The Cats

This is Jake, the cat. He showed up beside my garage on my 22nd birthday. I thought he was gorgeous, and while I loved my dogs, I loved having a cat. Jake was a pretty cool cat. In the picture above, he was cleaning Justin's ears. Justin would lean against whatever piece of furniture Jake was lounging on and wait for Jake to start cleaning his ears. Jake must have been very young when he got lost that night I found him so when ever he slept with me, he kneaded my side, leg or arm. I was quite entertained by him. Of course he had the normal cat habits: laying on the newspaper while you read it, sleeping in the dryer on the clean clothes, lounging in the bathroom sink when you needed to use it, and inspecting table centerpieces by laying on them or knocking them over. One night he sat in the living room with his tail twitching, eying my mom and then charging her as she sat in the chair, running up the arm, over the back and leaping into the window behind her. Mom screamed and dad and I were laughing too hard to be of much help. One morning Jake saved me from getting in the shower when a scorpion had gotten in by way of the drain. I couldn't figure out why he was acting so weird and refused to let me get in the shower by running in front of me everytime I tried to step in. Being fairly blind without my glasses, when I did put them on I realized what was in there. I'm surprised he hadn't been stung. I find myself wishing I had him back, even with the two other cats we have now.



We got Missy about a year before Jake died. Where Jake was pretty friendly and outgoing, Missy was not. She hid under our bed for 2 weeks before gracing us with her presence. She does NOT like dogs, although she tolerated Justin. Latter dogs usually find her quite prickly and have suffered a wicked slap upside the head. While she appears to be aloof and snobby, she's actually quite curious. I don't catch her playing too much, but night life seems to be her forte. Numerous frogs and fish have been terrorized by her, some loosing their life, some loosing a leg or fin, but she won't leave them alone. Missy weighs in at 17 lbs, although she lost 5 lbs last winter because of a bad tooth, she is bigger than any cats we've had in the past. Missy is however a good predictor of pregnancy. With the three pregnancies I've had since she joined our household if she held my hostage by laying right on top of my stomach for hours on end, I usually knew I was pregnant before taking any tests.



Nemo joined our family after we watched several of the Garfield movies for several weeks on end. He's playful, curious, friendly, and doesn't seem to mind being dragged around the house by young kids. In fact, he usually prefers the company of the kids rather than Curtis or my company. We have had him for four years and he's just now allowed to sleep only occasionally on our bed, per Missy's permission. Every now and then we catch him trying to play with Missy, but as she gets older, it sounds more like he came home one night without getting everything requested on the grocery list and she is chewing him out. No love there, I guess. A couple nights ago I finished binding a blanket for Hannah and I've been using a new sewing machine I just have not figured everything out on yet, so there was cut threads and string everywhere. Nemo pounced on a big tangle of string in the middle of the floor and then commenced to put on a great show of pounces, slides, and adorable kitty moves attacking the pile.
Even with these great antics, and Missy's preference for keeping our bed warm all day long, I miss Jake, and I guess I will always have a preference for the Tuxedo cats. I visited a friend the other day who has four kittens that have already been claimed, but in the bunch was a little black and white kitten. Ooh, how I wanted to take him home.

If you haven't seen these sketches found on You Tube under Simon's Cat, you are in for a treat. He has several others you can find on there, but I thought I would share one here. We got a good chuckle from them.