cat ramblings
Raccoons are surprisingly larger than you might think. Especially when there are 3 or 4 of them staring at you and telling you in very clear English: "We could take you." Not cat sized at all. That observation was not lost on Xica, who all in all remained fairly calm when requesting that I let her inside so that the big scary monsters could drink from her outside water bowl. No more unsupervised nighttime forays for her.
I just started letting these guys* outside in this past year as a treat for their golden retirement, once illness made their mortality an unavoidable reality to me. Since they are California cats, and have not really ever been outside here on the Other Coast before, it's fun watching them deal with such bizarre happenings as rain, snow, and squirrels. I'm pretty sure Xica holds me personally responsible for rain. She still wants to go out and lie on the deck in it, but would like me to keep it from falling on her, please.
Xica's the only one of the three that I'd let out totally unsupervised (at least intentionally). She knows where the food bowl is, and lord knows she'd never miss a meal. Initially they only went out for strictly supervised walks, one at a time, while the others stayed inside and caterwauled and made 1-900 telephone calls. After a while, they were able to all go out together, but only under very strict direct eagle-eyed Parent-o-Vision.
The deaf girl Chatu just loved lying on the deck in the sun. She also loved something in the neighbor's back yard, and was continually trying to slip away over there. The neighbors have seen me rooting around in their back yard more than once, with my funny morning hair and mismatched hurriedly thrown on clothes, pretending very loudly to "call" a completely deaf cat, so that they wouldn't sic the cops on me. ("Here KITTY KITTY! Oh my, where could my CAT have gone!")
Sam, despite having an arthritis which earned her the nickname "Pegleg" (when she wasn't listening), also was not one to go silently into the night. Using her invisibility cloak to befuddle three otherwise attentive young men, she made an adventuresome dash to the river about a quarter - half mile away during her last week of life. There, by the grace of deity and the neighbor three doors down, I found that my girl had stopped three cars full of people who were feeding her Friskies and water. The ten year old girl present had already re-named her. To Sam. My beloved Lady barely acknowledged my presence when I arrived, frantic, as she was much too busy chowing on the the candylike cat food. The people who found her thought that she'd been hit by a car, because she looked so bedraggled and crippled. I assured them that she was in full form. They ever so gently inquired as to whether I had considered euthanasia. "Ma'am, she just escaped past three guardians, made a half mile dash down here to the river, stopped your three cars, and has suckered food out of you. Really, she's still having a pretty good life." And she did, too, until she took that flying leap off the couch and injured herself, at which time she gracefully declined to renew her contract.
*I will be referring to all three of my cats in the present tense probably for at least the next 20 years or so.
I just started letting these guys* outside in this past year as a treat for their golden retirement, once illness made their mortality an unavoidable reality to me. Since they are California cats, and have not really ever been outside here on the Other Coast before, it's fun watching them deal with such bizarre happenings as rain, snow, and squirrels. I'm pretty sure Xica holds me personally responsible for rain. She still wants to go out and lie on the deck in it, but would like me to keep it from falling on her, please.
Xica's the only one of the three that I'd let out totally unsupervised (at least intentionally). She knows where the food bowl is, and lord knows she'd never miss a meal. Initially they only went out for strictly supervised walks, one at a time, while the others stayed inside and caterwauled and made 1-900 telephone calls. After a while, they were able to all go out together, but only under very strict direct eagle-eyed Parent-o-Vision.
The deaf girl Chatu just loved lying on the deck in the sun. She also loved something in the neighbor's back yard, and was continually trying to slip away over there. The neighbors have seen me rooting around in their back yard more than once, with my funny morning hair and mismatched hurriedly thrown on clothes, pretending very loudly to "call" a completely deaf cat, so that they wouldn't sic the cops on me. ("Here KITTY KITTY! Oh my, where could my CAT have gone!")
Sam, despite having an arthritis which earned her the nickname "Pegleg" (when she wasn't listening), also was not one to go silently into the night. Using her invisibility cloak to befuddle three otherwise attentive young men, she made an adventuresome dash to the river about a quarter - half mile away during her last week of life. There, by the grace of deity and the neighbor three doors down, I found that my girl had stopped three cars full of people who were feeding her Friskies and water. The ten year old girl present had already re-named her. To Sam. My beloved Lady barely acknowledged my presence when I arrived, frantic, as she was much too busy chowing on the the candylike cat food. The people who found her thought that she'd been hit by a car, because she looked so bedraggled and crippled. I assured them that she was in full form. They ever so gently inquired as to whether I had considered euthanasia. "Ma'am, she just escaped past three guardians, made a half mile dash down here to the river, stopped your three cars, and has suckered food out of you. Really, she's still having a pretty good life." And she did, too, until she took that flying leap off the couch and injured herself, at which time she gracefully declined to renew her contract.
*I will be referring to all three of my cats in the present tense probably for at least the next 20 years or so.