Cat Tales #5: Flies, Spiders & Birds In a Box... Or Is It a Window?

Stella is taunted by nature. Originally posted 8/07.

 

August 20^th, 2007 A.D.C.

 

Entry #5: Flies, Spiders, and Birds in a Box… or Is That a Window?

 

A little Catstory lesson. Yes, I said Catstory. Think about it. If you don’t get it now, you will eventually. Hopefully. Maybe. Ok, doubt it.

 

Since the beginning of feline-kind, cats have been known for their excellent grasp of sensory and instinctual behavior. In fact, from what I’ve read on the world wide web, our senses were employed by the Egyptians for keeping mice and rats out. Even the Vikings are reported to have a soft side with Freyja’s influence over cats and romance. And Japanese legend says that cats can even stand up and talk the talk Two Legs talks. These days, we’re just loved by everyone. Well, everyone that matters, that is.

 

Because of this catstory of my species, I have an image to uphold. That can be tough, too. I mean, the expectation levels are off the charts. Stella, don’t scratch this. Stella, don’t climb that. Stella, you can see in the dark but I can’t so if you walk in front of my feet again when I obviously can’t see I’m going to kick you and it might hurt. C’mon, Two Legs. Cut me a little slack here. Being cute is easy. Being a cat is hard work.

 

Those quick little flying b******s, Two Legs calls them flies, are a great joy for Alo and me, but boy are they hard to catch. Just before I started this entry, Two Legs pulled a fast one on me, thinks he’s cool. I was chasing this little flying b*****d all over the place. Once, I even had it under my paw but as soon as I let up to get a good bite of it, it buzzed away. So I chase after it and what does it do? Straight up into a corner in the ceiling. So I sit under it and ask Two Legs to get it for me so I can play some more. Instead, he grabs this square stuffy thing-

 

(Poster’s Note: Junk mail)

 

-and swats a few times at it. I’m thinking, hey, this is my toy, buddy. Why do you get to have all the fun? So I ask him to stop, tell him the flying b*****d is mine, and to back off. Eventually it flies away and Two Legs stops playing. I lose sight of it, too, so instead I decide to take a bath. While I’m bathing, and don’t get any ideas guys, you perverts, I see it start to fly around again. I let out a good, “Hey! There it is!” and Two Legs sees it, I see him track it with his eyes, like I do, then he stabs his hand out in the air and catches it. Somebody tell me how the hell that is fair? I put in all the work trying to catch the little flying b*****d and Two Legs just snatches out of the air like it was just floating there.

 

(Poster’s Note: Pure luck, seriously. I’ve only done that once before in my life)

 

Two Legs will try to tell you he got lucky, like he tried to tell me, but don’t believe him. He’ll also try to brag to you about the spiders he flattens on the wall. Does he have to take all the joy out of everything? I mean, it’s just crawling. How hard can it be to catch it? For cats, like yours truly, we at least make a game out of it. Maybe paw at it once or twice, make it think it can get away. Then paw at it again, rinse, repeat. Two Legs just gets one those square stuffy things and makes spider paste on the wall. Takes a big man, I guess, to catch a spider. I’d roll my eyes if I could.

 

Here’s yet another example of how being a cat can be hard. A few days ago, I was sitting on my perch by the window. There are a lot of trees and things on the other side of the glass and crazy looking creatures run around all over them. The ones that have bushy tails are squirrels. The ones that can fly are birds. Or so Two Legs says. Well, this one day a bird was on the ledge outside of the closed window. My sense of sight zeroed in on this thing and I never let it get out of my sight. I crouched low and slowly snuck up to within a paw of it. My tail went straight, one paw up, eyes dilated, ears forward, whiskers sensing anything within 10 feet of me, I get real low to the ground then… I… leapt into a pane of glass.

 

Now, from here it could have progressed two ways. The first way could be considering the fact that we cats only see in two dimensions, and the edges are a bit fuzzy to begin with. How was I supposed to know that window was there? The other is to take a page from Two Legs and laugh. But wait, there’s more.

 

The next day or so, Two Legs is sitting on the big comfy, fluffy thing-

 

(Poster’s Note: That would be the couch)

 

-and enjoying some of the human catnip I talked about a few entries ago. Directly across from him is this fascinating box with all kinds of moving images. I like to sit by his feet while he sits there but when I saw that same bird in that box, my whole body tensed. My tail went straight, one paw up, eyes dilated, ears forward, whiskers sensing anything within 10 feet of me, I get real low to the ground then… I… leapt into a much thicker pane of glass. This one didn’t give much.

 

(Poster’s Note: I tried warning Stella that it was on the television and wasn’t really there but she doesn’t listen to me)

 

 I’m pretty sure I screamed out “ow” but it sounded very deep and slow, like somecat else was saying it. My head hurt a little bit, too. I shook it a couple times, let the balance flow back into my ears, then left the room. At this point, both Two Legs and Alo are laughing at me.

 

So you see, being a cat is not easy. But I’ll leave you with these words of wisdom: You will always be lucky if you know how to make friends with strange cats.