WWIII and WWI
As a couple of you know, my wife and I just got a new kitten from my mom. My mom breeds siamese cats, and we adopted one of her "defective" cats. Of, there's nothing wrong with the cat, in the health sense...the poor little blighter is just colored all wrong (it's actually an unintended cross breed...the only thing wrong with it, as my mom says, is that "her mother was a hussy.").
Well, we brought the kitten, Sophie, to the new house, and introduced it to my other two cats. They are both siamese, and so...well, it was entertaining.
Alex, my cat that bit off a hunk of Gilgurth's nose, was fine. He kinda gave a perfunctory hiss and a growl, which the kitten returned. They do it every time they see each other, but it is getting more and more desultory, and will eventually stop altogether.
Elizabeth, my wife's cat, was...not fine. She's taken to her bed with the vapors.
Seriously. She has adopted a spot beneath a stool that is both sheltered and provided with a heating vent, and she has not left that spot except to grab a quick bite to eat and visit the litter box. If anyone comes near the stool, WWIII breaks out. Screaming, hissing, growling, and a flurry of swatted paws sends everyone- dog, cat, human- scurrying away.
A different sort of war happens at night. Elizabeth, of course, is under her stool, and is thus sitting out these hostilities. I'm laying on my side, with Alex curled up behind my knees. Allyson is on the other side of the bed, with Sophie behind her knees. Sticking up from behind both of our legs, like sentinels, are two pairs of cat ears. Every now and then one of the cats pokes his head up, verifies that the other one is still there, hunkered down behind cover, and then returns to his own trench. Then, the other one takes a look, then settles back down. If they both happen to look up at the same time, there is a half-hearted hiss, half-heartedly returned.
In No Man's Land is the dog, watching all of this with a jaded eye. She's just trying to get through the night without being bitten (or wandering too near to the Hissing Stool).
Well, we brought the kitten, Sophie, to the new house, and introduced it to my other two cats. They are both siamese, and so...well, it was entertaining.
Alex, my cat that bit off a hunk of Gilgurth's nose, was fine. He kinda gave a perfunctory hiss and a growl, which the kitten returned. They do it every time they see each other, but it is getting more and more desultory, and will eventually stop altogether.
Elizabeth, my wife's cat, was...not fine. She's taken to her bed with the vapors.
Seriously. She has adopted a spot beneath a stool that is both sheltered and provided with a heating vent, and she has not left that spot except to grab a quick bite to eat and visit the litter box. If anyone comes near the stool, WWIII breaks out. Screaming, hissing, growling, and a flurry of swatted paws sends everyone- dog, cat, human- scurrying away.
A different sort of war happens at night. Elizabeth, of course, is under her stool, and is thus sitting out these hostilities. I'm laying on my side, with Alex curled up behind my knees. Allyson is on the other side of the bed, with Sophie behind her knees. Sticking up from behind both of our legs, like sentinels, are two pairs of cat ears. Every now and then one of the cats pokes his head up, verifies that the other one is still there, hunkered down behind cover, and then returns to his own trench. Then, the other one takes a look, then settles back down. If they both happen to look up at the same time, there is a half-hearted hiss, half-heartedly returned.
In No Man's Land is the dog, watching all of this with a jaded eye. She's just trying to get through the night without being bitten (or wandering too near to the Hissing Stool).