can live without a cat (or two) in the house.




I have to stand on my hands sometimes not to explore my options to acquire another kitty.  I wouldn't even have to venture to a shelter, since a  new-to-me barn kitty just old enough to know how to nail a mouse is just a phone call away almost any time in spring and summer.    But I'm not missing the downsides of the extra work or expenses either.   So on balance, and so far,  life without a cat in the house remains an OK experience as long as I don't dwell on the now missing upside of the ledger.    No one can take away the sweet or comical memories, that's for sure.


----------



## thekev

Alli said:


> Cat speech is wonderful. We had the floof for a year before he decided to start talking. Now he does it when he wants attention. Jet does it when he’s playing fetch, or in the middle of the night when he feels you should wake up cause he has something important to say (or when he feels the food bowl is empty enough that he risks starvation before the sun comes up), and the old man usually just makes meep sounds as if to agree with whatever is going on in the house.
> 
> I really don’t understand how people can live without a cat (or two) in the house.




It would drive my allergies crazy. Cats around my neighborhood still become accustomed to me and don't run away. A couple of them seem to enjoy it when I watch cars with them.


----------



## Runs For Fun

Thor (the one that likes to play fetch) will randomly go around and make noises like he's being murdered. I have not figured out why he does this. Whether he feels lost, or is looking for his brother, or wants me to come to him, or just wants attention, I have no idea  but it's quite endearing.


----------



## Alli

RunsForFun said:


> Thor (the one that likes to play fetch) will randomly go around and make noises like he's being murdered. I have not figured out why he does this. Whether he feels lost, or is looking for his brother, or wants me to come to him, or just wants attention, I have no idea  but it's quite endearing.



What you’re describing sounds a lot like what Jet does when he’s roaming the house with a jingle ball in his mouth.


----------



## Clix Pix

I loved my two boys when they were here ruling the household, but after the second one also crossed the Rainbow Bridge, I decided that I wouldn't do anything for a while.....and see what Life Without Cats would be like.  The first thing I noticed was how much less sneezing I was doing, as the two cats, even though short-haired, did trigger my allergies.   I also appreciated (and still do) the freedom of being able to come-and-go, at times being away from home for long periods of time, without having to worry about the cats and who would look after them and such.  I had run into that situation with Harry and Tali a couple of times, and it really felt like such a relief to no longer have that concern, to be able to plan a trip and just go.   A couple of times in the years since my boys have been gone I've been away from home much longer than originally anticipated, making me all the more thankful that I didn't have to worry about the cats at home.   After about a year or so, one day I quietly took the cat tree and the two cat carriers out to the recycling area.....


----------



## Alli

I must admit, when these three are gone they will not be replaced. There are days I would love to not have a litter box to deal with or the south's largest dust bunny farm.


----------



## Alli

Volume up so you can hear what we’ve been talking about.


----------



## Runs For Fun

This was funny. Sleepyhead snoozing on my iPad


----------



## Runs For Fun

One of my parent’s cats.


----------



## Alli

We let the floof go out unleashed yesterday, mostly to see if he was actually going to go anywhere. He did not. Mostly he likes to hit the pavement and roll around in the warm sun. But then he whines when it's time to go in...like it's bitter cold in the house.


----------



## thekev

This thread is a bit too quiet, so I'm leaving this here.


----------



## Renzatic

Damn cats caught a baby raccoon, and brought it into the garage. You wouldn't believe the amount of effort it took to catch this thing, while making sure it wouldn't bite or scratch me.


----------



## Pumbaa

Renzatic said:


> Damn cats caught a baby raccoon, and brought it into the garage. You wouldn't believe the amount of effort it took to catch this thing, while making sure it wouldn't bite or scratch me.
> 
> View attachment 5568



Wow. Just wow. Can’t even decide what reaction to give, so I’ll improvise:


----------



## Renzatic

Pumbaa said:


> Wow. Just wow.




I'm amazed that the cats could manage to catch a raccoon, baby or not.


----------



## Scepticalscribe

Renzatic said:


> I'm amazed that the cats could manage to catch a raccoon, baby or not.




Predatory instinct. 

But, perhaps not.

I thought that you had mentioned that they had - or have - settled comfortably into the quiet contemplation of a sedentary middle aged lifestyle.


----------



## User.45

Renzatic said:


> I'm amazed that the cats could manage to catch a raccoon, baby or not.



In North America, _B. procyonis_ infection rates in raccoons are very high, being found in around 70% of adult raccoons and* 90% of juvenile raccoons.*[6]Transmission occurs similarly to other roundworm species, through the fecal-oral route. Eggs are produced by the worm while in the intestine, and the released eggs will mature to an infective state externally in the soil. When an infected egg is ingested, the larvae will hatch and enter the intestine. Transmission of _B. procyonis_ may also occur through the ingestion of larvae found in infected tissue.[6]





Mebendazole to all!


----------



## Renzatic

Scepticalscribe said:


> Predatory instinct.
> 
> But, perhaps not.
> 
> I thought that you had mentioned that they had - or have - settled comfortably into the quiet contemplation of a sedentary middle aged lifestyle.




Ha! Not quite. They do tend to laze around the breezeway a lot more these days, but they still go on the hunt. I'm always having to clean up birds, rabbits, chipmunks, and whatever else they happen to find.

I've had a lot of cats over the years, but these 4 are, by and far, the most adept at hunting I've ever seen. Even Polly, who's now an inside cat who gets pampered more than the others, will still snap with amazing speed at anything that captures her attention.


----------



## Renzatic

P_X said:


> Mebendazole to all!




...oh, great.


----------



## User.45

Renzatic said:


> Damn cats caught a baby raccoon, and brought it into the garage. You wouldn't believe the amount of effort it took to catch this thing, while making sure it wouldn't bite or scratch me.
> 
> View attachment 5568



I'd power wash this crate and handle the poop of this little fella as biohazardous material. Maybe he's too young yet to have been exposed to worms, but yukkity yuk. You have dewormer for your cats? Time to give it a run. You're probably fine but deep clean that garage and get rid of any food that may have been in touch with this one...


----------



## Renzatic

P_X said:


> I'd power wash this crate and handle the poop of this little fella as biohazardous material. Maybe he's too young yet to have been exposed to worms, but yukkity yuk. You have dewormer for your cats? Time to give it a run. You're probably fine but deep clean that garage and get rid of any food that may have been in touch with this one...




The garage and cat carrier are now disinfected. Not exactly how I intended on spending my Memorial Day Sunday morning, but hey, it beats a roundworm infection.


----------



## User.45

Renzatic said:


> The garage and cat carrier are now disinfected. Not exactly how I intended on spending my Memorial Day Sunday morning, but hey, it beats a roundworm infection.



It sucks, but yeah, it's something you don't want to take chances with.


----------



## Alli

Just one (of many) reason my cats never go out. (Except the idiot who likes being walked on a leash like a dog.)


----------



## User.45

Alli said:


> Just one (of many) reason my cats never go out. (Except the idiot who likes being walked on a leash like a dog.)



My beef with the neotenous murder machines some refer to as cats is this:



> A 2013 study by Scott R. Loss and others of the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service found that free-ranging domestic cats (mostly unowned) are the top human-caused threat to wildlife in the United States, killing an estimated 1.3 to 3.7 billion birds and 6.3 to 22.3 billion mammals annually.[4][5]











						Cat predation on wildlife - Wikipedia
					






					en.wikipedia.org


----------



## Renzatic

P_X said:


> My beef with the neotenous murder machines some refer to as cats is this...




I'm not surprised. My cats kill at least 2 birds a week.

On the plus side, the moles that were literally digging up my yard mysteriously disappeared about a year after they were born in my backyard.


----------



## Deleted member 199

Anyone got to the point of making (or I guess even buying/having made) a "catio" (i.e. cat patio)?

I have a basic idea in my head of what I think I'm gonna make but the few videos I saw about them seem certainly a lot smaller in scale than what I had planned so I dunno if there's something I'm not realising?


----------



## thekev

Renzatic said:


> I'm not surprised. My cats kill at least 2 birds a week.
> 
> On the plus side, the moles that were literally digging up my yard mysteriously disappeared about a year after they were born in my backyard.




Careful, once the moles and chipmunks are gone, they may begin to predate on unsuspecting postal workers.


----------



## User.45

thekev said:


> Careful, once the moles and chipmunks are gone, they may begin to predate on unsuspecting postal workers.



And in-laws....


----------



## Alli

Stephen.R said:


> Anyone got to the point of making (or I guess even buying/having made) a "catio" (i.e. cat patio)?
> 
> I have a basic idea in my head of what I think I'm gonna make but the few videos I saw about them seem certainly a lot smaller in scale than what I had planned so I dunno if there's something I'm not realising?



We talk about it. I imagine we’ll get there now that all available wall space is covered with cat climbing/resting protrusions.

There are a lot of feral cats in our neighborhood. One of them is in heat, and we all take turns breaking up their little parties. Meanwhile, there’s a new batch of kittens that we spend time running out of the yard to protect the birds and squirrels. If I could get them early enough I’d get them all fixed. That would take care of that problem.


----------



## Deleted member 199

Alli said:


> That would take care of that problem.


----------



## lizkat

Renzatic said:


> I'm not surprised. My cats kill at least 2 birds a week.
> 
> On the plus side, the moles that were literally digging up my yard mysteriously disappeared about a year after they were born in my backyard.




Moles don't taste good though, apparently.    Outdoor cats we had as kids while living in Maryland for awhile used to slay them during the night but always laid them out intact and very dead along the bottom step of the back porch.     Of rabbits or mice, however, we never found more than the occasional rabbit's tail or paw...


----------



## Renzatic

lizkat said:


> Moles don't taste good though, apparently.    Outdoor cats we had as kids while living in Maryland for awhile used to slay them during the night but always laid them out intact and very dead along the bottom step of the back porch.     Of rabbits or mice, however, we never found more than the occasional rabbit's tail or paw...




Yup. My cats do the same thing. Every once in awhile, I'll come across half a mole lying around, but usually they just kill them, and leave them on the breezeway.

Rabbits and birds though? They get eaten.


----------



## Runs For Fun

My parent's indoor/outdoor cats are always bringing back dead moles. Every so often a dead bird or baby rabbit will show up too.


----------



## lizkat

On a brighter note, I recently stumbled into a Twitter account called Bodega Cats.   Yeah, I'm hooked now.    Some samples:


----------



## Runs For Fun

lizkat said:


> On a brighter note, I recently stumbled into a Twitter account called Bodega Cats.   Yeah, I'm hooked now.    Some samples:
> 
> 
> 
> View attachment 5649
> 
> 
> View attachment 5650
> 
> View attachment 5651



Following!


----------



## thekev

Renzatic said:


> Yup. My cats do the same thing. Every once in awhile, I'll come across half a mole lying around, but usually they just kill them, and leave them on the breezeway.
> 
> Rabbits and birds though? They get eaten.




You clearly didn't get the intended message. The cats expect you to dress the carcass, season it, and cook it into something delicious, to be left in the same place. Thus far, you have been neglecting your duties.


----------



## Renzatic

thekev said:


> You clearly didn't get the intended message. The cats expect you to dress the carcass, season it, and cook it into something delicious, to be left in the same place. Thus far, you have been neglecting your duties.




I didn't volunteer for that. Ain't gonna do it.


----------



## Alli

Renzatic said:


> I didn't volunteer for that. Ain't gonna do it.



You accepted all responsibilities when you allowed yourself to be adopted by a cat.


----------



## Renzatic

Alli said:


> You accepted all responsibilities when you allowed yourself to be adopted by a cat.




Ain't in writing, didn't sign nothing. Ain't gonna do it.


----------



## Alli

Renzatic said:


> Ain't in writing, didn't sign nothing. Ain't gonna do it.



Good luck with that in court. Cats always win. Always.


----------



## Renzatic

This reminds me. I never did show off the recent pics of the nerd herd to anyone except Scribe, when she asked.

So here they are. The dorks.

Fuzzy.





Polly





PETE!


----------



## Alli

Renzatic said:


> So here they are. The dorks.



They are beautiful! 

Oreo has been getting visitors every evening. With the weather so beautiful I leave the back door open. Eventually I look over and he’s up on his hind paws meowing…and I see there’s another cat on the other side.


----------



## Renzatic

Alli said:


> Oreo has been getting visitors every evening. With the weather so beautiful I leave the back door open. Eventually I look over and he’s up on his hind paws meowing…and I see there’s another cat on the other side.




So, whatcha gonna name it?


----------



## Renzatic

Oh, and here's an old picture of them when they were still kittens. Probably a little over a month old here, when they all still got along.


----------



## thekev

Renzatic said:


> Ain't in writing, didn't sign nothing. Ain't gonna do it.




You probably missed a claws in your indentured servitude contract.


----------



## Renzatic

thekev said:


> You probably missed a claws in your indentured servitude contract.




I see what you did there.


----------



## thekev

Renzatic said:


> I see what you did there.




I make stupid puns... this is basically what I do. Also, Futurama used a similar one involving one of Zoidberg's relatives.


----------



## Runs For Fun

Renzatic said:


> This reminds me. I never did show off the recent pics of the nerd herd to anyone except Scribe, when she asked.
> 
> So here they are. The dorks.
> 
> Fuzzy.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Polly
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> PETE!






Renzatic said:


> Oh, and here's an old picture of them when they were still kittens. Probably a little over a month old here, when they all still got along.
> 
> View attachment 5675



Cuteness overload!  I love them!


----------



## lizkat

This is probably fake but seems credible enough to me and far more amusing than a botched Touch ID break-in.


​​


----------



## User.168

.


----------



## Pumbaa

theSeb said:


> Have I got a defective cat?



There is no such thing.


----------



## SuperMatt

theSeb said:


> My cat is weird. She refuses to drink water out of her bowl and will only drink from a tap. She will indicate to me both verbally and physically that she wants a drink and then run off to the bathroom and sit by the sink. Once I have switched on the water, she will test it first with her little paw to make sure it's the right temperature. She also will occasionally let the water go onto her paws after drinking and use that, instead of her spit, to clean herself.
> 
> Have I got a defective cat?



No, your cat is a very intelligent one. It has trained you quite effectively! All smart cats know how to train their humans.


----------



## Runs For Fun

theSeb said:


> My cat is weird. She refuses to drink water out of her bowl and will only drink from a tap. She will indicate to me both verbally and physically that she wants a drink and then run off to the bathroom and sit by the sink. Once I have switched on the water, she will test it first with her little paw to make sure it's the right temperature. She also will occasionally let the water go onto her paws after drinking and use that, instead of her spit, to clean herself.
> 
> Have I got a defective cat?



Nope, cat working as expected.


----------



## lizkat

When I shared a fourth-floor walk-up flat in NYC with a former college roommate, we had a big and very lazy and not really very bright orange tabby cat who used to love sleeping in the oval bathroom sink because he just fit into it, comfortably curled up.   Worked great for him until the hot water faucet developed a slow drip and it took the super a couple days to get around to fixing it.  Meanwhile that moronic cat not once but TWICE got into the sink anyway and curled up and went to sleep until the warm water reached his nose.  At that point he woke up sputtering,  then came charging into the living room like a half-drowned rat and full of outrage at whoever "had done that" to him.  So comical...  too bad it was long before the era of iphones and handy cameras!


----------



## Runs For Fun

lizkat said:


> When I shared a fourth-floor walk-up flat in NYC with a former college roommate, we had a big and very lazy and not really very bright orange tabby cat who used to love sleeping in the oval bathroom sink because he just fit into it, comfortably curled up.   Worked great for him until the hot water faucet developed a slow drip and it took the super a couple days to get around to fixing it.  Meanwhile that moronic cat not once but TWICE got into the sink anyway and curled up and went to sleep until the warm water reached his nose.  At that point he woke up sputtering,  then came charging into the living room like a half-drowned rat and full of outrage at whoever "had done that" to him.  So comical...  too bad it was long before the era of iphones and handy cameras!



This is the most cat thing I've read today.


----------



## tranceking26

Aww  In the comments somebody said it also happened to them.


----------



## lizkat

^^^ That is sweet!   Believe it or not, that was also the reaction of an aging barn cat, White Ear, long noted for her caring maternal attention.  After a couple years of not bearing kittens, she came across the farm lane from a meadow one day,  bringing a litter of abandoned baby skunks one at a time to hide and nurse them under the old barn where she used to hide her own kittens. 

My bro-in-law just thanked God it was an old barn area where he just stored backup equipment and stuff they kept for parts....   so they just left the whole lot of that little zoo alone until one day White Ear  --perhaps much more carefully at that point?--  marched them in a single-file troupe back across the farm lane, weaned and ready to go hunt for grubs and bugs and veggies on their own.

Fortunately most of the time baby skunks before weaning age will not spray.  When they do, they're not very precise in their aim so it can be comical to see what happens if they nail each other instead of a perceived foe.  But they'll telegraph intent to do spray by  mewing and hissing and stomping around as they get a little older and decide to unload some of their "precious bodily fluid" weaponry.    It's a good time to take a hike for awhile...


----------



## thekev

lizkat said:


> ^^^ That is sweet!   Believe it or not, that was also the reaction of an aging barn cat, White Ear, long noted for her caring maternal attention.  After a couple years of not bearing kittens, she came across the farm lane from a meadow one day,  bringing a litter of abandoned baby skunks one at a time to hide and nurse them under the old barn where she used to hide her own kittens.
> 
> My bro-in-law just thanked God it was an old barn area where he just stored backup equipment and stuff they kept for parts....   so they just left the whole lot of that little zoo alone until one day White Ear  --perhaps much more carefully at that point?--  marched them in a single-file troupe back across the farm lane, weaned and ready to go hunt for grubs and bugs and veggies on their own.
> 
> Fortunately most of the time baby skunks before weaning age will not spray.  When they do, they're not very precise in their aim so it can be comical to see what happens if they nail each other instead of a perceived foe.  But they'll telegraph intent to do spray by  mewing and hissing and stomping around as they get a little older and decide to unload some of their "precious bodily fluid" weaponry.    It's a good time to take a hike for awhile...




Skunks really don't like to spray, since they seemingly can't do it repeatedly over a short period of time. I just alert them to my presence so that they can keep as much distance as they like, which seems  to work. I do this by waving and saying "HELLO SKUNK!" They may raise their tails sometimes, but I do it from far enough away that they can retreat if they are uncomfortable. So far no one has witnessed it. I'm not sure exactly which way their reaction would go, but this amuses me.


----------



## lizkat

thekev said:


> Skunks really don't like to spray, since they seemingly can't do it repeatedly over a short period of time. I just alert them to my presence so that they can keep as much distance as they like, which seems  to work. I do this by waving and saying "HELLO SKUNK!" They may raise their tails sometimes, but I do it from far enough away that they can retreat if they are uncomfortable. So far no one has witnessed it. I'm not sure exactly which way their reaction would go, but this amuses me.




I spent hours one night sitting in my car in the driveway after discovering that while I was gone, a skunk had decided to walk onto my deck where I'd left the screen door ajar.   The pretty big skunk was parked underneath the simple plank step up from the deck to the back door of the damn kitchen. I was out there with groceries (some melting) but not brave enough to tangle with a skunk who'd likely decide it was cornered and let me have the full treatment if I ventured towards that kitchen door.  There was no way for either of us to sidestep an encounter if I had gone in there.

Finally I guess it decided there would be no storm after all (or it dismissed whatever alarm had earlier inspired it to seek shelter) and I took the next opportunity when in town to buy a regular ol' milk-house kind of screendoor slam-latch for that outer deck door, for sure.  What a dilemma.


----------



## thekev

lizkat said:


> I spent hours one night sitting in my car in the driveway after discovering that while I was gone, a skunk had decided to walk onto my deck where I'd left the screen door ajar.   The pretty big skunk was parked underneath the simple plank step up from the deck to the back door of the damn kitchen. I was out there with groceries (some melting) but not brave enough to tangle with a skunk who'd likely decide it was cornered and let me have the full treatment if I ventured towards that kitchen door.  There was no way for either of us to sidestep an encounter if I had gone in there.
> 
> Finally I guess it decided there would be no storm after all (or it dismissed whatever alarm had earlier inspired it to seek shelter) and I took the next opportunity when in town to buy a regular ol' milk-house kind of screendoor slam-latch for that outer deck door, for sure.  What a dilemma.




You know, your grocery trips seem a bit too eventful.


----------



## tranceking26

lizkat said:


> White Ear



Love the story! Often you hear of different animals having a close bond.


----------



## Runs For Fun

One of my cats just ate a wasp-looking insect. He didn't mess around with it; just gobbled that thing up like it was a cat treat. Then he went sniffing around the area like he was looking for another one!


----------



## lizkat

Runs For Fun said:


> One of my cats just ate a wasp-looking insect. He didn't mess around with it; just gobbled that thing up like it was a cat treat. Then he went sniffing around the area like he was looking for another one!




Was it a cicada?   Cats and dogs alike (and other critters) LOVE those things and will gorge on a mass emergence until they're practically comatose!     Most vets however will say that eating them in moderation is a better idea...


----------



## tranceking26

It's like something out of a film lol.


----------



## Runs For Fun

lizkat said:


> Was it a cicada?   Cats and dogs alike (and other critters) LOVE those things and will gorge on a mass emergence until they're practically comatose!     Most vets however will say that eating them in moderation is a better idea...



No definitely not a cicada. Kind of looked like this


----------



## lizkat

Runs For Fun said:


> No definitely not a cicada. Kind of looked like this




Hmm...  blue mud wasp?  They're pretty cool.  They kill a bunch of spiders one at a time --somehow these wasps don't get stuck in webs so they act like a struggling insect in a web until the spider shows up to dispatch its supposed meal--  and then the wasp stuffs these dead spiders into mud cells as they build their clustered nests.  They  lay one egg on top the first spider in each cell, then the wasp larvae snacks its way through the rest of the spiders as it develops.   So if you don't like spiders,  don't kill blue mud wasps!


----------



## Alli

Runs For Fun said:


> One of my cats just ate a wasp-looking insect. He didn't mess around with it; just gobbled that thing up like it was a cat treat. Then he went sniffing around the area like he was looking for another one!



It likes spicy food!


----------



## lizkat

Yeah i am hooked on that Twitter setup "Bodega Cats"...   this a snapshot of one from a couple days ago.


----------



## tranceking26




----------



## tranceking26




----------



## tranceking26




----------



## Yoused

I heard a cat picking up lunch last night. I suspect it was a bobcat, because house cats do not make noises like that. There was snarling and growling and some whimpering noises from the prey. The episode went on for quite some time – either the hunter was not highly skilled at finishing the job or else the other creature was putting up a really good struggle.


----------



## Alli

We always have ferals in the neighborhood. Now we have one runty little black cat who seems to have taken up residence under the house. While we are not crazy about his choosing accommodations there because he wants to attack the birds and squirrels (as far as we can tell he’s never caught anything), the annoying part is that he seems to have made friends with one of our cats, Oreo. Oreo will sit at the back door when it’s open (most of the time) and act like royalty receiving supplicants. The little black runt comes up on the deck and mopes about, while Oreo explains how much better he has it as a house cat. Meanwhile, “Runty” runs from us and spends his time spraying the deck.


----------



## Scepticalscribe

I've long been struck by the phenomenal punctuality, and time keeping ability of cats, and their extraordinary sense of spatial awareness.

When I was in Afghanistan, one of my colleagues - a Superintendent in the RCMP (Major/Lt-Colonel equivalent) - adopted, or bonded with, (or was adopted by, or chosen by) one of the semi-feral cats that roamed the compound (and were spoiled, and fussed over by many of us; they were very good at identifying which laps would readily accommodate, play host to, and welcome them).

Anyway, I recall - with awed amazement - how that cat would make its way to the door of the office of the Canadian RCMP Superintendent, on the dot, at exactly 16.50 each and every day, and would wait, sitting patiently outside the door of his office, until my colleague finished his day's work, (at 17.00) whereupon it would then proceed to accompany him to his room, and sprawl and stretch out blissfully and happily on his bed.


----------



## tranceking26

That's a lovely story @Scepticalscribe


----------



## Scepticalscribe

tranceking26 said:


> View attachment 6191
> 
> That's a lovely story @Scepticalscribe




Yes, it is.

That chap (dude, guy) - the Canadian Superintendent in the RCMP, he was a very good guy, who commanded the RCMP contingent.  He also fed that cat, and indeed bought - and also acquired - special food for it, persuading (bribing? begging? entreating?) the Defac to supply him with fresh milk, - a rarity in Afghanistan - and food.

However, I vividly recall the daily punctual arrival of that cat outside that office, where it would sit, quietly - not getting in anyone's way - and patiently, until 17.00. 

Colleagues would remark on it, and know that the arrival of the cat outside that office marked the end of the working day.


----------



## tranceking26

Scepticalscribe said:


> That chap (dude, guy) - the Canadian Superintendent in the RCMP, he was a very good guy, and commanded the RCMP contingent - also fed that cat, and indeed bought - and also acquired - special food for it, persuading (bribing? begging? entreating?) the Defac to supply him with fresh milk, - a rarity in Afghanistan - and food.



That's cute. My grandparents and other RAF members used to look after stray animals when stationed in Asian countries, sometimes quite literally saving their lives from the people in charge, who would have shot them.


----------



## Scepticalscribe

tranceking26 said:


> That's cute. My grandparents and other RAF members used to look after stray animals when stationed in Asian countries, sometimes quite literally saving their lives from the people in charge, who would have shot them.




Yes, that was weird, and I remember being astonished by this.

Locals (in both Afghanistan and in Georgia, where I also spent two years with an EU mission), far preferred to shoot, or otherwise kill, cats and dogs, rather than care for them, and - as part of the caring - neuter them.

And, in Georgia, I knew the BBC correspondent, and also knew his wife, who worked for The Daily Telegraph - a lovely couple, we used to have dinner together, regularly; they had cats - adored animals, not even rescue cats, but strays who adopted them, wonderfully cared for, - and they told me of a row they had with a Georgian vet.

They had wanted to neuter their two cats - but the Georgian vet they had approached (in Tbilisi, the capital) had baulked at this, claiming that it was "unnatural".  They were absolutely flabbergasted - "he's an educated man!" they exploded when relating this tale to me (with the implication, that, as such, he should have known better), and were even more stupefied when the vet explained to them that they could drown (or otherwise kill) whatever kittens were born because the cat hadn't been neutered.

That a vet would recommend killing kittens over neutering an adult cat left them stunned, speechless with shock, and absolutely stupefied.

Mind you, in Georgia, another colleague of mine, a German police officer, who had adopted a local (stray) dog - or had been adopted by a local (stray) dog (an extraordinarily affectionate, and intelligent animal he intended to bring home with him, and had had vaccinated - again, an animal who somehow knew the exact day whenever he was due to return from a month's home leave, and would be patiently awaiting his return outside the house he had rented) informed me that the dog was shot dead by Georgians for barking outside the house where - by then, vaccinated, and wearing a collar - he had been living with his adopted German owner prior to a planned repatriation to Germany.

In Kabul, (and later, in Mogadishu), we by-passed local vets entirely, and instead, approached western vets (on the military base) who would do the needful on their day off (usually Friday, in Muslim countries).

However, in Kabul, it is only fair to add that some of our local staff pointed out to me (when we discussed this subject matter) that 40 years of war - with your own people sometimes starving, destitute, desensitised, traumatised - does not engender an environment conducive to an awareness of the care needs of your fellow human beings, let alone the unfortunate animals that may depend on them.


----------



## tranceking26

Scepticalscribe said:


> but the Georgian vet they had approached (in Tbilisi, the capital) had baulked at this, claiming that it was "unnatural".  They were absolutely flabbergasted - "he's an educated man!" they exploded when relating this tale to me (with the implication, that, as such, he should have known better), and were even more stupefied when the vet explained to them that they could drown (or otherwise kill) whatever kittens were born because the cat hadn't been neutered.
> 
> That a vet would recommend killing kittens over neutering an adult cat left them stunned, speechless with shock, and absolutely stupefied.



A vet would be like that?! Crazy. Thankfully I've never met anybody with that mindset. And to drown kittens is awful.


----------



## tranceking26




----------



## SuperMatt

They really do have 9 lives:

https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1406808125034799106/


----------



## Yoused

SuperMatt said:


> They really do have 9 lives:
> 
> https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1406808125034799106/



See, you know what happened. Frankie got pissed off at that other cat for trying to look like him, so he waited till he saw a car coming, then pushed that cat into the road. But he miscalculated, tripped, and got his claw stuck in the door strip of the passing car and had to hang on for 300km till they finally stopped. It was a long walk home.


----------



## tranceking26




----------



## lizkat

Yes another clip from Bodega Cats on Twitter...   I could sure relate to this one yesterday.   A little cooler today as heat wave breaks up thanks to assorted thunderstorms...

​
​


----------



## Deleted member 199

lizkat said:


> Yes another clip from Bodega Cats on Twitter...   I could sure relate to this one yesterday.   A little cooler today as heat wave breaks up thanks to assorted thunderstorms...
> 
> View attachment 6411​
> ​



Someone should start a "7-Eleven Lizards" variant. Or perhaps (stray) dogs.. that's far more common TBH.


----------



## Yoused

Kitty Rental


----------



## Pumbaa

Yoused said:


> Kitty Rental



Been there, done that. Can recommend.


----------



## Runs For Fun

Yoused said:


> Kitty Rental






Pumbaa said:


> Been there, done that. Can recommend.



There's a cat house near me. They have literally dozens of cats just roaming around. They're all adoptable and you can go there just to visit them. Would definitely recommend.


----------



## lizkat

Runs For Fun said:


> There's a cat house near me. They have literally dozens of cats just roaming around. They're all adoptable and you can go there just to visit them. Would definitely recommend.




One is trying to adopt me lately, hanging out in the yard in the early evening when I'm opening up the windows again and putting in the sliding screens.   I'm like "uh...  help yourself to a spare bale of straw in the barn, pal...  it's summer and the livin' is easy." 

I'll  possibly be tempted in October when the mice start trying to set up housekeeping in my kitchen yet again.  A cat is not cheaper than an array of mousetraps but a cat is far more entertaining,  and even its maintenance is more fun than trap-watching. 

Still, I'm more likely to end up with a porch cat now than one that comes to live indoors.  I'm also pretty sure my barn and its straw bales left over from gardening each year get used as temporary shelter on cold nights,  for cats that have a home locally but cannot resist roaming around to see if there are better eats somewhere else...  and sometimes get caught out in a snowstorm.


----------



## Renzatic

I dunno if she's my cat anymore, but here's a cat...


----------



## Alli

Renzatic said:


> I dunno if she's my cat anymore, but here's a cat...



She was never your cat. People don’t own cats. Cats own people.


----------



## lizkat

Alli said:


> She was never your cat. People don’t own cats. Cats own people.




And bodegas!   (yes, another from the Twitter setup Bodega Cats).

​


----------



## Runs For Fun

Alli said:


> She was never your cat. People don’t own cats. Cats own people.


----------



## Yoused

Alli said:


> People don’t own cats. Cats own people.



and the internets


----------



## Hrafn

Our cats were rescued from a feral colony.  They demand scritches when appropriate for them.  Vocally.  And, if the vocals don't work, they are not above tripping us.


----------



## Herdfan

yaxomoxay said:


> Let's start a cats thread.
> 
> My youngest cat pissed in my shoes last night. Not around it. Not over it. In them. When I went to pick 'em up to get ready for work, it was a pool of cat urine. That's how my morning started.




When we got married my wife had 2 cats.  I had never had a cat and had let my parents keep the dog we shared.

Everything was fine until about 6 months in when a stray started showing up in the evening.  It was winter so the wife let him start coming into the garage at night.  He was happy to go out in the morning and he would show up at night.  So we decided to bring him inside and try to integrate him with the other 2.  One was pissed and the other didn't care.

But one night he hopped on the bed and laid in the pissed one's spot.  She walked to the foot of the bed and peed all over my feet.

-----------------------------------------------

We currently have 3 cats.  My daughter's Ragdoll and the 2 boys.  The 2 boys came to us a similar way.  Some @$$hole dropped a pregnant mama kitty in our neighborhood right before one of those polar vortexes.  There was no way she was going to survive out there, so the wife and daughter brought her into the basement bathroom and let her have the kittens.  She had 5, but one was stillborn.  The other 4 were fine, 2 calico girls and 2 tuxedo boys.  We were able to find homes for the girls easily, but not the boys.  Our other cat was in her last year, so we decided to keep the boys and my mom tool the mama kitty.  Those boys weigh a combined 41 pounds.  And while they are a little overweight, they are simply big cats. 

Now the fun part is about to happen.  Mom is in assisted living where she can have her cat.  At some point soon she will be moving to memory care where she can't.  While that has a whole set of problems, we are going to have to try to integrate the mama back with her sons.  One is territorial as hell and it will be a battle.


----------



## lizkat

Herdfan said:


> There was no way she was going to survive out there, so the wife and daughter brought her into the basement bathroom and let her have the kittens.




So it's looking true that in the long run that "no good deed goes unpunished"...   just the payback on this one is taking awhile to come around.  Argggh!  Meanwhile, sorry to hear about your mom's apparent decline in health.

I had a 20-pound black and white cat once that looked a distant cousin to the "boys" in that photo you posted.  He was huge and all muscle and had taken exception to some of the vet exams necessary after an idiot left my shutters open onto a fourth-floor fire escape and the cat went exploring, got startled and fell about 40' to the ground.  He had run back into the building and a neighbor had notified me so I took the poor thing to the Animal Medical center. 

They gave him some antibiotics for a cut tongue, which I guess he had bitten severely as he was landing... and then with some difficulty they managed to subdue him enough to x-ray him for dislocations or broken bones etc.,  by which point the cat had about made grass skirts out of their lab coats.  One of them finally popped my plucky monster back in his carrier and said "He's in better shape than we are, take him home."

He was one of the offspring of a then mama-to-be that had yowled piteously in the snow outside the courtyard level apartment of some friends of mine in NYC who were in law school at the time.  One of them was away and the other let the cat in and stashed it in the absent guy's bedroom to stay cozy over the holiday, figuring he could put her back out when it got warmer outside.  But the mama cat promptly chose my friend Pete's shirt drawer as a great place to pop out her babies.   Heh.  Everyone in the old college network who was in Pete's phone book in the city ended up with one of those kittens.   They kept the mama and named her more or less as such, just so they could yell at her and alarm the neighbors:   "Mother get the hell off the g'damn couch!""


----------



## Runs For Fun

Herdfan said:


> When we got married my wife had 2 cats.  I had never had a cat and had let my parents keep the dog we shared.
> 
> Everything was fine until about 6 months in when a stray started showing up in the evening.  It was winter so the wife let him start coming into the garage at night.  He was happy to go out in the morning and he would show up at night.  So we decided to bring him inside and try to integrate him with the other 2.  One was pissed and the other didn't care.
> 
> But one night he hopped on the bed and laid in the pissed one's spot.  She walked to the foot of the bed and peed all over my feet.
> 
> -----------------------------------------------
> 
> We currently have 3 cats.  My daughter's Ragdoll and the 2 boys.  The 2 boys came to us a similar way.  Some @$$hole dropped a pregnant mama kitty in our neighborhood right before one of those polar vortexes.  There was no way she was going to survive out there, so the wife and daughter brought her into the basement bathroom and let her have the kittens.  She had 5, but one was stillborn.  The other 4 were fine, 2 calico girls and 2 tuxedo boys.  We were able to find homes for the girls easily, but not the boys.  Our other cat was in her last year, so we decided to keep the boys and my mom tool the mama kitty.  Those boys weigh a combined 41 pounds.  And while they are a little overweight, they are simply big cats.
> 
> Now the fun part is about to happen.  Mom is in assisted living where she can have her cat.  At some point soon she will be moving to memory care where she can't.  While that has a whole set of problems, we are going to have to try to integrate the mama back with her sons.  One is territorial as hell and it will be a battle.



I don't understand people dumping cats off. How can you be so heartless? It makes me so mad. My parent's neighborhood seems to be a popular place for people to dump cats. Many years ago they took one in that ended up being pregnant. Unfortunately both kittens were stillborn. Poor cat mourned for months. There's now another one that started showing up and eventually found its way in to the house. He gets along mostly with three of their cats but not so much with the fourth.


----------



## Alli

Herdfan said:


> But one night he hopped on the bed and laid in the pissed one's spot. She walked to the foot of the bed and peed all over my feet.



OMG! My Jet does this kind of thing when he gets mad. The last time he did it was the last (forever!) time I cut his nails. He was so angry at me that he marched up on the arm of my chair and peed all over my arm before I knew what he was up to.


----------



## Runs For Fun

https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1413592083680567297/


----------



## lizkat

"So the mousetraps are all gone.  Get over it".

​


----------



## B S Magnet

Typical activity for my kid:


----------



## Herdfan

Alli said:


> She was never your cat. People don’t own cats. Cats own people.




Dogs have owners.  Cats have staff.


----------



## lizkat

Herdfan said:


> Dogs have owners.  Cats have staff.




Plenty of dogs have actual jobs, including the breeds long used to herd cows or sheep.   But some cats will also take it upon themselves to help you work, which usually amounts more to harassment than anything else.   My cat Grace had all manner of chores she volunteered for in my studio.   Quality assurance of my stitching was a favorite task, looking for loose threads from which to make mischief.  This scrap quilt was meant for her,  so she was giving it an especially vigorous round of QA.


----------



## Alli

Almost every day since I’ve been on this trip, my husband has sent photos of various cats helping him from on top of his computer, on his ladder, and even on the stairs to the attic.


----------



## Roller

If you're a cat lover — and even if you aren't — the _Owl Kitty_ videos are worth checking out. The creators, a couple in Portland, Oregon, insert their cat into short movie clips. One of my favorites is from _The Matrix_, but there are quite a few others, including a brilliant sequence from _Avengers: Endgame_.


----------



## Huntn

I miss our cats. I told this story in the past (hopefully not this thread ), but we grew up with dogs and were highly offended when Mom brought home a cat. It was an indoor outdoor cat and had a short life, I never really cottoned up to it.

A decade later, with no pets the wife wanted a cat, we got two brother- sister barn cats with sinus infections, got them meds, yet they blew snot all over our laundry room before shaking it.  My socialization complete,  I discovered just how good a pet they can be and we got a third. Great pets for 17 years.

When they passed, we were moving back and forth between two residences (with the seasons), and decided it was not a good time to get new pets. Maybe eventually we will. This time the wife wants a teacup Yorkie. That remains to be seen.  What I like about Yorkies, but not going to pay $1500 for one, is they are small but not yappy dogs, at least the ones I have met.


----------



## Yoused

Roller said:


> … the _Owl Kitty_ videos …




This may be


Spoiler: the most famous one


----------



## Herdfan

It was finally confirmed yesterday by our housekeeper.  Our big cat, Cocoa was able to open a door.  We had suspected this for a while now, but she saw him do it.

We have lever handles and he is tall enough to reach up and pull it down and his weight just pushes the door open.  He does this so he can get in a eat his sister's food.  She gets Royal Canin, he is on diet food.  We have seen the results several times and at first thought we hadn't latched the door, but lately we had began to suspect he was able to open the door.

It will be getting a knob this evening.  We didn't think he was that smart.

Here is a pic of the boys.  Cocoa is on top.  He got his name because when he was a kitten he was chocolate brown.  Then at about 6 months he turned black like his brother.  But in sunlight, you can still see some brown in his undercoat.  The one on the bottom is Gizmo.  When he was a kitten he had huge ears and looked like Gizmo from _Gremlins_.  Cocoa weighs in at 23lbs and Giz is right at 19.  Yeah, they knock over stuff when playing.


----------



## Alli

Herdfan said:


> The one on the bottom is Gizmo.



He looks just like our Oreo! Oreo actually pulled back the curtain for this photo.


----------



## Herdfan

Alli said:


> He looks just like our Oreo! Oreo actually pulled back the curtain for this photo.




LOL.

So out of curiosity, Cocoa has a black nose and black pads, Giz has a pink nose and pink pads.  What color are Oreo's pads given his/her nose is both?


----------



## Alli

Herdfan said:


> LOL.
> 
> So out of curiosity, Cocoa has a black nose and black pads, Giz has a pink nose and pink pads.  What color are Oreo's pads given his/her nose is both?



He has a combination of black and pink, of course. One of his little toe beans is actually black on top and pink on the bottom.


----------



## Herdfan

Alli said:


> He has a combination of black and pink, of course. One of his little toe beans is actually black on top and pink on the bottom.




Have you ever been to The Hemingway House in Key West?  They have those 6-toed cats.  Lots of them.


----------



## lizkat

Huntn said:


> I miss our cats. I told this story in the past (hopefully not this thread ), but we grew up with dogs and were highly offended when Mom brought home a cat. It was an indoor outdoor cat and had a short life, I never really cottoned up to it.
> 
> A decade later, with no pets the wife wanted a cat, we got two brother- sister barn cats with sinus infections, got them meds, yet they blew snot all over our laundry room before shaking it.  My socialization complete,  I discovered just how good a pet they can be and we got a third. Great pets for 17 years.
> 
> When they passed, we were moving back and forth between two residences (with the seasons), and decided it was not a good time to get new pets. Maybe eventually we will. This time the wife wants a teacup Yorkie. That remains to be seen.  What I like about Yorkies, but not going to pay $1500 for one, is they are small but not yappy dogs, at least the ones I have met.




The thing about kitties is they can be left with food, water and litter for a few days and will be just fine, shopping on Amazon with your credit cards and erasing their browsing history etc.   Whereas with a dog...   it's either take it with you on your out-of-town journeys or else find someone you trust not only with them but with the contents of your house.   I scratched my occasional itch to have a dog by settling for dog-sitting and house-sitting when my bro and his wife took vacations out west.  They were so fun, but I was always reminded then of why I'd ended up w/ cats.


----------



## Herdfan

lizkat said:


> The thing about kitties is they can be left with food, water and litter for a few days and will be just fine, shopping on Amazon with your credit cards and erasing their browsing history etc.




Always had dogs growing up.  When I met my to be wife, she had 2 cats and I shared a dog with my parents (I took her home at night, then when I was at work, she went to my parent's).  Her cats met my dog and it was quickly discovered that my parents were going to have a dog full time.  And they were fine with that.

But after we got married, we were going to go on a weekend away and I was wondering what to do with the cats.  She said she would make sure the dispensers were filled and boxes were scooped and that was it.  So much easier.  

Not so now since we can't free feed the boys.  They would weigh 30 lbs.  So we have a pet sitter come in twice a day and feed them their controlled portions.


----------



## Huntn

Herdfan said:


> It was finally confirmed yesterday by our housekeeper.  Our big cat, Cocoa was able to open a door.  We had suspected this for a while now, but she saw him do it.
> 
> We have lever handles and he is tall enough to reach up and pull it down and his weight just pushes the door open.  He does this so he can get in a eat his sister's food.  She gets Royal Canin, he is on diet food.  We have seen the results several times and at first thought we hadn't latched the door, but lately we had began to suspect he was able to open the door.
> 
> It will be getting a knob this evening.  We didn't think he was that smart.
> 
> Here is a pic of the boys.  Cocoa is on top.  He got his name because when he was a kitten he was chocolate brown.  Then at about 6 months he turned black like his brother.  But in sunlight, you can still see some brown in his undercoat.  The one on the bottom is Gizmo.  When he was a kitten he had huge ears and looked like Gizmo from _Gremlins_.  Cocoa weighs in at 23lbs and Giz is right at 19.  Yeah, they knock over stuff when playing.



Years ago I remember watching a video of a cat who would jump up (just like you are saying) with lever handles on the door to open it.


----------



## Huntn

lizkat said:


> The thing about kitties is they can be left with food, water and litter for a few days and will be just fine, shopping on Amazon with your credit cards and erasing their browsing history etc.   Whereas with a dog...   it's either take it with you on your out-of-town journeys or else find someone you trust not only with them but with the contents of your house.   I scratched my occasional itch to have a dog by settling for dog-sitting and house-sitting when my bro and his wife took vacations out west.  They were so fun, but I was always reminded then of why I'd ended up w/ cats.



With 3 cats when we went on vacation the longest we left them was a week, 3 large kitty litter boxes, a tower water and tower food dispenser. They would be in the basement concrete floor so no serious worries about revenge defecating. The ceiling light was on a timer and it always worked out well.


----------



## lizkat

Huntn said:


> Years ago I remember watching a video of a cat who would jump up (just like you are saying) with lever handles on the door to open it.




My sister had to put a kid-proofing latch around the handles of her base cupboard where she kept the catfood,  after one of her two cats had learned how to hook one of the doors open and so arrive at snack city in between meals.


----------



## DT

Our new kitty is a high speed ninja, she just appears out of nowhere and is gone in the blink of an eye - or - she's in full do-not-mess-with-me-I'm-relaxing, not much in between 

Message exchange with me and T about some misappropriated breakfast product


----------



## Scepticalscribe

A friend's cat managed to use lever handles to open the window of their spacious living room, in order to carry out nocturnal assignations of a romantic nature, a fact that only came to light when it became clear that she was pregnant.


----------



## Alli

Herdfan said:


> Have you ever been to The Hemingway House in Key West?  They have those 6-toed cats.  Lots of them.



I’ve actually never found a reason to go down to Key West.


----------



## Herdfan

Huntn said:


> With 3 cats when we went on vacation the longest we left them was a week, 3 large kitty litter boxes, a tower water and tower food dispenser. They would be in the basement concrete floor* so no serious worries about revenge defecating.* The ceiling light was on a timer and it always worked out well.




We had one of those.  It was one of the two my wife had when we got married.  When we left it took about a day before she would leave a big  right behind the door ensuring the door scraped through it when we got home.


----------



## Herdfan

DT said:


> Our new kitty is a high speed ninja, she just appears out of nowhere and is gone in the blink of an eye - or - she's in full do-not-mess-with-me-I'm-relaxing, not much in between
> 
> Message exchange with me and T about some misappropriated breakfast product




Ah yes, that kitty thing where they need to be in another room 5 seconds ago.


----------



## DT

"Is that a string?  Love those maybe I'll play a little ..."

"OMG I NEED TO MAKE SURE MY BOX IS STILL UNDER THE BED!!"

*disappears*


----------



## Huntn

Scepticalscribe said:


> A friend's cat managed to use lever handles to open the window of their spacious living room, in order to carry out nocturnal assignations of a romantic nature, a fact that only came to light when it became clear that she was pregnant.



Well, cats in heat are miserable to be around, so she was solving the issue for all concerned.


----------



## Huntn

Herdfan said:


> We had one of those.  It was one of the two my wife had when we got married.  When we left it took about a day before she would leave a big  right behind the door ensuring the door scraped through it when we got home.



Having two cats can help. Nothing worse than a lonely cat. Once we had to give our one cat up for non-compliance of litter box usage, imo a direct result of being left for a couple of days. In the Navy, living in a duplex on base (Guam) we used to baby sit the neighbors cat, who when left by itself would use the bath tub to take a dump in, consistently,


----------



## Scepticalscribe

Huntn said:


> Well, cats in heat are miserable to be around, so she was solving the issue for all concerned.




She was indeed solving the issue; I think the family were astonished at how determined she was to get out to her paramour, for the aforementioned assignation - he seems to have been waiting for her in their (large) garden; they had thought that they had secured the house safely - such measures had always worked for their other cats.

Actually, she was a very handsome cat, (large, and sleek and black, if memory serves, with large eyes) - and was named Wookey, after the Wookey caves; an excellent hunter (huntress?), formidably intelligent, calm, quiet, but an observing cat, a noticing kind of cat, the kind that sat quietly and watched you, and then you realised that she had not only studied you, but that she also remembered what you did.

Actually, she was the sort of cat that tapped a paw on the aforementioned window to be let in, after a small bout of nocturnal hunting, noticing that we were still in the living room, sipping wine; one summer's night, as she sat on the outside windowsill while waiting for us to open that window, I recall how her eyes had followed a large moth - it was crashing against the window - and then she simply somehow caught it, and calmly proceeded to eat it, almost daring us to intervene (we were too astonished to do anything more than set our wine glasses down in disbelief).

She would watch you closely, paying extremely close attention to what you were doing, (not just brushing by you impatiently) as you opened the window to admit her.

And she also used to ask to be fed, and/or let out in the morning, by heading into the parents' bedroom, leaping (quietly) onto the bed, and then proceeding (gently, but firmly) to tap the cheek of the mother (who was German, an absolutely lovely lady, who only died last year), with her paw, in order to awaken her, but not the father, the professor of German, who was left to sleep soundly.

The family were astounded to learn that she was able to open that window, but not surprised by her abilities; they had remarked on the fact that she was a very intelligent cat on a number of occasions, more intelligent they suspected than were the dogs she shared the house with; it was a lovely, large, rambling house, full of books and music, wine and welcome, intelligent, informed (liberal) conversation, discussion and debate, dogs and cats, and, at that time, (around thirty years ago), especially that particular cat; both parents were academics, and the younger son was (and still is) a very good friend of mine.

However, a visit to the vet did occur after the birth of the aforementioned kittens, and the nocturnal assignations ended.


----------



## Huntn

Scepticalscribe said:


> She was indeed solving the issue; I think the family were astonished at how determined she was to get out to her paramour, for the aforementioned assignation - he seems to have been waiting for her in their (large) garden; they had thought that they had secured the house safely - such measures had always worked for their other cats.
> 
> Actually, she was a very handsome cat, (large, and sleek and black, if memory serves, with large eyes) - named Wookey, after the Wookey caves; an excellent hunter (huntress?), formidably intelligent, calm, quiet, but an observing cat, a noticing kind of cat, the kind that sat quietly and watched you, and then you realised that she had not only studied you, but that she also remembered what you did.
> 
> Actually, she was the sort of cat that tapped a paw on the aforementioned window to be let in, after a small bout of nocturnal hunting, noticing that we were still in the living room, sipping wine; one summer's night, as she sat on the outside windowsill while waiting for us to open that window, I recall how her eyes had followed a large moth - it was crashing against the window - and then she simply somehow caught it, and calmly proceeded to eat it, almost daring us to intervene (we were too astonished to do anything more than set our wine glasses down in disbelief) - and watched closely, paying extremely close attention to what you were doing, (not just brushing by you impatiently) as you opened the window to admit her.
> 
> The family were astounded to learn that she was able to open that window, but not surprised by her abilities; they had remarked on the fact that she was a very intelligent cat on a number of occasions, more intelligent they suspected than were the dogs she shared the house with; it was a lovely, large, rambling house, full of books and music, wine and welcome, dogs and cats, and, at that time, (around thirty years ago), especially that cat; both parents were academics, and the younger son was (and still is) a very good friend of mine.
> 
> However, a visit to the vet did occur after the birth of the aforementioned kittens, and the nocturnal assignations ended.



We always had our cats neutered.


----------



## Scepticalscribe

I think the advice in those days was to allow a cat or dog to have one litter of kittens or puppies, - if female - and then neuter them.

Males were neutered regardless.


----------



## Renzatic

Something keeps hurting my poor cat, Cappy. This is the second time she's disappeared for a night, coming in limping the next evening. 

If I had to take a guess as to who or what's responsible, I'd have to say it's my neighbor's dog.


----------



## Alli

Renzatic said:


> Something keeps hurting my poor cat, Cappy. This is the second time she's disappeared for a night, coming in limping the next evening.
> 
> If I had to take a guess as to who or what's responsible, I'd have to say it's my neighbor's dog.



Keep her indoors. Problem solved.


----------



## Renzatic

Alli said:


> Keep her indoors. Problem solved.




Cappy can't be an indoor cat. She still has a little bit of her feralness about her, and she panics when she gets closed in.


----------



## Herdfan

Normally when my daughter utters the words: "I have a TikTok to show you" I run for the hills.  But this one is pretty funny:






And someday I will own a Bengal or Savannah.


----------



## Yoused

only 4 secs, but I can watch this one over and over and over


----------



## Herdfan




----------



## SuperMatt

Found this heavenly cat on twitter:

https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1311803806938804224/


----------



## DT




----------



## Herdfan

DT said:


> View attachment 8198



So cute.

I have that same coffee table.  It's in storage because we moved from a very traditional house to a more comtemporary one and it doesn't fit in.


----------



## DT

Herdfan said:


> So cute.
> 
> I have that same coffee table.  It's in storage because we moved from a very traditional house to a more comtemporary one and it doesn't fit in.




It's terrible, it doesn't fit into our design/style/aesthetic either, it's just a placeholder, from another house.


----------



## Runs For Fun

That’s one damn handsome cat


----------



## JamesMike

A new addition to our home, my dog found her in London during our walk about.


----------



## Clix Pix

So what's her name?!


----------



## Runs For Fun

I’d vote for him

His platform is only wet food and morning snuggles for all! from
      aww


----------



## lizkat

Clix Pix said:


> So what's her name?!




s/b Fortunata...   for having been found by a dog which thinks a cat would be a nice addition to the family.


----------



## Yoused

Runs For Fun said:


> That’s one damn handsome cat
> View attachment 8561




_Is it safe?_

Frodo shoulda had it so good.


----------



## JamesMike

lizkat said:


> s/b Fortunata...   for having been found by a dog which thinks a cat would be a nice addition to the family.




I know, my dog found a kitten while we were in London, now she is a pain in our home, lol!


----------



## DT




----------



## DT

Oh, I also see that the new Photos app on my iPhone IDs animals!  I have the "magic info" icon, and a little paw icon on the image, and when I tap that, I get info about Oriental shorthairs.


----------



## lizkat

DT said:


> Oh, I also see that the new Photos app on my iPhone IDs animals!  I have the "magic info" icon, and a little paw icon on the image, and when I tap that, I get info about Oriental shorthairs.




Earlier version of that app once identified part of a crazy-quilt block on my design wall as a person I should tag.  Only Picasso could have thought that thing was a person.    App has come a long way!


----------



## DT

@lizkat FWIW, this is the "stock" iOS photos app, it's pretty slick (this is iOS15 on a 13 Pro Max):


----------



## Alli

This little peanut has gotten so spoiled that when I didn’t move fast enough to the garage to feed him and his mama this morning that he came to the steps to escort me.


----------



## Herdfan

Is anyone having trouble getting cat food?  I mean more than usual.  Had to make 3 stops today while out looking for the only food my daughter's picky cat will eat.  No one had it and neither did Chewy.  Finally found it at PetCo.


----------



## lizkat

Herdfan said:


> Is anyone having trouble getting cat food?  I mean more than usual.  Had to make 3 stops today while out looking for the only food my daughter's picky cat will eat.  No one had it and neither did Chewy.  Finally found it at PetCo.




yeah there's probably a million long tons of the stuff  in containerships circling offshore the port of Los Angeles or else waiting for rail or truck transport east...    along with a lot of what people think they're going to gift-wrap for Christmas.


----------



## Runs For Fun

This picture just popped up in my memories. The look on his face


----------



## lizkat

Runs For Fun said:


> This picture just popped up in my memories. The look on his face
> View attachment 9204




Ok you guys are reminding me now of a little black manx kitty, of the "stumpy tail" variety,  named Tuxedo for his white accents.    He was so cute as a kitten, fearlessly walking atop the curved backs of chairs in the sunroom to get a view of the world outside my bro's home.


----------



## Renzatic

SKITTY!


----------



## lizkat

Herdfan said:


> Is anyone having trouble getting cat food?  I mean more than usual.  Had to make 3 stops today while out looking for the only food my daughter's picky cat will eat.  No one had it and neither did Chewy.  Finally found it at PetCo.




Buy your cats an iPad mini and let them download the app store's Game of the Day for today:  it's a cargo transport strategy sim called Port City:  Ship Tycoon.


----------



## Renzatic

lizkat said:


> Buy your cats an iPad mini and let them download the app store's Game of the Day for today:  it's a cargo transport strategy sim called Port City:  Ship Tycoon.




They'll have to mow the yard a few times before I'll consider doing that.


----------



## lizkat

Renzatic said:


> They'll have to mow the yard a few times before I'll consider doing that




For that you need a goat, since it will mow the lawn for free. Downside:  will also eat things should leave alone.

But cats might enjoy that cargo transport simulator app,  just explain there's a ton of catfood out there on containerships and all they have to do to nail some of it is find a way to dock a couple of those watercraft at a port and get it on a train or a truck to your neighborhood.


----------



## Renzatic

lizkat said:


> For that you need a goat, since it will mow the lawn for free. Downside:  will also eat things should leave alone.
> 
> But cats might enjoy that cargo transport simulator app,  just explain there's a ton of catfood out there on containerships and all they have to do to nail some of it is find a way to dock a couple of those watercraft at a port and get it on a train or a truck to your neighborhood.




If my cats want an iPad, they'll have to earn it, by god! Ain't no freebies in this household!


----------



## thekev

Renzatic said:


> If my cats want an iPad, they'll have to earn it, by god! Ain't no freebies in this household!




Do you remember when your backyard was full of moles and chipmunks? Pepperidge Farm remembers. Maybe you buy the iPad and every now and then leave the television set to an ornithological nature show. Maybe this whole thing goes away.

edit: why did I type backyard as two words....?



Spoiler: The family guy reference was closer than the Futurama one


----------



## Renzatic

thekev said:


> Do you remember when your back yard was full of moles and chipmunks? Pepperidge Farm remembers. Maybe you buy the iPad and every now and then leave the television set to an ornithological nature show. Maybe this whole thing goes away.




I guess they do deserve a treat. I'll buy them an Android tablet.


----------



## Herdfan

Renzatic said:


> I guess they do deserve a treat. I'll buy them an Android tablet.




Well at least they will be able to close all open Apps with 2 button presses.


----------



## lizkat

Herdfan said:


> Well at least they will be able to close all open Apps with 2 button presses.




Heh.  I have a very old iPad mini that occasionally manages that without any button presses at all.  I only keep it because it has an old version of Plants v Zombies that I liked but that didn't stay in the devs' upgrade lane.   Time to give it up and get a mini that was built in this decade.


----------



## lizkat

Renzatic said:


> I guess they do deserve a treat. I'll buy them an Android tablet.




This bodega cat likely has whatever kind of tablet it wanted.  And a stash of catfood as well, even if its job is to dispatch rodents to the next level...

https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1449379329863979011/


----------



## Renzatic

lizkat said:


> This bodega cat likely has whatever kind of tablet it wanted.  And a stash of catfood as well, even if its job is to dispatch rodents to the next level...
> 
> https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1449379329863979011/




That is one ticked off looking cat...


----------



## lizkat

Renzatic said:


> That is one ticked off looking cat...




Yah that cat looks like knows how to maintain law and order for sure.   Here are some happy cats for Monday.

​
Man is this app a perfect storm of a time-waster.  The app is KittyCollectors+ and I got the Arcade version at Apple's app store.   Terminally cute, slightly klutzy interface but of course I got over that. 

I might have to set up an iOS "focus" to prohibit my use of the app during what I regard as normal working hours.  



Spoiler: You know you want to try it



The regular app store's version of the app has in-app purchases but the Arcade version it's all just play money (well, fish) of which you're given an opening supply.    All you have to do is shop for goodies and then set those out in the yard to amuse or comfort any kitties who show up to eat and play and sleep...  and they leave you gifts (fish or goldfish) with which you purchase more goodies and replenish their food dish.

If they really like the stuff you leave out for them, one or another of them will eventually leave you special gifts called mementos.  Just check back every so often and fill up their food bowl, accept the gifts they've left, buy more goodies or swap out the arrangement of the ones you've put into the yard.

You can snap photos of them to stick in their in-game albums, or take group photos of the yard at a given time that will download to your Photos.



Each kitty has a name, some are very elusive, all have different personalities and goodie preferences you learn over time by consulting their individual photo albums, where their three most favored toys or comforting objects are recorded.   So this being October baseball season, I am quite fond of the kitty named Joe Dimeowgio.   Yeah, really there's one named that.


----------



## Renzatic

lizkat said:


> So this being October baseball season, I am quite fond of the kitty named Joe Dimeowgio.   Yeah, really there's one named that.




Skitty in blanket is best skitty.


----------



## lizkat

Renzatic said:


> Skitty in blanket is best skitty.




Bandit likes blankets, pull toys, upside down cardboard boxes, tents... even flat cardboard.


​


----------



## Runs For Fun

lizkat said:


> Yah that cat looks like knows how to maintain law and order for sure.   Here are some happy cats for Monday.
> 
> View attachment 9243​
> Man is this app a perfect storm of a time-waster.  The app is KittyCollectors+ and I got the Arcade version at Apple's app store.   Terminally cute, slightly klutzy interface but of course I got over that.
> 
> I might have to set up an iOS "focus" to prohibit my use of the app during what I regard as normal working hours.
> 
> 
> 
> Spoiler: You know you want to try it
> 
> 
> 
> The regular app store's version of the app has in-app purchases but the Arcade version it's all just play money (well, fish) of which you're given an opening supply.    All you have to do is shop for goodies and then set those out in the yard to amuse or comfort any kitties who show up to eat and play and sleep...  and they leave you gifts (fish or goldfish) with which you purchase more goodies and replenish their food dish.
> 
> If they really like the stuff you leave out for them, one or another of them will eventually leave you special gifts called mementos.  Just check back every so often and fill up their food bowl, accept the gifts they've left, buy more goodies or swap out the arrangement of the ones you've put into the yard.
> 
> You can snap photos of them to stick in their in-game albums, or take group photos of the yard at a given time that will download to your Photos.
> 
> 
> 
> Each kitty has a name, some are very elusive, all have different personalities and goodie preferences you learn over time by consulting their individual photo albums, where their three most favored toys or comforting objects are recorded.   So this being October baseball season, I am quite fond of the kitty named Joe Dimeowgio.   Yeah, really there's one named that.



OMG I didn't know there was an Apple Arcade version on that game! I kind of got annoyed by all the microtransactions. I might keep Apple Arcade for this game alone!


----------



## lizkat

Runs For Fun said:


> OMG I didn't know there was an Apple Arcade version on that game! I kind of got annoyed by all the microtransactions. I might keep Apple Arcade for this game alone!




Yah I ran into the Arcade version of KittyCollector+ after finally switching to Apple One plan since I already had Music and TV plans separately.   Had never even looked at the arcade games, picked that one up and havn't gone back for more yet --- since getting hooked on that one is bad enough!


----------



## Alli

Mama (Runty) and Bobtail Kitty. I’m going to have to rig up something a little better for cooler weather.


----------



## Thomas Veil

Last week as I was sitting down to lunch, my mom texts me to say that she can't find her cat and she thinks he's dead. It's true, he's pretty old, so that's not an unreasonable surmise.

So I skip lunch and drive over to her place with a flashlight. I play detective and ask her when was the last time she saw him. She says yesterday morning. So he's been missing for maybe a day and a half.

I start looking around. Behind furniture. Under furniture. The living room. The kitchen. The bathroom. Her bedroom. Some of these places she's already looked, but I want to be sure.

When I can't find him there, I start in the basement. Again, behind and under stuff with the flashlight. Nothing. Nada. Zip.

I ask her about the spare bedrooms. She tells me she never goes in there, so he can't be in there. You know where this is going, don't you? So I take another look around with no results.

At this point I decide to follow the advice of Hercule Poirot and sit and let the little grey cells do the work. Where could he be, where I haven't already looked? I come up with nothing. It's not that big a house. I've looked all the places I could think of. So then I follow another bit of advice (Sherlock Holmes?): when you have eliminated all other possibilities, whatever is left, no matter how improbable, is the answer. 

So I ask her about the spare bedrooms again. She insists she never opens those doors. I tell her barring that, the only thing she can do is wait until his body starts to, er, smell, and trace that. I'm about to leave when I tell her I'm gonna look in the spare bedrooms anyway, just to be positive.

Sure enough, I open the door and _immediately_ the cat runs out and bawls me out with a loud, crabby meow. _Then_ my mom tells me she was only in there to get an envelope from the dresser. 

*Sigh.*


----------



## DT

FFS ...


----------



## SuperMatt

DT said:


> FFS ...



Is that from the movie ET?


----------



## lizkat

Don't know where my bro got this. Looks like an extrajudicial settlement was up next.

​


----------



## Scepticalscribe

Thomas Veil said:


> Last week as I was sitting down to lunch, my mom texts me to say that she can't find her cat and she thinks he's dead. It's true, he's pretty old, so that's not an unreasonable surmise.
> 
> So I skip lunch and drive over to her place with a flashlight. I play detective and ask her when was the last time she saw him. She says yesterday morning. So he's been missing for maybe a day and a half.
> 
> I start looking around. Behind furniture. Under furniture. The living room. The kitchen. The bathroom. Her bedroom. Some of these places she's already looked, but I want to be sure.
> 
> When I can't find him there, I start in the basement. Again, behind and under stuff with the flashlight. Nothing. Nada. Zip.
> 
> I ask her about the spare bedrooms. She tells me she never goes in there, so he can't be in there. You know where this is going, don't you? So I take another look around with no results.
> 
> At this point I decide to follow the advice of Hercule Poirot and sit and let the little grey cells do the work. Where could he be, where I haven't already looked? I come up with nothing. It's not that big a house. I've looked all the places I could think of. So then I follow another bit of advice (Sherlock Holmes?): when you have eliminated all other possibilities, whatever is left, no matter how improbable, is the answer.
> 
> So I ask her about the spare bedrooms again. She insists she never opens those doors. I tell her barring that, the only thing she can do is wait until his body starts to, er, smell, and trace that. I'm about to leave when I tell her I'm gonna look in the spare bedrooms anyway, just to be positive.
> 
> Sure enough, I open the door and _immediately_ the cat runs out and bawls me out with a loud, crabby meow. _Then_ my mom tells me she was only in there to get an envelope from the dresser.
> 
> *Sigh.*



Not Sherlock Holmes, but, I think that could be Occam's Razor (after Roger of Occam).


----------



## ericwn

DT said:


> FFS ...




What is that even useful for?


----------



## DT

ericwn said:


> What is that even useful for?





Kitty on the deck / outside, who's 100% indoor only


----------



## DT

So I've been saying "hello!" to this kitty and now she walks around purring what sounds like, HELLOOO?

Then over the weekend, she was sitting at the rear screen door, making squirrel sounds - back at the squirrels.  It's __trippy__


----------



## lizkat

DT said:


> So I've been saying "hello!" to this kitty and now she walks around purring what sounds like, HELLOOO?
> 
> Then over the weekend, she was sitting at the rear screen door, making squirrel sounds - back at the squirrels.  It's __trippy__




Hah that cat has you in her pocket for life.  Didn't take long, did it?

Make sure she doesn't get outside during Halloween.   Kids can be stupidly cruel to kitties in this season.


----------



## DT

lizkat said:


> Hah that cat has you in her pocket for life.  Didn't take long, did it?
> 
> Make sure she doesn't get outside during Halloween.   Kids can be stupidly cruel to kitties in this season.




Hahaha, the screaming sort of drives me nuts, so I do have to occasionally chase her upstairs.

Yeah, we have a rule to  always have two doors closed for coming/going, unless she's specifically locked up (in Daughter's room).

Our laundry room has two doors, and that leads into the garage, so we go in, confirm no kitty, open the second door.  It's like leaving a space station ...


----------



## Herdfan

DT said:


> Hahaha, the screaming sort of drives me nuts, so I do have to occasionally chase her upstairs.



Our Gizmo rarely shuts up.  The irony is my wife wanted to keep him because as a kitten, he had almost no meow.  The vet guessed he had gotten his vocal chords damaged in the womb.  She was afraid someone would let him outside and if he got into trouble, he wouldn't be able to call for help.  

Well, that didn't last long as he found his voice at about a year and hasn't been quiet since.


----------



## lizkat

I used to have to worry about an indoor cat getting out;  it was after I first moved up here full time and still had a cat that was accustomed to life in my city apartment.   He was old though,  and quickly became content to snooze in the sunny places he picked out as his own inside the house.  

No problem with the last two cats I had acquired here in the boondocks, since both were winter rescues... and one of them would actually flee to the living room whenever I opened the back door and there was so much as a cool breeze coming in, even during summer.


----------



## Thomas Veil

Scepticalscribe said:


> Not Sherlock Holmes, but, I think that could be Occam's Razor (after Roger of Occam).



Occam's razor is similar, though it deals with explanations of various complexity, insisting that the simplest one is usually correct.

I had a moment to check it out, and it is Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, although I didn't exactly quote it correctly, hence the confusion. 





DT said:


> FFS ...




That's what Brian Laundrie's cat uses when it goes camping.





....What? Too soon?


----------



## Scepticalscribe

Thomas Veil said:


> Occam's razor is similar, though it deals with explanations of various complexity, insisting that the simplest one is usually correct.
> 
> I had a moment to check it out, and it is Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, although I didn't exactly quote it correctly, hence the confusion.




Given the respective dates, I'd wager that Sir Arthur Conan Doyle elaborated on principles first enunciated by Roger of Occam (not that this may have been attributed, needless to say) in that elegantly nonchalant manner perfected by educated aristocrats.


----------



## Alli

DT said:


> Our laundry room has two doors, and that leads into the garage, so we go in, confirm no kitty, open the second door. It's like leaving a space station ...






lizkat said:


> No problem with the last two cats I had acquired here in the boondocks, since both were winter rescues... and one of them would actually flee to the living room whenever I opened the back door and there was so much as a cool breeze coming in, even during summer.




Two of my three won’t go near the doors when they’re open. The third will race past your feet at every opportunity. Fortunately, once he gets out he usually just lies down on the cement and waits for you to bring him back in. He’s currently on house arrest though, because the last time he went out he decided he needed to follow the ferals under the house. He wouldn’t come out when I called him. Of course, when his daddy got down on all fours and hollered at him to come out, he came right away. Typical.


----------



## Runs For Fun

Alli said:


> The third will race past your feet at every opportunity. Fortunately, once he gets out he usually just lies down on the cement and waits for you to bring him back in.



Typical cat.


----------



## Thomas Veil

DT said:


> Our laundry room has two doors, and that leads into the garage, so we go in, confirm no kitty, open the second door. It's like leaving a space station ...




That is _exactly_ how my mom is whenever anyone wants to leave the house. I’ve trained myself to think of it as “the airlock maneuver”.


----------



## Renzatic

So I brought Polly into the house because she kept being beat up by Pete. I figured that would be the end of it, because she's always been the most timid of the bunch.

...but no. As it turns out, all it did was cause Pete to turn his aggression on Fuzzy. Now she's being beat up and harassed by Pete, and is actually taking it much worse than Polly ever did, fretting far more, and losing weight. I'm now acclimating her to the house as well.

I don't know what it is that made Pete so bullying and territorial, but he's incredibly mean to his sisters.


----------



## Scepticalscribe

Renzatic said:


> So I brought Polly into the house because she kept being beat up by Pete. I figured that would be the end of it, because she's always been the most timid of the bunch.
> 
> ...but no. As it turns out, all it did was cause Pete to turn his aggression on Fuzzy. Now she's being beat up and harassed by Pete, and is actually taking it much worse than Polly ever did, fretting far more, and losing weight. I'm now acclimating her to the house as well.
> 
> I don't know what it is that made Pete so bullying and territorial, but he's incredibly mean to his sisters.



I was about to write "has he been vaccinated", (for lamentably, this has become a sequence of letters and words that is now almost automatic) when I belatedly realised that the question I really wished to ask is whether he has had his Visit To The Vet for the purpose of curbing or curtailing his reproductive desires, or urges.


----------



## Renzatic

Scepticalscribe said:


> I was about to write "has he been vaccinated", (for lamentably, this has become a sequence of letters and words that is now almost automatic) when I realised that the question I really wished to ask is whether he has had his Visit To The Vet for the purpose of curtailing his reproductive urges.




Yup. He received the snip while he was still a kitten.

He's great towards people. Always friendly, comes when called, always wants to play and be pet. But when it comes to the other cats, he's a jealous bully. No idea why.


----------



## Yoused

lizkat said:


> For that you need a goat, since it will mow the lawn for free. Downside: will also eat things should leave alone.



There is an area in eastside downtown Portland (between 11th and 12th, south of Morrison) that has come to be known as the "Goat Blocks" because a developer cleared the vegetation from the neglected area by bringing in a herd of goats.


----------



## Runs For Fun

He's the cuddly one


----------



## The-Real-Deal82

We are currently looking for a British Short Hair as after doing our research, they fit our house the best in terms of temperament etc. I am not really a car person but have been overruled by the 3 females I live with on this one lol. Plenty of these for sale but want to make sure we source a female BSH from a reputable breeder.


----------



## Yoused

The-Real-Deal82 said:


> I am not really a car person but …



Yeah, I have heard that before. It will become your cat, treating everyone else with feline-meh. It will insist on sleeping on your face and you will end up revising your feelings about cats. Or at least about this one.


----------



## lizkat

Yoused said:


> Yeah, I have heard that before. It will become your cat, treating everyone else with feline-meh. It will insist on sleeping on your face and you will end up revising your feelings about cats. Or at least about this one.




Yep.  Next up:  bits of bacon fed under the table at breakfast.


----------



## ericwn

“In ancient times cats were treated like gods. They have not forgotten. “
(Terry Pratchett)


----------



## Renzatic

lizkat said:


> Yep.  Next up:  bits of bacon fed under the table at breakfast.




My cats get pureed leftover steak sometimes.


----------



## Alli

Renzatic said:


> My cats get pureed leftover steak sometimes.



My late mother-in-law used to feed her Siamese fresh shrimp. Shelled. Talk about spoiled!


----------



## lizkat

A cat will walk over fire to snag a piece of chicken, I know that much.  I learned a long time ago to take my plate with me back to the kitchen if I'd gone out to the deck for lunch and got there with some chicken and then thought something like "oh I know what would go great with this...."  

Meanwhile my most favorite cat-caught-stealing collection is this one:



			https://www.boredpanda.com/cats-stealing-food


----------



## Renzatic

lizkat said:


> A cat will walk over fire to snag a piece of chicken, I know that much.  I learned a long time ago to take my plate with me back to the kitchen if I'd gone out to the deck for lunch and got there with some chicken and then thought something like "oh I know what would go great with this...."
> 
> Meanwhile my most favorite cat-caught-stealing collection is this one:
> 
> 
> 
> https://www.boredpanda.com/cats-stealing-food




#7 reminds me of something one of my old cats did once. I had a glass of milk, and he decided he wanted a taste, so he stuck his head in, and...

...REALIZED IT WAS STUCK! So he started trashing his head around, and running into walls until I managed to stop him, and pull the glass off his head. Lucky for him, it was plastic.


----------



## lizkat

Renzatic said:


> #7 reminds me of something one of my old cats did once. I had a glass of milk, and he decided he wanted a taste, so he stuck his head in, and...
> 
> ...REALIZED IT WAS STUCK! So he started trashing his head around, and running into walls until I managed to stop him, and pull the glass off his head. Lucky for him, it was plastic.




Yeah stuff like that does happen.   One of the cats up at the family farm was missing for three days, turned up dragging his sorry self and an attached empty mayo jar backwards up the farm lane, apparently having fished that jar out of the trash down at a neighboring farm.   My kinfolk extricated him by applying liquid soap around the jar lid and his neck fur in that area. Next step was gonna be try to hacksaw the bottom of the jar off, so it's nice that the soap trick worked.  Kitty was grateful enough not to complain about the ensuing warm bath and toweling activity.   Vet later said only thing saved the cat's life was condensation from his breath in the jar overnights, when the temperature had dropped and the cat was smart enough to turn so the liquid ran towards him.   He quit venturing down the road after that and started hanging out underfoot near the door to the milkroom where he'd been taken for the rescue and washing-up process.


----------



## thekev

Renzatic said:


> That is one ticked off looking cat...




Cat's awesome. If they look at you that way the first time you see them, it is merely a challenge.


----------



## thekev

lizkat said:


> Yeah stuff like that does happen.   One of the cats up at the family farm was missing for three days, turned up dragging his sorry self and an attached empty mayo jar backwards up the farm lane, apparently having fished that jar out of the trash down at a neighboring farm.   My kinfolk extricated him by applying liquid soap around the jar lid and his neck fur in that area. Next step was gonna be try to hacksaw the bottom of the jar off, so it's nice that the soap trick worked.  Kitty was grateful enough not to complain about the ensuing warm bath and toweling activity.   Vet later said only thing saved the cat's life was condensation from his breath in the jar overnights, when the temperature had dropped* and the cat was smart enough to turn so the liquid ran towards him. *  He quit venturing down the road after that and started hanging out underfoot near the door to the milkroom where he'd been taken for the rescue and washing-up process.





It's a fremen cat. He was born knowing how to use a stillsuit.


----------



## Renzatic

lizkat said:


> Yeah stuff like that does happen.




That poor kitty. At least he got out of it okay.



thekev said:


> Cat's awesome. If they look at you that way the first time you see them, it is merely a challenge.




You know, I'm pretty sure I could take that cat in a fight.


----------



## Renzatic

thekev said:


> It's a fremen cat. He was born knowing how to use a stillsuit.


----------



## lizkat

thekev said:


> It's a fremen cat. He was born knowing how to use a stillsuit.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> .





Of course I had to look it up.   LOL at the fortuitous search results


----------



## Runs For Fun

Yoused said:


> Yeah, I have heard that before. It will become your cat, treating everyone else with feline-meh. It will insist on sleeping on your face and you will end up revising your feelings about cats. Or at least about this one.



Yep. Cats are fricking weird


----------



## lizkat

Runs For Fun said:


> Yep. Cats are fricking weird




Cool that they've been around humans for millennia,  but compared to dogs have become "domesticated" only on their own terms.


----------



## Runs For Fun

lizkat said:


> Cool that they've been around humans for millennia,  but compared to dogs have become "domesticated" only on their own terms.



That’s such a cat thing lol


----------



## Yoused

Renzatic said:


>



That sounds like it was looped out of something by The HU.


----------



## lizkat

Wow the game Kitty Collector+ really does have one named Joe DiMeowgio. Finally got a photo of him "at bat".


----------



## SuperMatt

Cats know how to be dramatic.


----------



## thekev

lizkat said:


> Of course I had to look it up.   LOL at the fortuitous search results
> 
> View attachment 9502




Did you look up stillsuit as well?




Renzatic said:


>




The slow claw penetrates the shield. It's only a matter of time before someone attaches a weirding module to a cat.


----------



## lizkat

thekev said:


> Did you look up stillsuit as well?




Yeah.  Gross.


----------



## thekev

lizkat said:


> Yeah.  Gross.




Also not theoretically feasible, but hey, if you can travel across the galaxy in spaceships powered by worm poop, it doesn't seem like such a stretch.


----------



## Herdfan

I am wondering how our boy Gismo is going to handle the time change.  In another thread we were discussing how we as people handle/don't handle it and I have to wonder about him.

He has an internal clock that is as accurate  as any humans.    He comes down with us in the evening to watch TV and within 5 minutes of 10 o'clock he is pacing and fussing because he wants to go up and have his "dinner" ( we can't free feed the boys because they would be bigger than they are).  He was a mess Tuesday because we were watching the election returns, the game and a recorded program.  So at about 10:30 the wife finally got tired of him and went up and fed them.   Fifteen minutes later he was back down fussing because his routine got messed up.

So I have no idea what is going to happen Sunday evening.  He is going to want to be fed by his clock at 9, which isn't going to happen otherwise he will be waking me up to feed them breakfast.  So I guess we will have to listen to him fuss for an hour or so.

Anyone else have cats with internal clocks?


----------



## Roller

Herdfan said:


> I am wondering how our boy Gismo is going to handle the time change.  In another thread we were discussing how we as people handle/don't handle it and I have to wonder about him.
> 
> He has an internal clock that is as accurate  as any humans.    He comes down with us in the evening to watch TV and within 5 minutes of 10 o'clock he is pacing and fussing because he wants to go up and have his "dinner" ( we can't free feed the boys because they would be bigger than they are).  He was a mess Tuesday because we were watching the election returns, the game and a recorded program.  So at about 10:30 the wife finally got tired of him and went up and fed them.   Fifteen minutes later he was back down fussing because his routine got messed up.
> 
> So I have no idea what is going to happen Sunday evening.  He is going to want to be fed by his clock at 9, which isn't going to happen otherwise he will be waking me up to feed them breakfast.  So I guess we will have to listen to him fuss for an hour or so.
> 
> Anyone else have cats with internal clocks?



I suspect our cat has an internal clock, but if he does, he's never been particularly forthcoming about it. He does tend to be more active at night, when he runs up and down our stairs and periodically visits our bed. We haven't noticed any behavioral changes during time transitions. But we don't feed him at fixed times — we just fill his bowl once a day and he eats when he wants. I know this is frowned upon, but he seems to self regulate and his weight is good.


----------



## lizkat

Herdfan said:


> I am wondering how our boy Gismo is going to handle the time change.  In another thread we were discussing how we as people handle/don't handle it and I have to wonder about him.
> 
> He has an internal clock that is as accurate  as any humans.    He comes down with us in the evening to watch TV and within 5 minutes of 10 o'clock he is pacing and fussing because he wants to go up and have his "dinner" ( we can't free feed the boys because they would be bigger than they are).  He was a mess Tuesday because we were watching the election returns, the game and a recorded program.  So at about 10:30 the wife finally got tired of him and went up and fed them.   Fifteen minutes later he was back down fussing because his routine got messed up.
> 
> So I have no idea what is going to happen Sunday evening.  He is going to want to be fed by his clock at 9, which isn't going to happen otherwise he will be waking me up to feed them breakfast.  So I guess we will have to listen to him fuss for an hour or so.
> 
> Anyone else have cats with internal clocks?




Oh yeah.   when I lived in California, the matriarch of the three Siamese cats the family had was about 20 years old and belonged to the grandma of the household.   Everyone was to gather in grandma's sitting room at 11pm for the late news.   Cat would then settle on grandma's lap and be fed kitty treats during the news.   Whoever resisted the roundup was pursued by that old cat and treated to verbal abuse like only a Siamese cat can dish out, probably 120 decibels.


----------



## Scepticalscribe

Herdfan said:


> He has an internal clock that is as accurate  as any humans.    .......
> 
> Anyone else have cats with internal clocks?



Fascinating.

Actually, I have known cats with astonishingly accurate internal clocks.

At the risk of quoting myself, I'll simply cite a post I wrote a few months ago.



Scepticalscribe said:


> I've long been struck by the phenomenal punctuality, and time keeping ability of cats, and their extraordinary sense of spatial awareness.
> 
> When I was in Afghanistan, one of my colleagues - a Superintendent in the RCMP (Major/Lt-Colonel equivalent) - adopted, or bonded with, (or was adopted by, or chosen by) one of the semi-feral cats that roamed the compound (and were spoiled, and fussed over by many of us; they were very good at identifying which laps would readily accommodate, play host to, and welcome them).
> 
> Anyway, I recall - with awed amazement - how that cat would make its way to the door of the office of the Canadian RCMP Superintendent, precisely on the dot, at exactly 16.50 each and every day, and would wait, sitting patiently outside the door of his office, until my colleague finished his day's work, (at 17.00) whereupon it would then proceed to accompany him to his room, and sprawl and stretch out, blissfully and happily on his bed.


----------



## Yoused

Scepticalscribe said:


> I've long been struck by the phenomenal punctuality, and time keeping ability of cats, and their extraordinary sense of spatial awareness.



Both? Cats have a keen sense of … _spacetime_? Well, that would explain why Erwin put a cat in the box, rather than some other creature.


----------



## ericwn

Wow!


----------



## thekev

ericwn said:


> Wow!




That guy is brilliant. The compositing work is really good too. He did it roughly as I would have expected, but that must have taken an incredible number of hours.


----------



## The-Real-Deal82

We are picking our British Short hair up on the 18th November. My daughters are adamant the name of this kitten is going to be ‘Beau’ as they like the name, however the kitten is female and this is a male name. We are thinking to get around this we’ll spell it ‘Boe’ or something like that. What do you guys think? I’m staying out of it as much as I can and just buying the accessories I’ve been told to buy 

This is the kitten we’ve gone for:


----------



## Herdfan

The-Real-Deal82 said:


> We are picking our British Short hair up on the 18th November. My daughters are adamant the name of this kitten is going to be ‘Beau’ as they like the name, however the kitten is female and this is a male name. We are thinking to get around this we’ll spell it ‘Boe’ or something like that. What do you guys think? I’m staying out of it as much as I can and just buying the accessories I’ve been told to buy
> 
> This is the kitten we’ve gone for:




Since you are in the UK, wouldn't that simply be a "short hair"?   

Sweet looking kitty.     The female version of Beau is Belle.


----------



## Roller

thekev said:


> That guy is brilliant. The compositing work is really good too. He did it roughly as I would have expected, but that must have taken an incredible number of hours.



IIRC, the guy who does his is a video editor. My favorite one is from The Matrix, with Home Alone a close second, but all of them are good.


----------



## thekev

Roller said:


> IIRC, the guy who does his is a video editor.* My favorite one is from The Matrix*, with Home Alone a close second, but all of them are good.




Ahh yes.. the movie that made drunk boxing into science fiction. Also the Home Alone one is pretty believable.


----------



## lizkat

Herdfan said:


> Since you are in the UK, wouldn't that simply be a "short hair"?
> 
> Sweet looking kitty.     The female version of Beau is Belle.




Hmm....  maybe "Beau" in the case of a girl kitty could just be short for Bodacious...


​


----------



## Scepticalscribe

The-Real-Deal82 said:


> We are picking our British Short hair up on the 18th November. My daughters are adamant the name of this kitten is going to be ‘Beau’ as they like the name, however the kitten is female and this is a male name. We are thinking to get around this we’ll spell it ‘Boe’ or something like that. What do you guys think? I’m staying out of it as much as I can and just buying the accessories I’ve been told to buy
> 
> This is the kitten we’ve gone for:



Nothing wrong with "Beau".

Several years go, my next door neighbour's daughter acquired two cats, litter mates and siblings that were given the names of Abby and Phoebe.

When the day came for That Visit To The Vet, it transpired that Phoebe was a boy, but he knew his name, and answered to it, and so, Phoebe he remained until the day he died, many years later.


----------



## Yoused

The Scots word _bò_, which is pronounced like "beau", means cow.


----------



## Scepticalscribe

Yoused said:


> The Scots word _bò_, which is pronounced like "beau", means cow.




This is also the Irish (Gaelic) word for cow.


----------



## Yoused

Scots and Irish are very similar. About like Spanish compared to Italian: same language with a bunch of words that are different.


----------



## The-Real-Deal82

Scepticalscribe said:


> This is also the Irish (Gaelic) word for cow.




I’m half Irish so perhaps i’ll suggest that but not tell my wife the meaning?


----------



## Yoused

The-Real-Deal82 said:


> I’m half Irish so perhaps i’ll suggest that but not tell my wife the meaning?



Hey, cows get a bad rap. I was driving home through the countryside some while back when I saw a cow spot another one and bound happily over to her. They are only stupid because we prevent them from being not stupid.


----------



## lizkat

Photos of kitties on US / British naval ships, mostly in WWII --  with their own little hammocks.









						Twitter User Shared 14 Historical Photos Of Cats Chilling In Their Tiny Hammocks Aboard Naval Ships
					

Having a cat is a blessing, especially when you’re lonely... and sailing across the sea. This Twitter thread will show you what it was like to have cats aboard naval ships.




					www.boredpanda.com


----------



## Renzatic

lizkat said:


> Photos of kitties on US / British naval ships, mostly in WWII --  with their own little hammocks.




War skitties.


----------



## ericwn

lizkat said:


> Photos of kitties on US / British naval ships, mostly in WWII -- with their own little hammocks.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Twitter User Shared 14 Historical Photos Of Cats Chilling In Their Tiny Hammocks Aboard Naval Ships
> 
> 
> Having a cat is a blessing, especially when you’re lonely... and sailing across the sea. This Twitter thread will show you what it was like to have cats aboard naval ships.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> www.boredpanda.com




Gotta have a pet when you’re not busy killing others, everyone has a down-time


----------



## lizkat

ericwn said:


> Gotta have a pet when you’re not busy killing others, everyone has a down-time




Hah, a bunch of cats were probably brought aboard those ships originally to help keep rats in check down in the storerooms.    Kittens ensued in the normal course of events and their cuteness probably helped save at least some from being drowned, which was the old fashioned and cruel way of dealing with too many underfoot...


----------



## The-Real-Deal82

We got our BSH yesterday and she’s settled in without any issues. Didn’t wake us in the night so hopefully she won’t tonight.


----------



## Herdfan

Beautiful.  

I thought BSH's were all gray?


----------



## Yoused

"Governing Council of Cat Fancy" ??


----------



## lizkat

The-Real-Deal82 said:


> We got our BSH yesterday and she’s settled in without any issues. Didn’t wake us in the night so hopefully she won’t tonight.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> e.




How sweet!  Settling right in...  but tonight she'll be measuring the drapes?    Good luck!


----------



## The-Real-Deal82

Herdfan said:


> Beautiful.
> 
> I thought BSH's were all gray?




No they are grey, cream, black and even brown from what I have seen. I joined a Facebook group for them for advice and they are various colours. Ours is a silver tipped British short hair.


----------



## The-Real-Deal82

lizkat said:


> How sweet! Settling right in... but tonight she'll be measuring the drapes? Good luck!




She hasn’t climbed the curtains yet but has been up and down the arms of the sofa and chairs. Kind of regretting the new three piece suite that is being delivered December the 1st . My youngest daughter is still terrified of her so also trying to work that one out lol.


----------



## Alli

The-Real-Deal82 said:


> My youngest daughter is still terrified of her so also trying to work that one out lol.



Hopefully it won’t take long.


----------



## lizkat

True bliss is a stash of salt and vinegar potato chips...  and some bodega cat has figured this out!

https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1463348558740996097/


----------



## Runs For Fun

blessed_recreation from
      blessedimages


----------



## lizkat

Runs For Fun said:


> blessed_recreation from
> blessedimages




My favorite of memes involving a cat's culinary critiques:


​


----------



## lizkat

Not sure cats actually like Twinkies, so this guy might not be guilty but he's sure acting like it.  And he's...  plump! 

https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1465438367970115589/


----------



## Yoused

umm,


Spoiler: what?












						Delta passenger was 'breastfeeding cat mid-flight and refused to stop'
					

A message that was sent by a Delta crew member through the Aircraft Communications Addressing and Reporting System claimed that a passenger was breastfeeding her cat.




					www.dailymail.co.uk
				







(note: this is the _Daily Mail_, so salt grains may be advisable)


----------



## lizkat

Kitty was just told that an egg turns into a chicken in 21 long days...

https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1467224844358062089/


----------



## Herdfan

Cats should come with sound effects like in cartoons.

I think I have mentioned that Gismo is way more observant than a cat should be.  Well last night we put them in the bedroom to keep them out from under our feet as we were rearranging the living room to put up the Christmas tree.

This morning when we opened the door Gismo ran out the door and you could almost hear his paws "screeeech" on the floor as he came to a dead stop when he noticed the room was different.  

It also reminded us of our departed Hummie.  We came home from a vacation in one August to discover one of our cats had gone blind.  Not totally, the vet though he could see large dark shapes.  But when we rearranged the living room, he walked right into the end table.  It was his last Christmas as he died the following February.  But he did great being a "blind" cat.


----------



## throAU

My younger one (well, she's 11, but she only started slowing down from "hyperactive kitten mode" in the past couple of years) has a terrible life.

If ever you feel you're having a bad day, spare a thought for this poor little critter (excuse somewhat potato quality, was a photo sent via SMS from my partner)


----------



## Runs For Fun

Guilty. ️


----------



## Herdfan

Definitely guilty.  Also have been know to tell one to go find his brother.


----------



## lizkat

Herdfan said:


> Definitely guilty.  Also have been know to tell one to go find his brother.




The worst thing is when you take a cat to the vet but return with an empty carrier and that kitty is never coming back, and you can't explain this to your other cat(s).  Happened to me in the city once when a cat expired enroute to the vet's.  I had another cat at the time, and was also cat-sitting one for a friend who was in Europe.  When I first came home and set the empty carrier down on the LR floor, the two remaining kitties just ran away to the bedroom. That's rule one for a cat ever spotting a cat-carrier:  hide under a bed.

Then I guess they remembered that their buddy had been carted away in that thing a few hours earlier, so now they wanted to see inside.  So I opened it.  No kitty.  Hmm...

And then they really started up.  WHERE'S OUR BUDDY?  They were relentless.  I had to leave all the room doors and closet doors open for a week and a half until they finally gave up looking for their missing pal.  The experience didn't do anything for me either, and by the time it was over I was crazy trying to explain to them, distract them, keep them from destroying my furniture...   and I think by around the 10th day they were starting to realize they could troll me for better food, too.


----------



## Herdfan

lizkat said:


> The worst thing is when you take a cat to the vet but return with an empty carrier and that kitty is never coming back, and you can't explain this to your other cat(s).  Happened to me in the city once when a cat expired enroute to the vet's.  I had another cat at the time, and was also cat-sitting one for a friend who was in Europe.  When I first came home and set the empty carrier down on the LR floor, the two remaining kitties just ran away to the bedroom. That's rule one for a cat ever spotting a cat-carrier:  hide under a bed.
> 
> Then I guess they remembered that their buddy had been carted away in that thing a few hours earlier, so now they wanted to see inside.  So I opened it.  No kitty.  Hmm...
> 
> And then they really started up.  WHERE'S OUR BUDDY?  They were relentless.  I had to leave all the room doors and closet doors open for a week and a half until they finally gave up looking for their missing pal.  The experience didn't do anything for me either, and by the time it was over I was crazy trying to explain to them, distract them, keep them from destroying my furniture...   and I think by around the 10th day they were starting to realize they could troll me for better food, too.




Yes, its horrible.  The wife had 2 cats when we got married.  I had a dog.  It ended up we had 2 cats and my parents had a dog. 

They were also litter mates she had brought home from Africa and they were inseparable.  One got sick and we had to take her to the vet and she didn't come home.  The other one looked for her for weeks.  Finally got her a kitten and she went into mother mode and all was well.

Losing a pet is horrible.


----------



## Yoused

Herdfan said:


> Cats should come with sound effects like in cartoons.



My cat did. Whenever she sat at the window watching the birds outside, let me tell you about sound effects.


----------



## throAU

Good things: being told that your 19 year old cat has "ridiculously good" blood test results in anticipation of required surgery to remove a cyst (small lump on her right rear leg) that burst and unfortunately hasn't healed properly and is causing an infection.  Must be doing something right...


----------



## Runs For Fun

Herdfan said:


> Definitely guilty.  Also have been know to tell one to go find his brother.



I do that as well. I have two that are biological brothers and they are the most bonded pair of cats I've ever seen. Totally inseparable.


lizkat said:


> The worst thing is when you take a cat to the vet but return with an empty carrier and that kitty is never coming back, and you can't explain this to your other cat(s).  Happened to me in the city once when a cat expired enroute to the vet's.  I had another cat at the time, and was also cat-sitting one for a friend who was in Europe.  When I first came home and set the empty carrier down on the LR floor, the two remaining kitties just ran away to the bedroom. That's rule one for a cat ever spotting a cat-carrier:  hide under a bed.
> 
> Then I guess they remembered that their buddy had been carted away in that thing a few hours earlier, so now they wanted to see inside.  So I opened it.  No kitty.  Hmm...
> 
> And then they really started up.  WHERE'S OUR BUDDY?  They were relentless.  I had to leave all the room doors and closet doors open for a week and a half until they finally gave up looking for their missing pal.  The experience didn't do anything for me either, and by the time it was over I was crazy trying to explain to them, distract them, keep them from destroying my furniture...   and I think by around the 10th day they were starting to realize they could troll me for better food, too.



Damn. Having to bring home an empty carrier would crush me. 


Yoused said:


> My cat did. Whenever she sat at the window watching the birds outside, let me tell you about sound effects.



When I first got cats I had no idea they could make this chirping sound. They can certainly make some strange noises!


----------



## Herdfan

Runs For Fun said:


> I do that as well. I have two that are biological brothers and they are the most bonded pair of cats I've ever seen. Totally inseparable.
> 
> 
> When I first got cats I had no idea they could make this chirping sound. They can certainly make some strange noises!




Ours are as well.  Ying and Yang. 

Yep, the open mouth cackle.  Some sources say a cat can make close to 100 different sounds.  Ours make 1  - "Feed Me".


----------



## Nycturne

Our cat is surprisingly vocal with us, more than any other cat I’ve had growing up. Enough that we’ve started to pick up on what she means with some of the different noises. She even has specific noises for “Hello / I see you” compared to “Where were you? / You’re back”. Never had a cat before her that would “notify” us when jumping up on the couch or bed, or jogging through the house to get to us either.


----------



## lizkat

I toyed with the idea of posting this over in the food thread ahead of the holidays, but it does belong here.

https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1464235267980673033/​


----------



## Yoused

Nycturne said:


> Our cat is surprisingly vocal with us, more than any other cat I’ve had growing up. Enough that we’ve started to pick up on what she means with some of the different noises. She even has specific noises for “Hello / I see you” compared to “Where were you? / You’re back”. Never had a cat before her that would “notify” us when jumping up on the couch or bed, or jogging through the house to get to us either.



Is it a beige cat with dark brown ears? We had to home my dad's cat, and not only did she vocalize a lot, but at 16, her voice was pretty rough. We hired her out to remodelers to loosen up wallpaper with that voice.


----------



## Runs For Fun

I’ve also been known to egg on one cat to attack the other when they are having their playful cat fights. 



lizkat said:


> I toyed with the idea of posting this over in the food thread ahead of the holidays, but it does belong here.
> 
> https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1464235267980673033/​




What a chonkers!


----------



## Nycturne

Yoused said:


> Is it a beige cat with dark brown ears? We had to home my dad's cat, and not only did she vocalize a lot, but at 16, her voice was pretty rough. We hired her out to remodelers to loosen up wallpaper with that voice.



We're pretty confident she has a good chunk of Norwegian Forest Cat in her heritage. No seal point coloration, just a tabby with some spotted patterning under the thick fur. 

She’s more of a chirp and trill vocalizer.


----------



## Herdfan

Runs For Fun said:


> I’ve also been known to egg on one cat to attack the other when they are having their playful cat fights.




Mine disappoint me that way.  I can have one of them fired up chasing a laser pointer, but as soon as I put it on his brother, he just stops and looks at me.  I mean just once I want him to pounce on his brother.


----------



## lizkat

Herdfan said:


> Mine disappoint me that way.  I can have one of them fired up chasing a laser pointer, but as soon as I put it on his brother, he just stops and looks at me.  I mean just once I want him to pounce on his brother.




His bro may have gotten some good licks in some other time when you weren't watching!


----------



## Nycturne

Since I’m new to the thread, I figured I should share the glow-up pics of our feline friend. First was from the night we brought her home 4 years ago, and the second is from this last summer. Went from 7.5 lbs to 12.5 lbs. The shelter we adopted her from didn’t know if she was a short hair or not. Turns out she needs both a restricted diet to manage IBD, and medication for lung issues, but she‘s still a very affectionate, playful, and intelligent cat after what’s she’s been through.


----------



## Runs For Fun

Nycturne said:


> Since I’m new to the thread, I figured I should share the glow-up pics of our feline friend. First was from the night we brought her home 4 years ago, and the second is from this last summer. Went from 7.5 lbs to 12.5 lbs. The shelter we adopted her from didn’t know if she was a short hair or not. Turns out she needs both a restricted diet to manage IBD, and medication for lung issues, but she‘s still a very affectionate, playful, and intelligent cat after what’s she’s been through.
> 
> View attachment 10291 View attachment 10292



She's beautiful!


----------



## Herdfan

lizkat said:


> His bro may have gotten some good licks in some other time when you weren't watching!




Well you're half right.  I can't see them because the lights are off when they decided to have a wrestling match at 2am.  

The one saving grace is that Coco is afraid of the ceiling fan.  He runs under the bed as soon as it comes on, so all I have to do is reach over and turn it on and the chaos stops.


----------



## Scepticalscribe

Nycturne said:


> Since I’m new to the thread, I figured I should share the glow-up pics of our feline friend. First was from the night we brought her home 4 years ago, and the second is from this last summer. Went from 7.5 lbs to 12.5 lbs. The shelter we adopted her from didn’t know if she was a short hair or not. Turns out she needs both a restricted diet to manage IBD, and medication for lung issues, but she‘s still a very affectionate, playful, and intelligent cat after what’s she’s been through.
> 
> View attachment 10291 View attachment 10292



Gorgeous cat.


----------



## Runs For Fun

I don’t really go out to drink but I’d totally go for the cats!
https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1470211845378260995/


----------



## The-Real-Deal82

Well our kitten decided to take a walk across the back of the armchair I was sitting in last night. When cats miss their footing and start to fall, they grab the nearest objects possible with protruding claws. Unfortunately my forehead was one of these convenient grabbling points and I currently have a 6” scratch from my forehead and across the top of my head. 

Obviously my wife was deeply concerned by the cats impact on our lounge floor whilst I checked my scalp was still intact! Other than that the kitten is fantastic.


----------



## DT

Hahaha, she's been wrecking the manger scene, and that's like 90-something years old (from Wife's family, some great-great person ...)


----------



## DT

And after we yelled at her to stop terrorizing the wise men   (the lights made a neat effect on the pic):






The Grinches thought it was hysterical ...


----------



## Herdfan

DT said:


> Hahaha, she's been wrecking the manger scene, and that's like 90-something years old (from Wife's family, some great-great person ...)
> 
> 
> 
> View attachment 10414




With your avatar, that needs to be a squirrel.


----------



## Yoused

Has anyone tried to protect their tree by putting a cucumber under it?


----------



## Herdfan

Yoused said:


> Has anyone tried to protect their tree by putting a cucumber under it?




There is a hidden pickle in it somewhere.  Does that count?


----------



## chengengaun

Yoused said:


> Has anyone tried to protect their tree by putting a cucumber under it?



You are supposed to sneakily serve the cucumber behind the cat to have the desired effect, isn’t it?

I wonder if that might place the tree in greater danger though…


----------



## lizkat

Those cat v cucumber videos are funny as hell,  but my one indoor-outdoor cat that brought me a live grass snake one night was evidently not the least bit afraid of cucumbers (in theory, snakes?) or summer squash etc.  She was also the cat that caused me to settle during winter holidays for little white lights in my kitchen windows as a substitute for anything remotely resembling a Christmas tree.  She had kept climbing the thing two years in a row to see if there were any birds or squirrels up there, and caused me to have to guy-wire the damn tree to the tops of the window trim on two walls of the living room...  I finally settled for an antique fake tree about a foot tall that I kept in my sewing studio.   I shoulda named that cat Grinch!


----------



## Renzatic

Here's another one of my dork ass cats, recently converted to being an inside animal. Now, only Pete and Cappy roam the yard, and he's too scared of his mom to try and harass her like he did his sisters.


----------



## Herdfan

At the moment, we have 3 pretty unhappy felines.  The boys are just generally unhappy when people are in their house.  Gismo will come out on occasion after he figures out the people aren't leaving, but Coco will remain hidden away until they all leave.  We finally coaxed him out from under the bed with treats.

But the most docile cat we have is my daughter's Ragdoll.  She is so laid back that when she let out what sounded like a cougar growl at my B-I-L's dog, we figured it was time to put her back in her room.


----------



## Yoused




----------



## chengengaun

Yoused said:


> View attachment 10592​



He forgot to squish that cat...


----------



## lizkat

I'm one of those critters with a birthday near the winter holidays, so the cards have started to land in my mailbox already.  I'm partial to this one, of course, since I wouldn't mind doing the four-year-old gig again.  I know I had a blast even the first time around!


----------



## Renzatic

chengengaun said:


> He forgot to squish that cat...




I learned something new today!

Also, HAPPY BIRTHDAY, LIZ!


----------



## thekev

Herdfan said:


> At the moment, we have 3 pretty unhappy felines.  The boys are just generally unhappy when people are in their house.  Gismo will come out on occasion after he figures out the people aren't leaving, but Coco will remain hidden away until they all leave.  We finally coaxed him out from under the bed with treats.
> 
> But the most docile cat we have is my daughter's Ragdoll.  She is so laid back that when* she let out what sounded like a cougar growl at my B-I-L's dog*, we figured it was time to put her back in her room.




If anything, that's impressive, coming from a ragdoll kitty.


----------



## Yoused




----------



## Runs For Fun

Happy birthday @lizkat!


----------



## Clix Pix

Happy Birthday, Lizkat!    A December baby, eh?   My late father-in-law, whose birthday was December 22nd, used to joke about which gifts would be his birthday gifts and which his Christmas gifts.


----------



## lizkat

Hah, I can identify with that!    Pretty often people with birthdays during the winter holidays do find that what should be their special day gets wearily thrown in with Christmas (or one of the days of Hanukkah or Kwanzaa), thanks to the hectic pace of elders having to run around and be here or there and everywhere during the season.

I got used to that as a kid, when I'd get one really nice present from a great great aunt and a tag that indicated it was to serve for both occasions.  Hmm...    When you're a kid, it can be about quantity, not quality, right...  so my nose was always a bit out of joint in midsummer,  when out of the blue there would start arriving this cascade of presents for one of my brothers,  and then the  entire day of his birthdate was also personalized:  the cake was his, the decorations, the phone calls and cards.

We laugh about it now but back then I'm pretty sure I was nearly green with envy some years.    I remember drawing the line one year and insisting on a birthday cake made just for me when one of my aunts suggested to my mother that a fruitcake someone had gifted the aunt would be "fine for the birthday girl, no?"   Well...  NO.


----------



## chengengaun

Happy Birthday @lizkat!


----------



## lizkat

chengengaun said:


> Happy Birthday @lizkat!




My "internet birthday" is at the end of the season on January 6th, a date I used to suggest to my parents (to no avail) as a good alternative to having a birthday celebration on the actual date, which is so much closer to Christmas proper.   Once I had my own place when I was in my 20s,   I  did begin to celebrate it on the 6th,  because by then the exhaustion of the holidays had worn off and I could enjoy the idea of a special day for me.

But nowadays our Chistmas adventures are less taxing as my generation ages out,  so I've reverted to earlier celebration, and remembrances from kin and friends still start showing up in the pre-Christmas parcel rush as 2-piece packets of cards or little gifts.  A few pals even call to make sure I'm not cheating and opening them both on Xmas.   They don't get it that I've always wanted a day when only I was getting to open cards and prezzies.


----------



## Yoused

I never tell anyone my birthday because I do not want a fuss. I just celebrate the day the hms Beagle set out from Plymouth on its voyage to the Galapagos with that guy Chuck on it.


----------



## DT

Hahaha, the show/title card on the TV was __not__ by design, but it's frighteningly accurate ...


----------



## The-Real-Deal82

Our Gwen is a great mix of being completely mental and loving at the same time. Reading threads on British short hairs, it seems to be pot luck as to whether you get a cat that is a lap cat or one that isn’t keen on human contact. Ours loves a cwtch and our affection which is what we wanted.

After a morning of climbing into our dishwasher, attacking my daughters feet, she’s now worn herself out lol.


----------



## Huntn

I miss our cats, at times.


----------



## Herdfan

The-Real-Deal82 said:


> After a morning of climbing into our dishwasher,




Our daughter's ragdoll had a fascination with the dishwasher as a kitten.  Thankfully she grew out of it.  But she just waits for the dryer to open so she can jump in and lay on the warm clothes.


----------



## DT

Ugh, so cute it makes me sick ...


----------



## Yoused

DT said:


> Ugh, so cute it makes me sick ...



The weird positions they get comfortable in are baffling to me. If I tried to curl up in a similar type of way, with my toes in my ears, every ligament in my body would be screaming.

I used to listen to _CBS Radio Mystery Theater_ in the '70s, which came on about the time I was going to bed. I recall one story in which the main character had some kind of heart condition that dictated he should avoid stress. The doctor wanted him to learn to relax, so he prescribed a cat, telling the guy to follow it around and emulate it, though I imagine that did not involve getting pretzeled. There was a twist to the story, of course, but I cannot remember what it was.


----------



## Huntn

DT said:


> Ugh, so cute it makes me sick ...
> 
> View attachment 10712



Is that the TV Mount that can lift back up over the  mantle?


----------



## lizkat

Yoused said:


> The weird positions they get comfortable in are baffling to me. If I tried to curl up in a similar type of way, with my toes in my ears, every ligament in my body would be screaming.
> 
> I used to listen to _CBS Radio Mystery Theater_ in the '70s, which came on about the time I was going to bed. I recall one story in which the main character had some kind of heart condition that dictated he should avoid stress. The doctor wanted him to learn to relax, so he prescribed a cat, telling the guy to follow it around and emulate it, though I imagine that did not involve getting pretzeled. There was a twist to the story, of course, but I cannot remember what it was.




Yeah cats don't have regular collarbones like humans do... their clavicles are attached to shoulders only by muscles so are more or less free-floating.   As a result, they can get into spaces only the width of their head, and also assume positions we'd only be in via accident or an intentionally injurious effort by someone else.


----------



## Scepticalscribe

Belated birthday greetings @lizkat; I have been so busy watching The Crown (all of Season Three and just over half of Season Four) over the past week that I seem to have lost track of time.

Sample dialogue with Decent Brother (who has allowed, nay encouraged, me to piggyback on his Netflix account; indeed, my German sister-in-law yesterday told me that her brother had "fixed up" their mother - a housebound widow, as my SIL's father died two years ago - with Netflix, to which she is now happily glued, a fact which has reduced - considerably - domestic tensions in a flat in a small town in south west Germany, not too far from Heidelberg).

Anyway, I had thanked Decent Brother, and, - since I am currently devouring episodes - recommended a few that I thought were especially good.

One such was "Aberfan".

DB: The Welsh one?

Me: Yes.  It's excellent.

DB: (With that lofty tone - both unusual and unexpected from this quarter - when a brother knows he has an older sister on the intellectual ropes): I thought you said that the Queen had never made any mistakes.

Me: (Rapidly consulting memory banks; hm, yes.  Actually, I do recall this; I did say - ages ago - that the Queen was quite remarkable in that, over the 60 plus years of her reign, she has been extraordinarily sure footed, shown very good judgment and has not really made any mistakes): Ah, well, what I actually said -

DB: (interrupts - he is a lawyer): You said she never made any mistakes -

Me: (Attempted hasty - and, yes, cough, I will admit it: A hasty, retrospective - amendment): I said she never made any major mistakes -

DB: Aberfan was a mistake -

Me: Well, yes, she admitted that.  Subsequently.

DB: - and so was the reaction to Diana's death. Not just a mistake, but this is the same mistake repeated again and again.

Ouch.

But true.

So, the lesson learned is not that just the Queen makes mistakes (but not many, not when compared with other world leaders) - well, yes, I concede she makes mistakes - but that Brothers remember what you said, store it, stash it away, squirrel it away somewhere in the recesses of their minds, and then proceed to quote it back at you *years* later.

Other lesson was that Decent Brother had clearly already watched the Aberfan episode himself.


----------



## DT

lizkat said:


> Yeah cats don't have regular collarbones like humans do... their clavicles are attached to shoulders only by muscles so are more or less free-floating.   As a result, they can get into spaces only the width of their head, and also assume positions we'd only be in via accident or an intentionally injurious effort by someone else.




They're just amazing animals.  The other day I was holding up her string, where I thought it was out of range, she must've gotten 3-4 feet of air from a dead stop crouch, hahaha, it was like she was shot out of a cannon ...


----------



## DT

Huntn said:


> Is that the TV Mount that can lift back up over the  mantle?




Yes!

It's supposed to have a new Sonos Arc hanging under it, but ...


----------



## lizkat

DT said:


> They're just amazing animals.  The other day I was holding up her string, where I thought it was out of range, she must've gotten 3-4 feet of air from a dead stop crouch, hahaha, it was like she was shot out of a cannon ...




Yeah once they figure out they can leap from kitchen counter to the exposed top of a refrigerator, that becomes a nap zone for some cats whose nominal "owners" may eventually despair of trying to keep cereal boxes up there.


----------



## Renzatic

lizkat said:


> Yeah once they figure out they can leap from kitchen counter to the exposed top of a refrigerator, that becomes a nap zone for some cats whose nominal "owners" may eventually despair of trying to keep cereal boxes up there.




This is why I like having lazy cats. They never get on top of anything they're not supposed to. It's too much effort for them.


----------



## Yoused

My cat could jump from the grass to my bedroom window, about 7 feet vertical. Some cats can jump better than others – if they have loose folds of skin between their knees and their belly, they tend to be really good jumpers.

If you have a problem with a cat jumping up there where you want them to not jump up there, put unsecured things on the edge of there. Once they get the idea that arriving up there is a dicey proposition that may immediately result in them not being able to stay up there, the jumping up there will happen much less.


----------



## Huntn

Yoused said:


> My cat could jump from the grass to my bedroom window, about 7 feet vertical. Some cats can jump better than others – if they have loose folds of skin between their knees and their belly, they tend to be really good jumpers.
> 
> If you have a problem with a cat jumping up there where you want them to not jump up there, put unsecured things on the edge of there. Once they get the idea that arriving up there is a dicey proposition that may immediately result in them not being able to stay up there, the jumping up there will happen much less.



In a previous home, we had a back staircase with a landing and a window about 5’ above the floor. Our lazy cat used to jump up to that , but cheated using her rear claws to dig into the drywall, partially because the windows sill was not that wide and  really not that comfortable to lay on bythe looks of it.


----------



## Runs For Fun

DT said:


> Ugh, so cute it makes me sick ...
> 
> View attachment 10712



That is one disgustingly cute cat picture!


----------



## shadow puppet

Speaking of cute cat pics, these two snaps caught my attention (and I'm more of a dog person  ).


----------



## Herdfan

One of my little projects for today was replacing the "lever" handle on my daughter's bedroom door with a regular knob.

Because the boys figured out that they could reach up and pull down and get into her room.  That in itself isn't bad, but the ragdoll eats the Royal Canin Ragdoll food and the boys get diet food.  Let them in there for a minute and her bowl is cleaned out.

I suspect they will be aggravated when they try to open the door next time.


----------



## JamesMike

Herdfan said:


> One of my little projects for today was replacing the "lever" handle on my daughter's bedroom door with a regular knob.
> 
> Because the boys figured out that they could reach up and pull down and get into her room.  That in itself isn't bad, but the ragdoll eats the Royal Canin Ragdoll food and the boys get diet food.  Let them in there for a minute and her bowl is cleaned out.
> 
> I suspect they will be aggravated when they try to open the door next time.




The ‘boys’ have placed you on The Cat‘s Owners Watch List!  A cat swat team should be descending on your location soon, lol!


----------



## lizkat

Herdfan said:


> Let them in there for a minute and her bowl is cleaned out.





That iOS arcade app KItty Collector+  that I mentioned somewhere else has a cast of cat characters and eventually you sort out their personalities.   There's one kitty called Tubbs.   When the cats leave a round of gifts for you   --each representing some number of "goldfish", which are the currency of the game, given you for specific goodies you've set out in the playing venue--     I noticed that Tubbs always leaves inordinately high numbers of goldfish, like 37 (average is more like 2 or 7) and he only leaves them for whatever I've last put in the food bowl.  So clearly whenever he shows up the bowl is emptied and the other kitties must just hang out and amuse themselves with soccer balls or blankets or whatever until I show up to provide another round of food and have to hope Tubbs doesn't show up.  I never catch him at it!    Game is totally silly but it's cute and sometimes hilarious.   I can stand playing it just about long enough for the kettle to boil for a cuppa tea...


----------



## SuperMatt

I don’t know what to say about this.


----------



## Yoused




----------



## Clix Pix

I am surprised no one has provided a link to this hilarious story of the couple who bought themselves a nice new Vitamix Blender and when it arrived, set the large box down on the floor "momentarily," and their three cats immediately took possession of it.  They still haven't been able to get the  blender out of the box because the three cats fiercely guard it, with one always on top of the box at all times....



			https://www.bellinghamherald.com/news/nation-world/article257061197.html
		




			https://www.washingtonpost.com/home/2022/01/08/cats-took-vitamix-hostage/


----------



## Yoused

When you name a cat George Destroyer of Worlds, you get what you asked for.


----------



## Herdfan

Clix Pix said:


> I am surprised no one has provided a link to this hilarious story of the couple who bought themselves a nice new Vitamix Blender and when it arrived, set the large box down on the floor "momentarily," and their three cats immediately took possession of it.  They still haven't been able to get the  blender out of the box because the three cats fiercely guard it, with one always on top of the box at all times....




I could see our boys doing that..... until they heard food hit their bowls and then it would be over.


----------



## Clix Pix

Herdfan said:


> I could see our boys doing that..... until they heard food hit their bowls and then it would be over.



Ah, but these three cats are keeping the box protected at all times, even when food is deposited in their bowls....one still stands guard on the box while the other quickly eat and then the one who had been protecting the blender is relieved of his duties as another takes his place so that he can go and eat, too.....  LOL!  Apparently they've set up a really good rotation system to allow for all necessary situations such as eating, paying a visit to the litter box,  sleeping, etc.....


----------



## Yoused

The cats have conferred and agreed, _In this box is an evil monster that we must not allow to escape and torment us with its terrifying and annoying banshee howls while we are trying to nap – also, the box being here makes it easier to get up on the counter_.


----------



## Herdfan

How often does everyone call their cats by their actual names?

We have Coco, Gismo and Gabby.  Gabby usually gets called Gabby, but also gets called Fluff because she is fluffy.  But the boys get called all sorts of things.  For example Coco will be called Big Boy, Puff (Coco Puffs) Puff Daddy, Rescue Panther (from the commercial) and Gismo will be called Little Man, Bubby and Spaz (because he is one).

Just wondering what other names people call their cats other than their real names.


----------



## lizkat

_*Tevvi *_acquired her nickname bc the vet receptionist could not read, hear or say* "*Zantevvi" without asking why that name, did I make it up or was it out of a movie... and meanwhile the clock was ticking and I always had other errands, so the cat officially became Tevvi after a few more rounds of that at her annual checkups.

"Michael O'Shaughnessey" was one of my NYC kitties back in the 70s and he was called _*Mikey. *_ His long name was bestowed on him when a brother and I had had a few beers and decided the then kitten --an orange tabby-- looked a bit like an Irishman spoiling for a fight, so we opened the Manhattan phone book to the Os, and finally settled on the name of some guy who lived down in Hell's Kitchen.

"Jefferson Airplane" was another eventual NYC find, and he promptly became _*oh poor baby*_ bc he was a fraidy-cat and would freak out and run in the direction his nose pointed and slam into bookcases or walls if anyone  so much as dropped a sheet of paper on the floor.

_*Delaware*_ was the one who used to bring livestock into the house in the wee hours, and treat mice as though they were windup toys instead of sentient (and terrified) prey, so she was most often addressed by her full name, slowly and with emphasis on all the syllables,  the same way I was in my youth when being told I was supposed to know better or else was in the process of acquiring such knowledge.

Tempted to name my next cat _*Badmashi*_ after an Urdu word that means roughly "wrongdoing" but that kitty hasn't crashed onto my porch in a snowstorm yet, which is how I had acquired one or two of my former companions back in the day.


----------



## Runs For Fun

Clix Pix said:


> I am surprised no one has provided a link to this hilarious story of the couple who bought themselves a nice new Vitamix Blender and when it arrived, set the large box down on the floor "momentarily," and their three cats immediately took possession of it.  They still haven't been able to get the  blender out of the box because the three cats fiercely guard it, with one always on top of the box at all times....
> 
> 
> 
> https://www.bellinghamherald.com/news/nation-world/article257061197.html
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> https://www.washingtonpost.com/home/2022/01/08/cats-took-vitamix-hostage/






Clix Pix said:


> Ah, but these three cats are keeping the box protected at all times, even when food is deposited in their bowls....one still stands guard on the box while the other quickly eat and then the one who had been protecting the blender is relieved of his duties as another takes his place so that he can go and eat, too.....  LOL!  Apparently they've set up a really good rotation system to allow for all necessary situations such as eating, paying a visit to the litter box,  sleeping, etc.....



OMG this is epic! They definitely know what’s in that box. The loud noisey thing must not be let out!


----------



## Yoused

Herdfan said:


> Just wondering what other names people call their cats other than their real names.



My cat was telepathic, so I rarely actually had to address her by name (though I did quite a fair bit just to get her to make the association). Sometimes I called her


Spoiler: Pretty Kitty








because, well, she was.

She did get used to her name, though, because one time we were sitting in my room and the TV in the other room was running some History Channel (back before it turned to crap) thing on Ramses II, and when the narrator said his queen's name, that got her attention.

Later, I found out her name translated to "beautiful companion", and I thought, well, of course it does.


----------



## The-Real-Deal82

Herdfan said:


> Just wondering what other names people call their cats other than their real names.



I call ours ‘bellend’, especially when she’s attacking our tv, curtains and indoor plant.


----------



## Renzatic

Here's a totally random picture of a cat eating corn.


----------



## SuperMatt

Cats love the internet.

https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1476985855981993984/


----------



## Herdfan

It's funny because it is so accurate:


----------



## DT

Always watching ... judging ...


----------



## lizkat

DT said:


> Always watching ... judging ...
> 
> View attachment 11091
> 
> 
> View attachment 11093





Or... waiting to ambush you from assorted choice hiding places... like the laundry hamper.

​​


----------



## Renzatic

I have no idea why, but Polly has taken to always wanting to go into the basement recently. She'll scratch at the door at all hours of the day, always begging to be let in, and will happily spend hours doing whatever it is she does down there.

It's creepy, considering my basement is a very scary place.


----------



## DT

Ours has been sitting in the area where we have holiday stuff queued up for the attic, just staring at the snowman ... for hours.

It's equal parts confusing and frightening.


----------



## lizkat

Renzatic said:


> I have no idea why, but Polly has taken to always wanting to go into the basement recently. She'll scratch at the door at all hours of the day, always begging to be let in, and will happily spend hours doing whatever it is she does down there.
> 
> It's creepy, considering my basement is a very scary place.






DT said:


> Ours has been sitting in the area where we have holiday stuff queued up for the attic, just staring at the snowman ... for hours.
> 
> It's equal parts confusing and frightening.




All this and more about why your cat is so weird...  addressed scientifically:









						Why your cat is so weird, explained by an actual scientist
					

A wonderful five-minute explanation.




					www.vox.com


----------



## DT

OMG the wife found that article a few weeks ago, hahaha, I think she was specifically researching about the highest spot.

In that one photo you can see my safety net for her desire to access a high location.


----------



## Renzatic

lizkat said:


> All this and more about why your cat is so weird...  addressed scientifically




I think they're just natural doofballs.


----------



## lizkat

DT said:


> OMG the wife found that article a few weeks ago, hahaha, I think she was specifically researching about the highest spot.
> 
> In that one photo you can see my safety net for her desire to access a high location.




High spots like atop the fridge, yep (if an indoor cat has no gym setup in another room),  or even up in exposed rafters if a house has a great room with those as a feature. One of my cats used to hang out in the rafters of my deck in summertime until it got too warm up there even for her in the afternoon.

The other thing they all seem to like is trying to fit into small boxes.  I had a cat who would wear out an empty pretzel box in a few days trying to back into the thing.  It didn't faze him in the least that he never succeeded, could never succeed,  and yet he approached each new opportunity with the same level of zeal.   Pretzels were cheap back then,  so the box was an inexpensive toy.


----------



## Renzatic

lizkat said:


> The other thing they all seem to like is trying to fit into small boxes.  I had a cat who would wear out an empty pretzel box in a few days trying to back into the thing.  It didn't faze him in the least that he never succeeded, could never succeed,  and yet he approached each new opportunity with the same level of zeal.   Pretzels were cheap back then,  so the box was an inexpensive toy.




Every time I leave out one of those 12 can fridge packs of coke next to the trash, a cat WILL at some point slide into it, and fall asleep.


----------



## Roller

https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1482807386096103427/

I have no idea if our cat could do this, but if he could, I suspect he'd go back and knock everything down just to spite us. BTW, if you're on Twitter, Science girl is very much worth a follow. The stuff she finds and posts is fascinating, and such a welcome relief from the toxic soup.


----------



## Runs For Fun

Renzatic said:


> I have no idea why, but Polly has taken to always wanting to go into the basement recently. She'll scratch at the door at all hours of the day, always begging to be let in, and will happily spend hours doing whatever it is she does down there.
> 
> It's creepy, considering my basement is a very scary place.



Loki has become obsessed with trying to get out the door into the apartment hallway when I come in lately. Why I have no idea. All he does is immediately flop down on the carpet and just roll around.


Roller said:


> https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1482807386096103427/
> 
> I have no idea if our cat could do this, but if he could, I suspect he'd go back and knock everything down just to spite us. BTW, if you're on Twitter, Science girl is very much worth a follow. The stuff she finds and posts is fascinating, and such a welcome relief from the toxic soup.



Cats can be so elegant sometimes!


----------



## lizkat

The follow-on to that tweet, the one about dogs is equally entertaining (scroll down).

https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1482808607288832005/


----------



## Scepticalscribe

Have any of you ever watched the "cat goalkeeper" video (lockdown vintage) from a flat in Italy - one clip/link - comes with the title "This cat is pound for pound the best goalkeeper in the world".

Anyway, a seriously talented feline.

And a hilarious video.


----------



## Runs For Fun

Scepticalscribe said:


> Have any of you ever watched the "cat goalkeeper" video (lockdown vintage) from a flat in Italy - one clip/link - comes with the title "This cat is pound for pound the best goalkeeper in the world".
> 
> Anyway, a seriously talented feline.
> 
> And a hilarious video.



This one? That’s quite impressive!
https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1262431963371225091/


----------



## Scepticalscribe

Runs For Fun said:


> This one? That’s quite impressive!
> https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1262431963371225091/



No, not that one.

It is Italian, and the voiceover - the cat's owner - speaks in Italian; the cat is named Gigi after a rather talented Italian goalkeeper.  

Anyway, the whole/video runs for a little under a minute and a half, but is quite wonderful. 

It takes place in the hall of a flat in Italy and is absolutely brilliant (I love the way that the cat's tail moves, slowly, while it lies in wait for the football to be kicked).


----------



## Runs For Fun

Scepticalscribe said:


> No, not that one.
> 
> It is Italian, and the voiceover - the cat's owner - speaks in Italian; the cat is named Gigi after a rather talented Italian goalkeeper.
> 
> Anyway, the whole/video runs for a little under a minute and a half, but is quite wonderful.
> 
> It takes place in the hall of a flat in Italy and is absolutely brilliant (I love the way that the cat's tail moves, slowly, while it lies in wait for the football to be kicked).



Found it. You were right, that’s amazing


----------



## Scepticalscribe

Runs For Fun said:


> Found it. You were right, that’s amazing




That's the one, thanks for locating and linking it.

It takes place in the hallway of a flat in Rome, and is quite wonderful; the cat's ferocious concentration is - as the owner says in the video - "fantastico".


----------



## Herdfan

Until the boys, the largest cat we had was Misty who came in at just under 12 lbs.  The boys are 18+ and 22.  Yes, they are a little fat, but they are also both very long and tall.  Knowing what it takes to pick one of them up, I can't imagine this:









						Giant cat looks set to break world record after weighing in at 27.5lb
					

NO kitten around — Yulia Minina’s pet looks furmidable. She says the Maine Coon weighs 12.5kg (27.5lb), making it just a whisker away from a world record. And as Kefir is only 22 months, she still …




					www.the-sun.com


----------



## Scepticalscribe

Herdfan said:


> Until the boys, the largest cat we had was Misty who came in at just under 12 lbs.  The boys are 18+ and 22.  Yes, they are a little fat, but they are also both very long and tall.  Knowing what it takes to pick one of them up, I can't imagine this:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Giant cat looks set to break world record after weighing in at 27.5lb
> 
> 
> NO kitten around — Yulia Minina’s pet looks furmidable. She says the Maine Coon weighs 12.5kg (27.5lb), making it just a whisker away from a world record. And as Kefir is only 22 months, she still …
> 
> 
> 
> 
> www.the-sun.com




Wow.  Just wow.

But a brilliant foot warmer at night (if you could persuade the cat to remain at the end of the bed, keeping your feet warm, rather than curled up beside - or, on top of - you).


----------



## Renzatic

Scepticalscribe said:


> Wow.  Just wow.
> 
> But a brilliant foot warmer at night (if you could persuade the cat to remain at the end of the bed, keeping your feet warm, rather than curled up beside - or, on top of - you).




Given their propensity to find a way to step RIGHT on your crotch when they're trying to find a place to snuggle, I think he'd be more of an outside the bedroom cat.


----------



## Renzatic

Speaking of cats, I'm being invaded by all the neighborhood strays. There are two new cats, a large brown tabby, and a jet black smaller cat. They're in the front yard, chasing each other around. It's only a matter of time before Pete and Cappy get involved.

...where do all these cats come from? I seriously think someone is using my house as a cat dumping ground.


----------



## Scepticalscribe

Renzatic said:


> Given their propensity to find a way to step RIGHT on your crotch when they're trying to find a place to snuggle, I think he'd be more of an outside the bedroom cat.



And do you really think that this - given the calculated and meticulous precision of their movement - is not, in any way, somehow, deliberate?


----------



## Renzatic

Scepticalscribe said:


> And do you really think that this - given the calculated and meticulous precision of their movement - is not, in any way, somehow, deliberate?




Oh, it's definitely deliberate. I have no idea why they do it, but they do it, and they know they're doing it.


----------



## Runs For Fun

Scepticalscribe said:


> And do you really think that this - given the calculated and meticulous precision of their movement - is not, in any way, somehow, deliberate?



Oh it is definitely deliberate. Cats know exactly what they're doing.


----------



## Scepticalscribe

Renzatic said:


> Oh, it's definitely deliberate. I have no idea why they do it, but they do it, and they know they're doing it.






Runs For Fun said:


> Oh it is definitely deliberate. Cats know exactly what they're doing.



How true.

Well, my question was rhetorical, but you have confirmed the answer.


----------



## Renzatic

Scepticalscribe said:


> How true.
> 
> Well, my question was rhetorical, but you have confirmed the answer.




If you pay attention to them, it's almost like you can see them calculating their every movement for optimal foot placement.


----------



## lizkat

Oklahoma Wildlife Conservation posted lighthearted tweet about not letting mountain lions in the house just because it's cold outside ("_*You*_ are cold.  _*They*_ have fur")... and then all Twitter hell broke loose, of course, requiring assorted clarifications and other comedy gold. Now they're updating all their tweets using talking corgis or whatever those are...  Hilarious.


https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1484173250498285570/


https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1484971267929395206/


----------



## Runs For Fun

lizkat said:


> Oklahoma Wildlife Conservation posted lighthearted tweet about not letting mountain lions in the house just because it's cold outside ("_*You*_ are cold.  _*They*_ have fur")... and then all Twitter hell broke loose, of course, requiring assorted clarifications and other comedy gold. Now they're updating all their tweets using talking corgis or whatever those are...  Hilarious.
> 
> 
> https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1484173250498285570/
> 
> 
> https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1484971267929395206/



Those replies are hilarious  

https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1484403537228402689/

NGL this would be me. I love cats too much I would try to pet a big one.


----------



## Herdfan

lizkat said:


> ("_*You*_ are cold.  _*They*_ have fur")...
> 
> 
> https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1484173250498285570/




Reminds me of the viral post from the Karen who was complaining that her neighbors dog was out in the cold.  So he posted this pic of his dog:







Runs For Fun said:


> NGL this would be me. I love cats too much I would try to pet a big one.




Right there with you. 

The wife and I agreed that we would not ever buy a purebred cat again as there are too many in shelters that need a home.  The one exception will be a Savannah.


----------



## Thomas Veil

Herdfan said:


> The wife and I agreed that we would not ever buy a purebred cat again as there are too many in shelters that need a home.  The one exception will be a Savannah.



I don't know about cats, but I have divided feelings about dogs. 

On the one hand, I have in the past been a believer in saving shelter dogs. That belief has been tested by the fact that pretty much everybody I know who has one, has a dog with behavior problems, ranging from being unruly (jumping on people constantly) to chewing entry door frames to being ferocious to anyone but immediate family.

My daughter OTOH got the only purebred in the family, and she is the sweetest, quietest thing. Friendly as hell and a joy to have around.


----------



## Herdfan

Thomas Veil said:


> I don't know about cats, but I have divided feelings about dogs.
> 
> On the one hand, I have in the past been a believer in saving shelter dogs. That belief has been tested by the fact that pretty much everybody I know who has one, has a dog with behavior problems, ranging from being unruly (jumping on people constantly) to chewing entry door frames to being ferocious to anyone but immediate family.
> 
> My daughter OTOH got the only purebred in the family, and she is the sweetest, quietest thing. Friendly as hell and a joy to have around.




We have had 3 purebred Ragdolls.  One mama and two of her offspring.  Mama and one had horrible health issues and died a 12 and 11.  The other one is still going strong at almost 15, but if her box isn't scooped daily, there will be a problem.

But none of them are good box users which is common with those raised in a cattery - no mama to teach them.  OTOH, our rescues have been great pets although they sort of chose us as opposed to us going and picking them out.  Our first rescue, we let this kitten in the garage one night when it was going to be cold.  Gave him some food and water, but forgot a box.  He dug a hole in a potted plant and used it.


----------



## Roller

Thomas Veil said:


> I don't know about cats, but I have divided feelings about dogs.
> 
> On the one hand, I have in the past been a believer in saving shelter dogs. That belief has been tested by the fact that pretty much everybody I know who has one, has a dog with behavior problems, ranging from being unruly (jumping on people constantly) to chewing entry door frames to being ferocious to anyone but immediate family.
> 
> My daughter OTOH got the only purebred in the family, and she is the sweetest, quietest thing. Friendly as hell and a joy to have around.



We've had two dogs, one of which was "pure" based on appearance (we didn't know her exact history prior to adoption) and the the other a mix. Both have been sweet and friendly to just about everyone. I think this may have to do with how they are handled in their early years in addition to behavioral tendencies related to their breed(s), but I know many people with shelter dogs acquired at various ages who are wonderful.


----------



## DT

She was ignoring this bed, put it in the sun, now she's in kitty heaven


----------



## lizkat

Testing the strength of the heart of a tiger...   a surprised mama tiger.

https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1493940729718218752/


----------



## chengengaun

lizkat said:


> The follow-on to that tweet, the one about dogs is equally entertaining (scroll down).
> 
> https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1482808607288832005/



This came up on my YouTube feed today.


----------



## DT

OMG, she's gotten really social, like coming in first thing in the morning, hanging out wherever we are, and wow does she like that bed now


----------



## Scepticalscribe

I saw (read, was helpless with laughter reading) a (yes, an appalling but hilarious) Twitter thread about cats eating (and enjoying) butter.

Check out the thread by Sarah Kessler (@moveablejaw) which starts with the immortal tweet:"My wife has taken to leaving the butter on the counter European-style and I just caught the cat LICKING THE BUTTER and it appears she’s been doing this for months and that we’ve been eating CAT-BUTTER please send help immediately."

This was followed (same author, same thread) by a tweet which read: "We literally just had a convo about how each of us thought the other was taking weird dented knifefuls of butter from the stick but IT WAS THE CAT, whose Velcro tongue ridges are in fact VISIBLE ON THE STICK OF BUTTER"....


----------



## DT

OMG, butter, hahaha, that's both unexpected and, yes, of course, because cats


----------



## Runs For Fun

Scepticalscribe said:


> I saw (read, was helpless with laughter reading) a (yes, an appalling but hilarious) Twitter thread about cats eating (and enjoying) butter.
> 
> Check out the thread by Sarah Kessler (@moveablejaw) which starts with the immortal tweet:"My wife has taken to leaving the butter on the counter European-style and I just caught the cat LICKING THE BUTTER and it appears she’s been doing this for months and that we’ve been eating CAT-BUTTER please send help immediately."
> 
> This was followed (same author, same thread) by a tweet which read: "We literally just had a convo about how each of us thought the other was taking weird dented knifefuls of butter from the stick but IT WAS THE CAT, whose Velcro tongue ridges are in fact VISIBLE ON THE STICK OF BUTTER"....



Found in that thread
https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1495709693163245579/


----------



## lizkat

DT said:


> OMG, butter, hahaha, that's both unexpected and, yes, of course, because cats




Yes, cats, even an ambitious dog...  

What, these people never heard of a butter dish?  What is the world coming to...


----------



## lizkat

See this is what might happen to a cat that steals butter....

https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1495857847745327111/​


----------



## Yoused

I had to give my cat a course of antibiotics, which I naturally put in a wad of butter*. After that, it became a ritual that she would come and sit by me as I was making toast and receive a bit of butter to be licked off my finger.


*margarine, actually, as I rarely use real butter, and anyway, adult cats and dogs are not lactose-tolerant, so butter is a bad idea.


----------



## lizkat

I had one cat in the city who was a dedicated food thief.  If you had to go back to the kitchen for some forgotten item, your only recourse was to cart your plate of eggs or chicken or whatever back out there with you  if you were dining alone. Otherwise the cat would materialize from somewhere a credenza or the piano and scarf up half your meal in the few seconds you were gone.

That cat even went after a plate of chipped beef and vinegar on toast that my sister-in-law had made for her lunch one day while she was staying at my place during some postgraduate work.  Who knew a cat liked vinegar?!


----------



## Alli

So I’m sitting here on the deck minding my own business and reading TA. All of a sudden I spot a tabby under the carport. I talk to her and assure her I’m not running her off, but I’m also not going to feed her. When I look back down I see a visibly pregnant black cat peeking out from under my chair. (She’s the only one I feed.) Evidently she’s extra hungry that she came up her to beg for food. I hope the neighbor will feed her once we move.


----------



## Arkitect

2001 — 2021

So… last year in August our beloved cat Skattie died.

During the summer heatwave she just stopped eating — kept on drinking water — used her litter tray to the end… but she just faded away. Her personality was there all the time. She was just tired. 

The vet was out of answers… nothing we could do. It was desperate. We bought all the different brands of food… all the snacks… just anything to get her starting eating again. But she'd walk up to her favourite food, sniff it… and walk away. 
It was horrible how quickly she lost weight. She was a hefty little cat, but by the end she was light as a feather.

We finally decided to have her put to sleep. The vet came to our house and she died while my husband held her in his arms… and then… then she stopped purring.
The grief was terrible. We had lost more than a pet. For weeks afterwards we kept seeing her shadow in the corner of our eyes.

With a broken tail that left a permanent kink, she had been rescued from the streets, we found her at the SPCA in Causeway Bay, Hong Kong in July 2001. The feistiest and most confident kitten you could imagine.

In her nearly 21 years she was well travelled — Hong Kong, South Africa, UK, Italy, France… back to the UK. When we went on a holiday she'd come with us. People often don't think about taking their cats with them… dogs, sure. Cats? Not so much. But she travelled well and was used to the drill. 

She was dearly loved and spoilt beyond belief.
As she deserved to be.
We still miss her terribly.

So far we have not made a decision on adopting another cat… The temptation is huge and so many older cats out there who deserve a good life. Time will tell.


----------



## Runs For Fun

Arkitect said:


> 2001 — 2021
> 
> So… last year in August our beloved cat Skattie died.
> 
> During the summer heatwave she just stopped eating — kept on drinking water — used her litter tray to the end… but she just faded away. Her personality was there all the time. She was just tired.
> 
> The vet was out of answers… nothing we could do. It was desperate. We bought all the different brands of food… all the snacks… just anything to get her starting eating again. But she'd walk up to her favourite food, sniff it… and walk away.
> It was horrible how quickly she lost weight. She was a hefty little cat, but by the end she was light as a feather.
> 
> We finally decided to have her put to sleep. The vet came to our house and she died while my husband held her in his arms… and then… then she stopped purring.
> The grief was terrible. We had lost more than a pet. For weeks afterwards we kept seeing her shadow in the corner of our eyes.
> 
> With a broken tail that left a permanent kink, she had been rescued from the streets, we found her at the SPCA in Causeway Bay, Hong Kong in July 2001. The feistiest and most confident kitten you could imagine.
> 
> In her nearly 21 years she was well travelled — Hong Kong, South Africa, UK, Italy, France… back to the UK. When we went on a holiday she'd come with us. People often don't think about taking their cats with them… dogs, sure. Cats? Not so much. But she travelled well and was used to the drill.
> 
> She was dearly loved and spoilt beyond belief.
> As she deserved to be.
> We still miss her terribly.
> 
> So far we have not made a decision on adopting another cat… The temptation is huge and so many older cats out there who deserve a good life. Time will tell.



So sorry for your loss. She was such a beautiful cat. It's so hard to say good-bye to them. They are family. I've lost two myself and it still gets to me whenever I think about it.


----------



## Herdfan

Arkitect said:


> 2001 — 2021
> 
> So… last year in August our beloved cat Skattie died.




Yes, so sorry for your loss.

But they know when it is time.  Enjoy the memories of the 20 years you had with her.


----------



## Huntn

Arkitect said:


> 2001 — 2021
> 
> So… last year in August our beloved cat Skattie died.
> 
> During the summer heatwave she just stopped eating — kept on drinking water — used her litter tray to the end… but she just faded away. Her personality was there all the time. She was just tired.
> 
> The vet was out of answers… nothing we could do. It was desperate. We bought all the different brands of food… all the snacks… just anything to get her starting eating again. But she'd walk up to her favourite food, sniff it… and walk away.
> It was horrible how quickly she lost weight. She was a hefty little cat, but by the end she was light as a feather.
> 
> We finally decided to have her put to sleep. The vet came to our house and she died while my husband held her in his arms… and then… then she stopped purring.
> The grief was terrible. We had lost more than a pet. For weeks afterwards we kept seeing her shadow in the corner of our eyes.
> 
> With a broken tail that left a permanent kink, she had been rescued from the streets, we found her at the SPCA in Causeway Bay, Hong Kong in July 2001. The feistiest and most confident kitten you could imagine.
> 
> In her nearly 21 years she was well travelled — Hong Kong, South Africa, UK, Italy, France… back to the UK. When we went on a holiday she'd come with us. People often don't think about taking their cats with them… dogs, sure. Cats? Not so much. But she travelled well and was used to the drill.
> 
> She was dearly loved and spoilt beyond belief.
> As she deserved to be.
> We still miss her terribly.
> 
> So far we have not made a decision on adopting another cat… The temptation is huge and so many older cats out there who deserve a good life. Time will tell.



Pretty cat, sorry for your loss. After our 3 cats passed, we decided although we loved having our cats,  to take a break from pets.


----------



## Scepticalscribe

Arkitect said:


> 2001 — 2021
> 
> So… last year in August our beloved cat Skattie died.
> 
> During the summer heatwave she just stopped eating — kept on drinking water — used her litter tray to the end… but she just faded away. Her personality was there all the time. She was just tired.
> 
> The vet was out of answers… nothing we could do. It was desperate. We bought all the different brands of food… all the snacks… just anything to get her starting eating again. But she'd walk up to her favourite food, sniff it… and walk away.
> It was horrible how quickly she lost weight. She was a hefty little cat, but by the end she was light as a feather.
> 
> We finally decided to have her put to sleep. The vet came to our house and she died while my husband held her in his arms… and then… then she stopped purring.
> The grief was terrible. We had lost more than a pet. For weeks afterwards we kept seeing her shadow in the corner of our eyes.
> 
> With a broken tail that left a permanent kink, she had been rescued from the streets, we found her at the SPCA in Causeway Bay, Hong Kong in July 2001. The feistiest and most confident kitten you could imagine.
> 
> In her nearly 21 years she was well travelled — Hong Kong, South Africa, UK, Italy, France… back to the UK. When we went on a holiday she'd come with us. People often don't think about taking their cats with them… dogs, sure. Cats? Not so much. But she travelled well and was used to the drill.
> 
> She was dearly loved and spoilt beyond belief.
> As she deserved to be.
> We still miss her terribly.
> 
> So far we have not made a decision on adopting another cat… The temptation is huge and so many older cats out there who deserve a good life. Time will tell.



So sorry for your loss; she looks absolutely gorgeous, - her coat is magnificent - and she was clearly much loved and wonderfully cared for.  

A happy cat who lived a long, much loved, well-travelled, interesting and adventurous life.

Who among us can ask for more?


----------



## Arkitect

Runs For Fun said:


> So sorry for your loss. She was such a beautiful cat. It's so hard to say good-bye to them. They are family. I've lost two myself and it still gets to me whenever I think about it.



Thank you. She was a beauty.



Herdfan said:


> Yes, so sorry for your loss.
> 
> *But they know when it is time.*  Enjoy the memories of the 20 years you had with her.



This is true. I always heard about that — our other cat (also a Hong Kong street moggy) died of stomach cancer, so it was a different situation.
But this was extra heartbreaking… she just knew, _"Time to go…"_ and of course our response is, _"You can't possibly leave us!" _Sometimes being human is hard…


Huntn said:


> Pretty cat, sorry for your loss. After our 3 cats passed, we decided although we loved having our cats,  to take a break from pets.



Thank you very much. Yes, as much as we would love to adopt another one (or two!) it was such a heartbreaking thing that we're not being hasty. But still, this winter was extra cold for us.



Scepticalscribe said:


> So sorry for your loss; she looks absolutely gorgeous, - her coat is magnificent - and she was clearly much loved and wonderfully cared for.
> 
> A happy cat who lived a long, much loved, well-travelled, interesting and adventurous life.
> 
> Who among us can ask for more?



Thank you very much. Indeed a well travelled cat. We'd get to the destination, she'd skulk about a bit sniffing where things were — litter tray *check* Food *check* Windows *check* Warm cosy bed *check* She was A-OK. 

Happy memories.


----------



## ericwn

I have four cats in the household. Three of them relocated to Canada with us almost 7 years ago so they’re older ladies while the Canadian cat is the youngest at 6 years old. 
All of our cats are either from shelters or rescued by us because their former owners left them behind. 

One day I’d love to have a Maine Coon because I really like that breed.


----------



## Yoused

ericwn said:


> One day I’d love to have a Maine Coon because I really like that breed.



I was in love with one of those once. She was the sweetest kitty I ever met. Sadly, some other house belonged to her, so I only got to see her once in a while. And perhaps a good thing, that, because I have no idea what it was like with that 27-foot-long fur during shedding season.


----------



## Nycturne

ericwn said:


> One day I’d love to have a Maine Coon because I really like that breed.




We think our current one is a Wedgie, and we somehow got a Maine Coon from the shelter when I was a kid. Both are really good breeds, although the health problems Maine Coons can have took ours far too early, and he was somewhat traumatized by the previous owner so we never really got to see how social they can be.

Our current cat though. Loyal, social (with us), intelligent. I still get surprised by some of the ways she’s been figuring out how to use non-verbal communication with us to ask for play time (with us specifically), or to put the harness on and go outside for a little bit.


----------



## Arkitect

*Kedi*…

In November last year we spent a week in Istanbul.

Here are a few of the fabulous street cats we came across.
On the whole the cats are well looked after — shelters and food and most seem in good health.

The first one nearly came home with us. I could fit this little kitten in my pocket. Look at those eyes!








This one and her family lives in the Hagia Sophia…




Heart shaped snooze.




This old bruiser was so friendly — definitely king of the street, been around the block a few times…
















This old fellow is near the end. He lives downstairs in the apartment block we stayed in. Didn't move much from the chair, but always enjoyed a stroke and snacks.




She's completely at ease amongst the crowds of the Grand Bazaar…




There is a rather lovely film about Istanbul's cats… Kedi
Youtube


----------



## Scepticalscribe

Arkitect said:


> *Kedi*…
> 
> In November last year we spent a week in Istanbul.
> 
> Here are a few of the fabulous street cats we came across.
> On the whole the cats are well looked after — shelters and food and most seem in good health.
> 
> The first one nearly came home with us. I could fit this little kitten in my pocket. Look at those eyes!
> 
> View attachment 12055View attachment 12056
> 
> 
> This one and her family lives in the Hagia Sophia…
> View attachment 12057
> 
> Heart shaped snooze.
> View attachment 12060
> 
> This old bruiser was so friendly — definitely king of the street, been around the block a few times…
> View attachment 12058
> 
> View attachment 12059
> 
> 
> View attachment 12061
> View attachment 12062
> 
> This old fellow is near the end. He lives downstairs in the apartment block we stayed in. Didn't move much from the chair, but always enjoyed a stroke and snacks.
> View attachment 12063
> 
> She's completely at ease amongst the crowds of the Grand Bazaar…
> View attachment 12064
> 
> There is a rather lovely film about Istanbul's cats… Kedi
> Youtube



Wonderful shots.

That - the sheer number of cats, and how well-cared for, they seemed to be - was something that always struck me whenever I walked through the centre of Istanbul, and there were a number of years when I was transiting through the city (often, over-nighting and always spending time in the city centre) on a regular basis.


----------



## Herdfan

Nycturne said:


> although the health problems Maine Coons can have took ours far too early,




I think health problems are much more prevalent in pure-bred cats than "mutts".  We have had 3 ragdolls and 2 had kidney issues.  And they weren't even from the same breeder.


----------



## Huntn

Herdfan said:


> I think health problems are much more prevalent in pure-bred cats than "mutts".  We have had 3 ragdolls and 2 had kidney issues.  And they weren't even from the same breeder.



This is my impression with any pure breEd, not as healthy as muts due to the genetics of the process.


----------



## DT

kind of topical cross post 

https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1497778728776060928/


----------



## lizkat

Arkitect said:


> Heart shaped snooze.



Amazing how a cat knows exactly what is a nap zone at first glance.


----------



## Arkitect

lizkat said:


> Amazing how a cat knows exactly what is a nap zone at first glance.



Yup. Cat comfort radar.


----------



## Nycturne

Herdfan said:


> I think health problems are much more prevalent in pure-bred cats than "mutts".  We have had 3 ragdolls and 2 had kidney issues.  And they weren't even from the same breeder.



Oh, we learned that lesson years and years ago. But we also never were really looking to get a particular breed. The Maine Coon was from the era where the "shelter" just put all the animals in small kennels. So we didn't realize how big he was at first. And we knew of the heart risks early on thanks to the vet we had at the time, since yeah, purebred Maine Coons were notorious for heart problems. Breeders are supposedly getting better about trying to widen the gene pool, but I'd still rather adopt an adult cat from a shelter. 

Our current has been full of surprises. We thought we were getting a short hair of a little over 7lbs, and wound up with a 13lb amazon of a cat with a thick double coat. She also has IBD and a respiratory condition that weren't known at the time of adoption but will need to be managed for the rest of her life. But her personality has made it a lot easier to get her on the right diet, and other than the inhaler, she's pretty easy to medicate. She's the sort of cat that will come when you call if she knows she's going to get groomed, or you'll take her outside, which helps to make things part of her grooming routine.


----------



## Huntn

Nycturne said:


> Oh, we learned that lesson years and years ago. But we also never were really looking to get a particular breed. The Maine Coon was from the era where the "shelter" just put all the animals in small kennels. So we didn't realize how big he was at first. And we knew of the heart risks early on thanks to the vet we had at the time, since yeah, purebred Maine Coons were notorious for heart problems. Breeders are supposedly getting better about trying to widen the gene pool, but I'd still rather adopt an adult cat from a shelter.
> 
> Our current has been full of surprises. We thought we were getting a short hair of a little over 7lbs, and wound up with a 13lb amazon of a cat with a thick double coat. She also has IBD and a respiratory condition that weren't known at the time of adoption but will need to be managed for the rest of her life. But her personality has made it a lot easier to get her on the right diet, and other than the inhaler, she's pretty easy to medicate. She's the sort of cat that will come when you call if she knows she's going to get groomed, or you'll take her outside, which helps to make things part of her grooming routine.



As someone else said, I always wanted a Maine Coon breed.  What is very interesting is that it’s described as a domestic breed. I assumed all  domestic cats were brought here from other places,









						Maine Coon - Wikipedia
					






					en.wikipedia.org
				



_The *Maine Coon* is a large domesticated cat breed. It has a distinctive physical appearance and valuable hunting skills. It is one of the oldest natural breeds in North America. The breed originated in the U.S. state of Maine,[3] where it is the official state cat.

No records of the Maine Coon's exact origins and date of introduction to the United States exist, so several competing hypotheses have been suggested, the most credible suggestion being that it is closely related to the Norwegian Forest cat and the Siberian._


----------



## Arkitect

Huntn said:


> _No records of the Maine Coon's exact origins and date of introduction to the United States exist, so several competing hypotheses have been suggested, the most credible suggestion being that it is *closely related to the Norwegian Forest cat and the **Siberian*._



I think they landed in Americas with Leif Erikson! Liked what they saw and stayed. 

In fact "Vikings" had a lot to do with the spread of cats. 
Link


----------



## Arkitect

I am at serious risk of becoming the TalkedAbout cat lady... But wow. How lovely are they?


----------



## Herdfan

Serval????


----------



## Arkitect

Herdfan said:


> Serval????



Caracal. (I think).


----------



## Herdfan

Arkitect said:


> Caracal. (I think).




I think you are right.  

I want a big cat like a Serval or Savannah.  Wife doesn't want a pet that has to eat raw meat.  LOL


----------



## Arkitect

Herdfan said:


> I think you are right.
> 
> I want a big cat like a Serval or Savannah.  Wife doesn't want a pet that has to eat raw meat.  LOL



That's a tough one.
I think they are incredible animals… not sold on the idea of having one as a pet.

Just mind you feed it lots of meat. Not good if it decides to go snacking on the local Chihuahua population.  

Edit: Should we get a new pet — kitten or puppy, we're definitely going the BARF route.
If we adopt an older cat, we'll probably have to stick with what they are used to.


----------



## Huntn

Herdfan said:


> I think you are right.
> 
> I want a big cat like a Serval or Savannah.  Wife doesn't want a pet that has to eat raw meat.  LOL



Does it have to eat raw meat?


----------



## Arkitect

Huntn said:


> Does it have to eat raw meat?



I would think so.
These are obligate carnivores after all. And in the wild their food would be both raw, and alive (at least for a while).

Now, feeding them LIVE meat I would have a problem with!


----------



## Renzatic

Arkitect said:


> Now, feeding them LIVE meat I would have a problem with!




All you'd have to do is bring in a cow, then let nature take its course.


----------



## Herdfan

Huntn said:


> Does it have to eat raw meat?




Yes.  True Servals and F1 Savannah's have to eat raw meat.


----------



## Huntn

Arkitect said:


> I would think so.
> These are obligate carnivores after all. And in the wild their food would be both raw, and alive (at least for a while).
> 
> Now, feeding them LIVE meat I would have a problem with!






Herdfan said:


> Yes.  True Servals and F1 Savannah's have to eat raw meat.



So I’ll assume that regular cat food,  they’d  either turn their nose up at it or it would not sustain them.


----------



## Herdfan

Huntn said:


> So I’ll assume that regular cat food,  they’d  either turn their nose up at it or it would not sustain them.




They will eat anything.  They need the protein from raw meat.  Apparently regular cat food doesn't have enough, yet all of our ragdolls either ended up on or are currently on low protein food for their kidneys.


----------



## Yoused

Arkitect said:


> Not good if it decides to go snacking on the local Chihuahua population.



Though, some of the annoying dogs in my neighborhood ...


----------



## Arkitect

Yoused said:


> Though, some of the annoying dogs in my neighborhood ...



I must admit to a dream of owning one of these biggish cats — a nice Caracul or Serval — something with a nice bit of tail swishing swagger and ambling down to town for a coffee on a Sunday morning. 
The reactions from the folks with their Golden Labradors and the Hipsters with their French bulldogs would be priceless.


----------



## Arkitect

Herdfan said:


> They will eat anything.  They need the protein from raw meat.  Apparently regular cat food doesn't have enough, yet all of our ragdolls either ended up on or are currently on low protein food for their kidneys.



Yes, pet food is a horror show.
After our first cat died of stomach cancer we started paying a lot more attention to what we were feeding our remaining cat.
First thing was make it meat based — she especially enjoyed liver, but raw chicken was a staple — with a side of gluten free kibbles.

It made a huge difference. She was more perky, alive, talkative — just a whole lot more fun. And her seizures stopped.


----------



## ericwn

Herdfan said:


> Yes. True Servals and F1 Savannah's have to eat raw meat.




But would you really want an F1 in the house?


----------



## Herdfan

ericwn said:


> But would you really want an F1 in the house?




The wife has said she doesn't want to change the litter box.   

There are a couple of TikTok owners of Servals and Savannah's that make a lot of videos of their cats.  The two that come to mid are ChloetheServal and Strykerthecat.  Chloe is a true Serval and Stryker looks to be an F1.  Both are very calm cats, at least in the videos.

And we already have 40lbs of dumb chasing each other all over the place, so combining that into one cat might not be that bad.


----------



## Alli

https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1511003686901854213/


----------



## Renzatic

So I had to take Pete to the ER vet for an emergency cat unblocking. This is the 2nd time I've had to have this done for the poor little guy, and it's cost me $600 bucks each time. He's starting to feel less like a beloved pet, and more like a long term investment.

On top of that, I decided to get some Subway across the street while the vets were sticking a catheter up him to clean out his insides, and while I'm walking from my truck to the car, I'm looking at the Jack's next door, and I end TRIPPING OVER THE DAMN CURB NEXT TO THE DRIVE-THRU, AND FACEPLANTING RIGHT ON THE ASPHALT!

...it's been a really bad day today.


----------



## Huntn

Renzatic said:


> So I had to take Pete to the ER vet for an emergency cat unblocking. This is the 2nd time I've had to have this done for the poor little guy, and it's cost me $600 bucks each time. He's starting to feel less like a beloved pet, and more like a long term investment.
> 
> On top of that, I decided to get some Subway across the street while the vets were sticking a catheter up him to clean out his insides, and while I'm walking from my truck to the car, I'm looking at the Jack's next door, and I end TRIPPING OVER THE DAMN CURB NEXT TO THE DRIVE-THRU, AND FACEPLANTING RIGHT ON THE ASPHALT!
> 
> ...it's been a really bad day today.



The most I payed for a cat was $500 back around 2000 because he had swallowed a string that was looped around his tongue. The vet knocked him out and then pulled on the string but it was stuck too far in his intestines, needed an operation to remove it.


----------



## Renzatic

Huntn said:


> The most I payed for a cat was $500 back around 2000 because he had swallowed a string that was looped around his tongue. The vet knocked him out and then pulled on the string but it was stuck too far in his intestines, needed an operation to remove it.




Altogether, I've probably spent about $1500 on ole Pete now. And I'll probably end up having to spend even more on that special diet catfood to keep him from going again.

I have a special needs cat.


----------



## lizkat

Renzatic said:


> Altogether, I've probably spent about $1500 on ole Pete now. And I'll probably end up having to spend even more on that special diet catfood to keep him from going again.
> 
> I have a special needs cat.




Well Pete sure has good luck having landed at your place.  I hope he will do well going forward.  

I shelled out $1200 once for a great vet to restore full mobility to an indoor-outdoor barn kitty of mine (acquired "free" from my kin's dairy farm)  after she trashed her leg taking on a motorcycle when she was nine months old. 

She was the last of my indoor-outdoor cats,  and was the one who eventually brought me that live grass snake, to my and the snake's dismay and her great pride in showing off her hunting skills.  Honestly there is nothing like waking up to the sound a cat makes when they've fresh prey in their mouth and the cat is on your bed and it's three o'clock in the morning.  And then when you turn on the light and the thing is not a dead mouse but a live snake, well.   Gee.   I started grounding her by closing the cat door with her inside the house at nightfall, believe me.

Anyway in that surgery the guy put in a plate and some titanium screws to fix her rear leg,  and she ended up entirely capable of scaling the willow tree in search of oriole babies, the little brat.   The vet used to stop by once in awhile with one of his interns in tow, just to point her out up in some tree or other and to brag on his skill.

The upside of the motorcycle incident was that the kitty never did cross that road again,  no matter if some enchanting cabbage moth had led her to the edge.  More than once I spotted her putting on the brakes as she neared the last ten feet of lawn. 

Also, I never again figured that I was getting a *free* cat, no matter how I acquired it.  I guess with your kitties, you have long since made a similar realization.


----------



## Huntn

lizkat said:


> Well Pete sure has good luck having landed at your place.  I hope he will do well going forward.
> 
> I shelled out $1200 once for a great vet to restore full mobility to an indoor-outdoor barn kitty of mine (acquired "free" from my kin's dairy farm)  after she trashed her leg taking on a motorcycle when she was nine months old.
> 
> She was the last of my indoor-outdoor cats,  and was the one who eventually brought me that live grass snake, to my and the snake's dismay and her great pride in showing off her hunting skills.  Honestly there is nothing like waking up to the sound a cat makes when they've fresh prey in their mouth and the cat is on your bed and it's three o'clock in the morning.  And then when you turn on the light and the thing is not a dead mouse but a live snake, well.   Gee.   I started grounding her by closing the cat door with her inside the house at nightfall, believe me.
> 
> Anyway in that surgery the guy put in a plate and some titanium screws to fix her rear leg,  and she ended up entirely capable of scaling the willow tree in search of oriole babies, the little brat.   The vet used to stop by once in awhile with one of his interns in tow, just to point her out up in some tree or other and to brag on his skill.
> 
> The upside of the motorcycle incident was that the kitty never did cross that road again,  no matter if some enchanting cabbage moth had led her to the edge.  More than once I spotted her putting on the brakes as she neared the last ten feet of lawn.
> 
> Also, I never again figured that I was getting a *free* cat, no matter how I acquired it.  I guess with your kitties, you have long since made a similar realization.



No saying this judgmentally, but I’d never own an indoor-outdoor cat, indoors only for longevity.


----------



## Herdfan

Huntn said:


> No saying this judgmentally, but I’d never own an indoor-outdoor cat, indoors only for longevity.




And lack of worry.

We have 2 that a former neighbor turned out and they have been showing up to sleep in the garage for about 8 years.  One shows up regularly, but the other one likes to hunt and may disappear for 2-3 nights.  Wife keeps going out late at night and calling to see if she will come home.  Then doesn't sleep well if she doesn't.


----------



## lizkat

Herdfan said:


> And lack of worry.
> 
> We have 2 that a former neighbor turned out and they have been showing up to sleep in the garage for about 8 years.  One shows up regularly, but the other one likes to hunt and may disappear for 2-3 nights.  Wife keeps going out late at night and calling to see if she will come home.  Then doesn't sleep well if she doesn't.




The cat whose photo became my avatar was Porch Kitty.   She was not an indoor kitty, since when she showed up,  I had two of those, my max.   And she was a serious rover anyway, with several other hangouts she apparently used to cruise every day for whatever other comfy spots or good eats she had discovered were hers for the taking.  But my back deck was her chosen sleepover spot after a brutal February snowstorm drove her to seek shelter one night,  and her place of expected breakfast service.  She showed up then early in 2004 and passed away in 2007.

I had to get used to worrying about her, since I had no control over her roamings,  and I was right to worry too.  She's the kitty who somehow managed to crawl back here one afternoon, after being shot by some a-hole using an airgun for his amusement,  or else to let her know he didn't like cats, or anyway didn't respect her life.

Of course when I realized she was injured, I did take her to the vet and they tried to fix her up...  and she briefly became an indoor kitty, ensconced in two generously sized cages wired together and lined with towles and set up in my upstairs hallway, with my own cats banished to the first floor meanwhile.  

But she was old and had internal organ injuries from the shooting, plus --as the vet pointed out on xrays--  it was not even the first time she had been shot with an airgun either. She ended up needing a bit of help across the rainbow bridge.  Her ashes are in a bookcase in my library, so she finally did become an indoor kitty after all.

She was truly a sweet cat.   Even my other kitties were subdued for a few weeks after they realized she wasn't coming around any more and they needn't sit on this side of the kitchen door while she was eating breakfast out there "just in case" she might have tried to come in for a second helping or whatever.   Cats are so comical, really, how they decide how to manipulate the lives of their so-called owners!


----------



## Nycturne

Huntn said:


> No saying this judgmentally, but I’d never own an indoor-outdoor cat, indoors only for longevity.



Ours is “kinda” an indoor-outdoor cat, but in the sense that we’ll put a harness and leash on and go outside together. She’s come to seeing this as part of the routine, and is smart enough to ask _us_ to go outside. In the warmer months, she even helps by getting up in a specific cat tree to get the harness put on so we don’t have to bend over. We will find her in the tree waiting for us, chirping to get our attention around lunch time these days, since we’ve been taking her outside on our lunch breaks while working from home during the pandemic.

Because she can get bored of toys easily, this is honestly one of the easiest ways to keep her stimulated and happy. She‘s not much of a wanderer, but she does like to enjoy the property and we _sometimes_ go for short walks of maybe 100 yards down the road and back. 

I do agree with the sentiment, but when I see how well this cat handles the harness, and how positively she reacts to getting to go outside with us, it’s a good compromise in this case. 



Renzatic said:


> I have a special needs cat.



We learned the same thing after we adopted our current. Turns out she has GI issues that need to be managed by diet. Although looking back, she was smart enough to try to signal to us what her triggers were, we just didn’t know what she was trying to tell us at the time. She also has a collapsed lung node from some lower airway respitory condition that will need to be managed by medication.

Thankfully neither of these should post a huge problem going forward so long as we can keep the IBD managed.


----------



## Herdfan

Today is the birthday of my daughter's cat.  She is 15.

My daughter wants to take her to her new apartment with her new job, but wife and I aren't sure.  Caring for an aging cat is a handful and while she is in great health right now, that could change almost overnight.  So we are discouraging it for now.


----------



## Roller

Herdfan said:


> Today is the birthday of my daughter's cat.  She is 15.
> 
> My daughter wants to take her to her new apartment with her new job, but wife and I aren't sure.  Caring for an aging cat is a handful and while she is in great health right now, that could change almost overnight.  So we are discouraging it for now.



If your daughter doesn’t take her cat with her, I assume you’ll keep the kitty. I wouldn’t underestimate the value of having a beloved pet for support after a move, though. Depending on the distance, perhaps your daughter can bring her cat to the new place, and if caring for her becomes too difficult, you can take her back.


----------



## Renzatic

You know what the worst thing about cat ownership is? When you're sitting around, minding your own business, and suddenly you hear...

HURKA-HURKA-HURKA-HURKA-HURKA-HURKA-HURKA!

...and you have to get up, and hurry to where they're at to make sure they're not hairballing on any carpet.


----------



## lizkat

Renzatic said:


> You know what the worst thing about cat ownership is? When you're sitting around, minding your own business, and suddenly you hear...
> 
> HURKA-HURKA-HURKA-HURKA-HURKA-HURKA-HURKA!
> 
> ...and you have to get up, and hurry to where they're at to make sure they're not hairballing on any carpet.




I will cop to having administered (gentle but prompt) flying lessons when I occaionally heard that sound starting up at the foot of my bed in the middle of the night.

Of course I usually then also turned on a lamp at bedside to remove the evidence from the floor,  lest I forget about it and perhaps encounter a cold, wet hairball while barefoot in the dark if needing to go downstairs to use the bathroom before first light.


----------



## Renzatic

lizkat said:


> Of course I usually then also turned on a lamp at bedside to remove the evidence from the floor, lest I forget about it and perhaps encounter a cold, wet hairball while barefoot in the dark if needing to go downstairs to use the bathroom before first light.




I've done that before. It's actually worse when it's still warm.


----------



## Herdfan

Did something last night I have never done.  

I had to wake Gismo, who was sleeping at the foot of the bed, because he was snoring.  Loudly.


----------



## Renzatic

Herdfan said:


> I had to wake Gismo, who was sleeping at the foot of the bed, because he was snoring. Loudly.




I've seen a cat do that exactly once. It is the weirdest thing.


----------



## Herdfan

Renzatic said:


> I've seen a cat do that exactly once. It is the weirdest thing.




He's never done it before, so yeah, weird.


----------



## Cmaier

Looking after the neighbor’s cat for a month, and he viciously attacked me and went for the neck.


----------



## Eric

Cmaier said:


> Looking after the neighbor’s cat for a month, and he viciously attacked me and went for the neck.
> 
> View attachment 14941



Never seen such a bloodthirsty cat.


----------



## Cmaier

Eric said:


> Never seen such a bloodthirsty cat.




It’s funny, because the neighbor keeps warning everyone that the cat bites and hurts people.  If I kneel down to pet him, he immediately jumps on my lap and rolls over to expose his belly. I‘m not seeing it.


----------



## Renzatic

My cat learned how to open doors earlier this year. She always wants to go into the scary ass snuff film dungeon I call a basement for some odd reason.


----------



## Eric

Cmaier said:


> It’s funny, because the neighbor keeps warning everyone that the cat bites and hurts people.  If I kneel down to pet him, he immediately jumps on my lap and rolls over to expose his belly. I‘m not seeing it.



They know who to trust.


----------



## Herdfan

Cmaier said:


> Looking after the neighbor’s cat for a month, and he viciously attacked me and went for the neck.
> 
> View attachment 14941



Redhead!  What did you expect?


----------



## Renzatic

Here's a flat cat in the guest bedroom.

Wish I could let ole Fuzz here out alongside Polly, but Polly will jump her the moment she sees her. For now, I just have to cycle my cats. One goes out, one goes up.


----------



## Herdfan

Renzatic said:


> Here's a flat cat in the guest bedroom.
> 
> Wish I could let ole Fuzz here out alongside Polly, but Polly will jump her the moment she sees her. For now, I just have to cycle my cats. One goes out, one goes up.




We're cycling right now as well.  My daughter is home and brought her cat which can't be seen by our cats or all hell breaks loose.  Coco will start hissing at his brother, who doesn't understand and then go hide under the bed.


----------



## Renzatic

Herdfan said:


> We're cycling right now as well.  My daughter is home and brought her cat which can't be seen by our cats or all hell breaks loose.  Coco will start hissing at his brother, who doesn't understand and then go hide under the bed.




I wish mine were that calm. When Polly sees Fuzz, she will go into Out For Blood Mode, and straight up attack her.

The only reason I can think of for her doing this is because she was always bullied by Pete when she was still an outdoor cat. He was always harassing her, making her jump and skittish, and taking her food. When I brought her in, she started relaxing. Guess now she sees the house as her domain, and poor Fuzz, who I had to bring in because Pete started bulling her after losing Polly as a target, is an interloper.


----------



## Cmaier

I fed my neighbor’s cat for a few weeks while he was out of town, and now the cat jumps over the fence and into my yard when he hears my voice. I am, apparently, now his human.

He has also almost figured out how to get in the dog door, which has led to a couple of swats on the nose for my poor little terrier who just wants to play with the strange orange creature.


----------



## Cmaier

“But i just want to be friends!”


----------



## Runs For Fun

Cmaier said:


> I fed my neighbor’s cat for a few weeks while he was out of town, and now the cat jumps over the fence and into my yard when he hears my voice. I am, apparently, now his human.
> 
> He has also almost figured out how to get in the dog door, which has led to a couple of swats on the nose for my poor little terrier who just wants to play with the strange orange creature.



Typical cat. He owns you now.


----------



## Runs For Fun

Haven't posted my kitties in a while. These two cuddle buddies


----------



## DT

As part of our ongoing cleanup/out/minimizing, I finally went ultra minimum downstairs in the main TV room, just the Sonos sub in the corner, no consoles, no AVR, no ethernet switch, etc., that freed up the nice Sanus rack for upstairs to replace a pretty mediocre one in the bedroom.  While I was cleaning off the old of wire/gear cruft, kitty kept getting involved   so i chased her out, then I moved a stack of stuff into the corner and when I turned around ...

Ummm, no, I can't see you ...


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## DT




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## Nycturne

This cat does this when she wants to go outside. Makes it easier to put the harness on, so we try to encourage her to keep doing it.


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## DT

Nycturne said:


> This cat does this when she wants to go outside. Makes it easier to put the harness on, so we try to encourage her to keep doing it.




We just got a harness/leash for our kitty, though haven't tried a test fitting yet.   She's a 100% inside cat, and we're hoping to give her a little outside exposure via leash, but also use it to get her into a new cat tent we bought.  It's pretty nice, we opened it inside, and she eventually went in, later was in/out a few times, like not freaked out by it, even when I zipped up the door.  We're going to set it up on the deck (when it's cooler ...), leash her into it, then we can hang out with her outside, she can talk to her squirrel friends, etc. 

My ILs have a cat that will knock at the door to go outside, and go from the house, right into a cat tent (I think it's the same one).  Then when he's done, he'll sit up next to the door and squeak, you open it, and he'll stroll right back into the house, with zero interest in running off, we'd love if it ours would eventually do that.


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## Nycturne

DT said:


> We just got a harness/leash for our kitty, though haven't tried a test fitting yet.   She's a 100% inside cat, and we're hoping to give her a little outside exposure via leash, but also use it to get her into a new cat tent we bought.  It's pretty nice, we opened it inside, and she eventually went in, later was in/out a few times, like not freaked out by it, even when I zipped up the door.  We're going to set it up on the deck (when it's cooler ...), leash her into it, then we can hang out with her outside, she can talk to her squirrel friends, etc.
> 
> My ILs have a cat that will knock at the door to go outside, and go from the house, right into a cat tent (I think it's the same one).  Then when he's done, he'll sit up next to the door and squeak, you open it, and he'll stroll right back into the house, with zero interest in running off, we'd love if it ours would eventually do that.




Our cat adapts to things faster than I would expect. Within a minute of the harness going on for the first time we were outside and she was enjoying herself in the lawn, and 30 minutes later, she led us back to the house to go back inside. Everything we've seen suggests she was an indoor cat previously, but she sure doesn't mind the harness or the leash, doesn't like leaving the property though. Early on we had to train her not to climb the fences, though.


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## Yoused

DT said:


> View attachment 16500
> 
> View attachment 16502



you left out the link


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## lizkat

Yoused said:


> you left out the link




Heck every day is International Cat Day, just ask any cat.  They know they're descended from royalty and humans are peons.

​


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## DT

lizkat said:


> Heck every day is International Cat Day, just ask any cat.  They know they're descended from royalty and humans are peons.
> 
> View attachment 16531​





There's an amazing issue of The Sandman (the series is on my mind with the recent Netflix series ...), it was published during a run of single issue stories:





Dream presents her with a vision of an alternative reality where cats are huge and humans are merely their playthings, tiny servants which groom their bodies and which the cats can kill at their leisure. A man ruined that world by informing the humans that their dreams will shape the world. Enough humans listened to make the vision a reality. Upon waking, the cat undertakes a spiritual quest for justice. She preaches her vision to motley assortments of housecats around the world, hoping that if she can make enough cats believe in and dream of this reality, the world will change to conform to their dreams.







It's pretty amazing ... and a little terrifying


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## lizkat

DT said:


> and a little terrifying




Hah, certainly if you already live in a household where a cat has you wrapped around meeting its every whimsical demand for space, food, playtime...


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## lizkat

On second or third or fourth or fifth thought..    must be an easy solution to any problem.

https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1556627285771296768/


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## lizkat

Honestly this is hilarious, i cannot stop laughing.

https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1557085796833939457/


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## Runs For Fun

lizkat said:


> Honestly this is hilarious, i cannot stop laughing.
> 
> https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1557085796833939457/



Nothing to see here, now beat it.


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## lizkat

Runs For Fun said:


> Nothing to see here, now beat it.




Yep the black kitty has his priorities straight, he's *totally *focused on preparing to beat the daylights out of the tiger one.


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## lizkat

One of my bros sent this after I had sent a link to the tweet with the cats and the Roomba.   


​
​


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## Runs For Fun

lizkat said:


> One of my bros sent this after I had sent a link to the tweet with the cats and the Roomba.
> 
> View attachment 16566​
> ​



Accurate!


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## lizkat

No rest for the weary and talented...


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## Runs For Fun

https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1559657541440880641/

Look at the second tweet


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## lizkat

One of my kin sent me this after gaining some life experience on the subject.  He concluded after about half an hour that the cat was possibly not all that sick if it could prevail through a 7-round match and leave the room waving its tail in that infuriating way they have when they've put you in your place.


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## Renzatic

DAMN YOU ALL! LET ME IN!


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## Cmaier

This is not my cat. But if he figures out how that dog door flap works, I may be his human.


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## Cmaier

This local family of cats was just seen on a bike ride. Five of them in there.


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## lizkat

Cmaier said:


> This local family of cats was just seen on a bike ride. Five of them in there.
> 
> View attachment 17060




Juvie bandidos!    Gotta love 'em.   I saw a family of five too once, around 3am on a Saturday morning during my weekend commute upstate.  They were up at the very top of a back mountain road I used as a shortcut home in the summertime, just milling around on the double yellow line and doubtless plotting some sort of juvenile mischief.    Was way before the days of smartphone cams or I'd been all over them even though I'm no photographer.    Thanks for these, the laughs and the memories!


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## Yoused

Cmaier said:


> This local family of cats was just seen on a bike ride. Five of them in there.
> 
> View attachment 17060




Is that, like, from some Stephen King book? The one on the left is Trashpandawise or somesuch?


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## Cmaier

Yoused said:


> Is that, like, from some Stephen King book? The one on the left is Trashpandawise or somesuch?



Nah, just a Northern California family of sewer cats planning some kind of heist, i think.


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## DT

There's a pretty fun doc on Netflix about cats:









						Watch Inside the Mind of a Cat | Netflix Official Site
					

Cat experts dive into the mind of the feline to reveal the true capabilities of the pouncing pet in this captivating and cuddly documentary.




					www.netflix.com


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## lizkat

DT said:


> There's a pretty fun doc on Netflix about cats:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Watch Inside the Mind of a Cat | Netflix Official Site
> 
> 
> Cat experts dive into the mind of the feline to reveal the true capabilities of the pouncing pet in this captivating and cuddly documentary.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> www.netflix.com




I almost clicked on that tonight but I'm fading...    I'll go back tomorrow though and add it to my list!


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## Runs For Fun

DT said:


> There's a pretty fun doc on Netflix about cats:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Watch Inside the Mind of a Cat | Netflix Official Site
> 
> 
> Cat experts dive into the mind of the feline to reveal the true capabilities of the pouncing pet in this captivating and cuddly documentary.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> www.netflix.com



Oh I need to watch this NOW!


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## DT




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## lizkat

This guy is more of an ad for Weight Watchers than for either bodega cats or snacks... even if I do feel badly for any mice trying to get a grip in that place.   The cat is no slacker.

https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1566967768565571585/


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## lizkat

Remember hiding behind the LR drapes as a kid?


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## DT

Cut and pasted kitty using the new iOS16 feature ...


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## DT

Trippy I did that right out of the photo posted above from Safari …


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## lizkat

Imagine all the additional trouble cats around the world will now be portrayed on social media as having got into.

Bad enough what they managed before on their own


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## Renzatic

lizkat said:


> Imagine all the additional trouble cats around the world will now be portrayed on social media as having got into.
> 
> Bad enough what they managed before on their own




I got scratched by one of my cats the other day. The butthole...


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## DT

Renzatic said:


> I got scratched by one of my cats the other day. The butthole...




Geez, that must've hurt and make going #2 extra tricky ...


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## Renzatic

DT said:


> Geez, that must've hurt and make going #2 extra tricky ...




Nah. It wasn’t my wiping hand, so it’s all good.

My actual butthole was spared too.


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## Runs For Fun

DT said:


> Cut and pasted kitty using the new iOS16 feature ...
> 
> 
> View attachment 17584






DT said:


> View attachment 17586
> 
> 
> Trippy I did that right out of the photo posted above from Safari …



Oh this feature is going to make the internet a whole lot more awesome!


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## Herdfan

Renzatic said:


> I got scratched by one of my cats the other day. The butthole...




LOL.

Have you ever had a cat think your Achilles looks tasty.  So they bite it while you're watching TV.  

Guess he wasn't getting the attention he thought he deserved.


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## Renzatic

Herdfan said:


> LOL.
> 
> Have you ever had a cat think your Achilles looks tasty.  So they bite it while you're watching TV.
> 
> Guess he wasn't getting the attention he thought he deserved.




I haven't had a cat bite my achilles tendon before, but my cat Pete does like to go after exposed toes. I guess he thinks they're little worms or something.


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## lizkat

Runs For Fun said:


> Oh this feature is going to make the internet a whole lot more awesome!




Yes it will.  And it's more than just cats landing in places they're unlikely to have been, it will be about more sophisticated (if amateur) photo 'adjustments' in the realm of say pols partying with drug kingpin's wives etc.

Still there are likely to be photos around where if you know cats,  you know the photo was 100% real.

https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1569506502721040385/


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## lizkat

Heh, the fakery may already have begun...

https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1569453301397086209/


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## lizkat

This one, however, looks real enough to me.

https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1569528855525838854/​


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## Renzatic

CHONK!


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## lizkat

Renzatic said:


> CHONK!
> 
> View attachment 17646





Cats were born to zone out, right?  No other critter seems to spend so much time catching Zs.


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## Renzatic

lizkat said:


> Cats were born to zone out, right?  No other critter seems to spend so much time catching Zs.




I don't even know why they need all that sleep. It's not like they do all that much when they're awake.


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## lizkat

Renzatic said:


> I don't even know why they need all that sleep. It's not like they do all that much when they're awake.




Well it's not like they always SHOW us that much of whatever they're up to when they're awake....

​​​


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## Renzatic

So, Pete was late coming in tonight. Usually, he’s ready to be put up in the garage by 6, but tonight, he was nowhere to be found.

It’s 9:30, and he just showed up, carrying a good midsized possum in his jaw. He drops it off in front of my door, and goes sit next to the garage, waiting to be put up. I put him up, and go out to grab some tongs to move the possum carcass…

…and the damn thing gets up and runs off down the driveway.

It was playing possum, you see.


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## lizkat

And today we have...   yes,  a cat playing mailman.


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## Herdfan

Wife showed me this last night.  Wow.  I feel a bit sorry for the babysitter.

The first 30 seconds or so can be skipped.  Just her and the kid tossing the ball.  Then the glass breaks......


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## Renzatic

Herdfan said:


> Wife showed me this last night.  Wow.  I feel a bit sorry for the babysitter.




My cats wouldn't do that for me. I could be getting my ass beat by some random stranger, and all they'd do is rub up against the person hitting me.


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## Roller

Posted without comment:

https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1576528492854153217/


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## Nycturne

Roller said:


> Posted without comment:
> 
> https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1576528492854153217/




Our cat is pretty similar. Once she knows the trick behind a toy, it stops being entertaining. Pretty much none of the electronic toys work beyond the first try because of that. Those food puzzles that say “Hey, start at the low difficulty and ramp it up over time”? She’s usually on the hardest setting after a day and working it out in seconds.


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## Herdfan

Nycturne said:


> Our cat is pretty similar. Once she knows the trick behind a toy, it stops being entertaining. Pretty much none of the electronic toys work beyond the first try because of that.




Bought one of those wiggle fish.  It was just too loud and none of the cats would play with it.


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## Yoused

just get a box


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## Renzatic

Herdfan said:


> Bought one of those wiggle fish.  It was just too loud and none of the cats would play with it.




I have two of those. Pete carries his around with him when he's in the garage.


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## lizkat

Cat catchin' the beat...  from a metronome?


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## Yoused




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## Yoused

It has been said that "fox" is cat software installed on dog hardware with a dolphin audio card.


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## Nycturne

Why are you taking the brush away? You aren’t done yet.


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## DT




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## lizkat

@DT Yeah did you get permission to take her royal highness' photo?   Doesn't seem like it!


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## Yoused

A couple decades back, Mom bought me a digital camera for my birhday, my first. I had to get a USB/Firewire card to put in my 7200 so I could get pictures off it. One of my first pictures was


Spoiler: my babycat






She was about 3y/o at the time. I personally thought she was the prettiest cat ever. Still feel that way, though she has been for gone quite a while.


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## Herdfan

Daughter's 15, almost 16, year old Ragdoll isn't doing well.  She hasn't eaten much since Thursday and has had diarrhea since yesterday afternoon.

She is on her way to the vet as I post this.  She has already outlived her mother and half-sister by a couple of years.


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## DT

Herdfan said:


> Daughter's 15, almost 16, year old Ragdoll isn't doing well.  She hasn't eaten much since Thursday and has had diarrhea since yesterday afternoon.
> 
> She is on her way to the vet as I post this.  She has already outlived her mother and half-sister by a couple of years.




When it was time to put the last kitty to sleep, we used this really nice service that comes to your home.  We knew of it because the  neighbor used the same with his Lab he'd had for like 20 years.

It' really nice, gives something that's really tough a more peaceful, and if you will, more spiritual sort of ending, we sat in the yard with a blanket, vs. a cold, clinical ending.


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## DT

lizkat said:


> @DT Yeah did you get permission to take her royal highness' photo?   Doesn't seem like it!




Hahaha, that look is definitely "_Wait, what are you doing?_"


----------



## Herdfan

DT said:


> When it was time to put the last kitty to sleep, we used this really nice service that comes to your home.  We knew of it because the  neighbor used the same with his Lab he'd had for like 20 years.
> 
> It' really nice, gives something that's really tough a more peaceful, and if you will, more spiritual sort of ending, we sat in the yard with a blanket, vs. a cold, clinical ending.




That's awesome.  

The vet gave her some fluids and a shot of Flagil to stop her up and some prescription food.  We need to take a stool sample back Monday and then they will determine if we need to bring her back.  She seems a bit perkier this evening so hopefully she will be on the mend.


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## Renzatic

My cat’s developed a new bad habit.


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## Yoused

Renzatic said:


> My cat’s developed a new bad habit.




Time for a wall-mount.


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## Renzatic

Yoused said:


> Time for a wall-mount.




Not in those walls. You can’t even drive nails into them. 

And anyway, the cat would just hang off the TV.


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## Roller

Well, here's something we can all agree on as being something new in the cat world:









						Airport staff find cat trapped in suitcase
					

TSA staff at New York's JFK airport found a ginger cat trapped in a suitcase that had been checked for a flight for Florida. The cat -- which apparently got in the suitcase by mistake -- was unharmed.




					www.cnn.com


----------



## lizkat

Roller said:


> Well, here's something we can all agree on as being something new in the cat world:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Airport staff find cat trapped in suitcase
> 
> 
> TSA staff at New York's JFK airport found a ginger cat trapped in a suitcase that had been checked for a flight for Florida. The cat -- which apparently got in the suitcase by mistake -- was unharmed.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> www.cnn.com




Cats sure do like to get into boxes and bags!  There are also pretty often stories of cats getting into produce trucks and the like and traveling across a whole continent... curiosity seems to be a thing with them.  Or else they just got caught on a mouse patrol and didn't bail out soon enough.


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## Herdfan

We have to keep the work van’s doors shut or we would take home people’s cats.


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## Renzatic

Cat smells the ham on my breath. She keeps getting up in my grill!


----------



## lizkat

The famous Los Angeles puma P-22 has had to be euthanized.   RIP to a cat who became the face of saving his kind from extinction.   Piece has video w/ stills of some of the photo captures of him over the years..









						P-22, L.A. celebrity mountain lion, euthanized due to severe injuries
					

P-22, L.A. celebrity mountain lion, euthanized due to severe injuries




					www.latimes.com


----------



## shadow puppet

lizkat said:


> The famous Los Angeles puma P-22 has had to be euthanized.   RIP to a cat who became the face of saving his kind from extinction.   Piece has video w/ stills of some of the photo captures of him over the years..
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> P-22, L.A. celebrity mountain lion, euthanized due to severe injuries
> 
> 
> P-22, L.A. celebrity mountain lion, euthanized due to severe injuries
> 
> 
> 
> 
> www.latimes.com



I was just reading about this on our Santa Monica Mtns account.  This is such a sad loss in our area.  I'm absolutely gutted.  He was such an incredibly beautiful Puma.


----------



## Clix Pix

Saw the article in today's _Washington Post_.....  He was quite the adventurer, wasn't he, and I can see how he was a local legend. Such a shame that he was no longer healthy, then sustained injuries, and would've not fared well on his own any more.  He looked like a lovely, powerful cat who must've been something in his heyday.


----------



## Herdfan

Clix Pix said:


> Saw the article in today's _Washington Post_.....  He was quite the adventurer, wasn't he, and I can see how he was a local legend. Such a shame that he was no longer healthy, then sustained injuries, and would've not fared well on his own any more.  He looked like a lovely, powerful cat who must've been something in his heyday.




I love big cats.  Got to hold a juvenile Leopard at a big cat rescue and it was probably one of the best "wild" animal encounters I have every had.  Nothing will ever top diving with a pregnant shark, but this was close.  He was just like a house cat, only bigger.  He played, he nuzzled and was very sweet.

One day I hope to have either a Serval or an F1 Savannah.


----------



## shadow puppet

Safe travels on the next part of your journey P-22. 
By @groundfloormurals


----------



## lizkat

Herdfan said:


> I love big cats.  Got to hold a juvenile Leopard at a big cat rescue and it was probably one of the best "wild" animal encounters I have every had.  Nothing will ever top diving with a pregnant shark, but this was close.  He was just like a house cat, only bigger.  He played, he nuzzled and was very sweet.
> 
> One day I hope to have either a Serval or an F1 Savannah.




I was just rewatching a PBS Nature segment that aired back in November, the one about ocelots in Texas.  They are about twice the size of a house cat...   and I hadn't realized how nearly extinct they may be in the USA.  I think there are efforts now to reestablish genetic diversity of that subset now --by working with Mexican wildlife authorities-- to bring in some new blood,  since the ocelot is still more widely established south of our border, and has even been found to live comfortably there in a wide range of microclimates.









						Nature | Preview of American Ocelot | Season 41 | Episode 4 | PBS
					

Dive deep into South Texas to meet one of America’s most endangered cats: the ocelot.




					www.pbs.org


----------

