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Thursday 14 April 2016

Queen of Hearts, Despite Some Bad Habits

Introducing our third and final feline, GreyGirl. Somedays I call her The Queen. Other days I call her StopThatRightNowMissy - Missy for short. Maybe I'm not so bad at naming critters after all. I mean, that cat has three names. I'd say I'm doing okay, quantity-wise at least.

GreyGirl came to us after she was hit by a car, taken by the police to our vet, surgically rehabilitated by him, and never claimed by anyone. We were looking for a companion for BoyCat after his brother died from liver problems at less than two years old. The brothers had come from the cat shelter as identical black fluffy kittens who played together, slept together, got into trouble together and were mighty cute together. After BoyCat's brother died, he was lonely. We decided he needed a friend.

GreyGirl did not turn out to be a friend. She turned out to be The Queen. She bosses BoyCat as if he's her servant. When she plops down in front of him, she's not looking for company. She's looking to have her face cleaned, and pronto.

Sometimes, she doesn't even plop down in front of BoyCat. Sometimes she plops down across the room from him, and just stares at him. First he tries to avoid her stare, then he tries to ignore it, then he helplessly bumbles his way to her and does as she has commanded with her demon eyes. He doesn't like it, and he usually ends up rebelling and jumping on her near the end of the face-cleaning, but it's amazing that he never refuses to do it.

GreyGirl, aka The Queen, aka StopThatRightNowMissy, has a bottomless pit for a stomach. And her girlish figure has suffered for it. We have tried several diet foods but she has a delicate system (she is The Queen, after all) and could not tolerate them.

When Missy wants to be fed, which is every second she is awake, she will sit by her food dish and meow as if a very large imaginary person is standing on her tail and perhaps even grinding it into the floor with their big heavy imaginary workboots. It is pitiful and it is like nails on a chalkboard and it drives me to grind my teeth and forget important things. Even if she has just eaten and should by all accounts have a happy tummy, she will meow anyway.

This behavior is getting worse as Missy gets older. My current theory is that she has some worsening brain damage caused by her run-in with that car, and she actually forgets that she has eaten. This theory of cat dementia has not caused her to stop meowing, nor caused me to feed her less - it has only allowed me to keep my sanity. She remains convinced that if she meows long enough and hard enough, food will appear in her bowl. And you know what? She's right.

GreyGirl/The Queen/Missy is a wonderfully affectionate cat, however. She will lie in my arms and stretch out one paw to touch my face, and purr until she finally falls asleep. Ahhh ... peace. And love.

Here she is:

Missy with  her piercing stare. She was looking at the birds here. But this is the same look she gives her adopted brother when she wants her face washed.
 Snap to it, slave. Spare no spit.





10 comments:

dinthebeast said...

In my experience, the head cat runs the place, and I'm lucky to have a job there as servant...

-Doug in Oakland

Joanne Noragon said...

Cat stories forever. We had a cat that ate her way to diabetes. Never a favorite cat of mine; we found her in the garden under a cabbage leaf--literally.
The grey tabby who died a couple of years ago always considered himself a doormat. Toby, the current cat, closed right in on this, as it meant free ear cleaning. It's what Toby misses the most about his door mat buddy, and will lick my arm and rub his head on the spit. Best he can get; I don't do ears.

Elephant's Child said...

Missy is obviously related to lots of cats I have known. M'lady was imperious. About everything. She was a tiny cat. And bigger cats got out of her way. She liked to wash Medlyn. Experience taught him it was dangerous. But he succumbed. Every time. And she would carefully wash him until he stretched out his neck in bliss. And then she would bite him in the throat.
And Ming (also a small cat) used to nail other cat's ears to the floor. She would sit in the door way and wait. They would walk/scurry past her. And her hot foot would snake out, hook into their ear and then she would put her foot on the ground. The other cat had a choice. It could stay there - or tear a hole in its ear pulling free.

jenny_o said...

Hahahaha!

I think our guy just got another nickname: door mat buddy ...

jenny_o said...

Ow - ow - ow ... for both these stories. Well, at least I'm feeling somewhat better about our two generally getting along. Maybe small cats have to be scrappy to survive. Our third cat (Sweetie) despite her name is the most hostile of the three and can't be loose with the other two. She is the smallest of the bunch.

Diane Stringam Tolley said...

Here is where I make the embarrassing admission that I have owned very few cats in my life (one). But I certainly enjoy the stories!

jenny_o said...

Indeed. It's good that you know your place!

jenny_o said...

Haha! Well, I'll go ahead and admit that I owned very few dogs in MY life (ONE)! And I've certainly had fun reading your doggy tales, Diane.

baili said...

i did not know that you have your own vet dear Jenny this is great that you cure pets,lovely job indeed!
i feel sorry for catboy who lost his such friendly brother and akka is not being nice to him i can see her eyes are demon eyes really .
this is sweet of you that you adopt her when she came to you after accident and was not claimed by any one ,she is beautiful cat with queeny attitude

jenny_o said...

"Our" vet just means the veterinarian office we take our cats to - we don't own them, although it might be cheaper if we did! ha ha

This post was written before our son took BoyCat to live with him - he is much happier there than he was here, so I am happy too.