cats

Black and White Alsatian Killer Cat was lying amidst the sad wreckage of the Chaenomeles under the kitchen window this morning, looking pleased with himself.  He has been around a lot recently.  I saw him yesterday morning from the bathroom window, patrolling the lower lawn, and stopping periodically to peer intently into the ditch bed.  It's just as well that he does.  None of our cats can be bothered any more.

Three of them were lying this morning scattered luxuriously across the kitchen floor like so many rugs, and I thought as I picked my way between them that it was touching how they implicitly trusted me not to step on them, and that visitors to the house never saw the full effect of the cats in relaxed domestic mode.  The two Essex originals absent themselves at the first hint of anybody except us getting out of a car.  The big anxious tabby sometimes hangs around the hearth rug, once he summons up his courage, but only Our Ginger makes any major effort to be sociable.  He loves everybody, and is convinced that any new person is simply a lap he hasn't sat in yet.

The fat indignant tabby was in such a good mood that she let me tickle her tummy, while she stretched out her back toes luxuriously.  This was a rare privilege.  Normally she does not go in for too much physical contact, and a quick rub behind the ears is quite enough.  She has a rather delightful tummy, covered in crimped fur the colour of a slightly overdone ginger biscuit.  It began to go bald a few years ago, which was a shock to me and probably to her too.  Over-grooming seemed to be the cause, and a dose of flea treatment broke the habit, though we never saw any evidence that any of them had fleas.

The other day I picked her up, as she was looking approachable.  That's a rarity too.  Very occasionally she will let me hold her for about two minutes, during which time she does purr, before she wriggles and wants to get down, but this time she did not want to be picked up, and tried to grab the back of the chair she was sitting on as she was lifted up.  She will never, never sit on anybody's lap, but sometimes comes and sits on the arm of my chair and dabs at my lap with one paw, as if she were thinking about it, but could not bring herself to take the plunge.  The strange thing is that at one time she loved sleeping on our bed, before we decided that cats in the bedroom were antithetic to conjugal relations.  They were not originally allowed in the bedroom at all, but the Essex originals obtained squatters' rights after the awful shock of Our Ginger moving in with them.

The black cat has developed a rather charming habit of chirruping in a dimly lit room, if either of us walks close to where he is lying down.  I think it is to make sure that we don't tread on him, the feline equivalent of giving a polite cough to ensure that someone knows you're there.  He does it much more in dim light than the middle of the day, which is what makes me think it is not just a friendly greeting but a warning.  That implies he has grasped that we can't see very well in the dark.

All in all they are delightful animals, and the pain of having to vacuum such enormous quantities of fur off practically everything is worth it.  Even the Systems Administrator's car has got cat fur in it, and none of the cats have ever been in that car.