Cat Tales – Page 20

Poor Phurball

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Jan 092006

I came home with my son this afternoon. Put my purse down on the table, reached behind me to give the door a little push to close it. It swung most of the way and stopped—no noise to indicate why, it just stopped. I turned around to see what was blocking it.

There, in the doorway, stood Phurball, the door gently rebounding off his body, an expression of long-suffering exasperation on his face.

Needless to say I immediately dropped down next to him and apologized profusely, petting and fussing over him. He forgave me with a perfunctory purr, still looking exasperated: “Yes, yes, when you’ve quite finished you can open the door for me.”

Poor old man. The things he puts up with.

Cat Spat, Redux

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Jan 082006

We’re still seeking a home for our foster cat. (If you know anyone who wants one…) I think she came to us to learn how to be a housecat before going to her permanent home. She’s now allowing us to walk past her without bolting away, and we can walk towards her to pet her instead of crouching down and coaxing her over. When I say hello to her in the morning she perks up, knowing a petting is imminent. A couple of times she’s curled up on the couch next to me and gone to sleep.

Oddly enough, her favorite person has been, from day one, my hyperactive ten-year-old son. When anyone else would approach she would scuttle away, yet by the third day he would leap across the room to pet her and she would wait for him. I suspect this is because they are about the same relative age, and are both total attention hogs. The little cat will bug Phurball in much the same way my son bugs his older brother, and for exactly the same reason: she wants someone to play with.

Phurball is still attempting to maintain his policy of “ignore it and it’ll go away.” At first she had him totally cowed and he wouldn’t even enter the hardwood area that she had claimed as “hers.” Now, however, he takes little notice of her. I believe this is explained by the fact that she was in heat when we took her to be spayed; males of every species are intimidated by hormonal females.

She, on the other hand, is having great fun stalking him whenever he appears. Now and then she’ll work up the nerve to pounce on his tail. I can always tell when she does this, even if I’m not in the room, as I will hear a thump, an irritated vocalization from Phurball, and the galloping of little feet as she scampers away, giggling.

Only once has Phurball been aggressive towards her, and that was when he caught her with me in my room in the basement. He walked in the door looking for me and found her in the room as well. Oh, he was irked. He rattled off a series of short, curt meows, glaring at her—but he was standing in the door so she couldn’t acquiesce.

I picked him up and sat down with him in my lap so that she could get out of the room. She went to the doorway and then sat down, looking back at us. Incensed, Phurball jumped out of my lap and went after her, uttering several more of those irritated meows and swatting at her. She got the point and fled upstairs. Clearly Phurball’s tolerance of her ends when she starts infringing on his person.

I’m hoping we can find a home for her with another young cat who will play with her. We’ve been teaching her basic housecat rules, such as what she is and is not allowed to jump up on. Basically, she may not walk anywhere that we eat or prepare food. I’ve caught her up on the table a couple of times, exploring; not having the Bad Kitty bottle handy I used the other time-honored method of cat discipline: clapping my hands sharply while exclaiming, “No!” then going on about my business after she had jumped down, as if nothing had happened. She’s a bright little cat and twice appears to be all it took to get the message across.

She’s a nice little cat. I wonder if she’ll remember her foster family after she’s grown up and moved away.

Merry Christmas Y’all!

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Dec 302005

Our Christmas was relatively quiet. Which was nice, after taking a friend to the ER on Christmas Eve. (Short version: bad reaction to antibiotics given for strep earlier in the week left her severely dehydrated. She’s okay now.)

We had the parental units all come over for turkey dinner. The kids made out like bandits, as usual. Everyone seemed happy with what they got. My spouse was not surprised by his gift, as I’d had to involve him in the ordering of it—I got him a custom-tailored silk bathrobe from a tailor in China. I couldn’t figure out any way to secretly measure him for it.

He got me a Roomba.

I love Roomba. Hell, I love anything that does housework for me. And Roomba does it better than I do, because (unlike me) it doesn’t just swipe over the rug once and call it done. No, this little gizmo trundles back and forth until its batteries run low, and then it returns to its docking station. If it finds a particularly dirty spot, it stops its random pattern and does spirals in one place for a bit. And it has a little whisking brush on the side to get along the walls, something I do maybe twice a year when I’m feeling motivated.

We had a lot of fun Christmas day watching the Roomba. What can I say, we’re easily entertained. I pressed the “clean” button and Roomba sang its little boot-up song, sallied forth, and immediately began to strangle on the fringe of the Christmas tree skirt.

We performed a Heimlich maneuver, removed the skirt from the tree, and turned Roomba loose again. At once it set about humping the base of the tree; clearly its attempt to eat the skirt was not just a cleaning mishap. Eventually it left the tree, making “call me” gestures as it went, and got down to actually cleaning the carpet.

I’ve read some hilarious accounts of cats and Roombas, but Phurball is apparently not going to be providing any. He is utterly disdainful of the Roomba. When we first turned it loose he sat with his back to it, refusing to acknowledge its presence. Being a machine, Roomba did not realize it had been snubbed, and cheerfully continued to vacuum the carpet.

“Wheee!” said Roomba, nudging Phurball’s tail aside as it went. Phurball deigned to give it a scornful glance.

Roomba bonked into a wall, turned around, and headed directly for the cat.

If Phurball had eyebrows, one would have been raised as Roomba approached. When Roomba was a few inches away he finally rose and strode with great dignity to the couch, where he sat in lofty immunity.

Roomba returned to humping the tree.

Phurball’s dignity has been under attack on all sides these days. Now that our temporary cat has been spayed, she no longer goes after him whenever he approaches. Now, she wants him to play with her. Unfortunately he’s a grumpy old man and doesn’t want to play with her. One morning as he sat patiently at my feet awaiting his breakfast, he glanced around to see That Damn Kid preparing to pounce on his tail. Never have I heard such outrage expressed in a sibilance.

We’re still looking for a home for her. We’re reluctant to take her to the SPCA, because neither of us want her to spend time in a cage. Since she’s just starting to relax and trust people a little, we think an institutional environment would be a major setback for her. Ideally we’ll find an adoptive family and she can just go straight into their house.

So that’s about all that’s going on here, these days. Next year I’m hoping to add to the family with a Scooba. Of course, it’ll be a bit longer than usual until next Christmas, since 2006 has been postponed.

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