"Stray Cat Strut" redux

If you want to hear a short audio clip of "Stray Cat Strut," go to http://www.jr.com/JRProductPage.process?Product=3860395 and scroll down to #7. I dare you to try to resist moving to the beat!

stray cat strut or feeling feral?

Kuki asked about the difference between a stray cat and a feral cat, related to my response to Kathy's foster kitty.

A stray cat is one that has lived around people and therefore is not afraid of them. It has most likely been abandoned or gotten lost. A feral cat is, basically, a wild cat--it's never been domesticated and so is afraid of people. Stray cats can usually be re-domesticated, but it's extremely uncommon to to tame feral cats that are beyond the age of 8 weeks or so. Check out http://www.pets911.com/programs/national/feralcats/ for more.

Kathy and I were both surprised by the websites's description of the physical condition of stray and feral cats. Apparently stray cats often appear disheveled because they're not accustomed to living on the streets. Feral cats will generally be well-groomed--life on the streets is all they've ever known. Seems the opposite of what you'd expect, huh?

For an oldie (from the 1980s) but goodie, have a look at the lyrics of "Stray Cat Strut" by (who else?) The Stray Cats: http://www.geocities.com/ironwallcoleman/songs/strut.htm

playing kitten poker

I started watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer when I lived in Turkey. It's not a show that would have attracted my attention under ordinary circumstances, but you can get a bit desperate for TV programs in English. Anyway, I actually found it to be a well-written, humorous, and thought-provoking show. I liked the underlying themes of personal responsibility, consequences to one's actions, and redemption. I also like the emphasis on friendship and a strong female protagonist. I still try to catch some of the reruns.

In one of my favorite episodes, Buffy goes to a demon bar with Spike, a vampire, in order to get information about some new bad guys in town. Spike says they have a better chance of getting the demons to talk if he plays cards with them (rather than beating them up, as Buffy wants to do). The demons ante up--and it turns out they're gambling not with poker chips but with kittens. I love the scene where the "big bads" put their kittens in a basket in the center of the table. Buffy can't believe they're playing for such "stupid currency!" Spike hasn't come with any dosh and asks the others if they can advance him "a tiny tabby."

compared to a feral cat...

After the balloon episode, it took four of us--a vet, two assistants, and myself--to maneuver Tigra out of the vet cage and into her pet carrier. None of us escaped unscathed. I apologized to the assistants for their (fortunately minor) injuries and for the difficulty of treating Tigra. That's ok, they said. They had treated difficult cats before: they had treated feral cats.

vet tales, part III; or, the end of the balloon era

I grew up with a cat that liked to play with balloons, and I was thrilled to find that Tigra also liked to chase and retrieve them. We started off with fully-inflated balloons, which were fun. (Actually, I read on a cat care site that popping a large balloon was a good way to teach a cat to stay away from an off-bounds area, but the sound never deterred Tigra; she's pretty fearless!) Tigra's favorite, however, was a balloon with just a puff of air in it. That way she could easily carry the balloon in her mouth. She was so cute, chasing wildly after a bouncing piece of rubber and then trotting back with it for me to throw again. You'll notice the use of the past tense here.

One day I discovered her chewing on a balloon and, after finding some pieces that had passed through her system, decided that she could only be allowed to play with balloons "under supervision." Unfortunately, she still managed to swallow a balloon. Some vomiting, x-rays, surgery, and a few hundred dollars later, she was fine. Needless to say, we don't play with balloons any more.

vet tales, part II

When Tigra was vaccinated in Turkey, she had an allergic reaction to one of the vaccines and Dr. Ates noted it in her records. I told our new vet in California about her reaction, but let myself be persuaded that she would be ok receiving the vaccine and staying at the clinic for observation. To be honest, I think the vet might have been skeptical about the quality of treatment Tigra had received in Turkey. I feel bad that I didn't defend the first-rate care she had received in Turkey.

Some hours after the vaccination, Tigra had an allergic reaction (fever and vomiting) and the clinic monitored her and gave her fluids. They kept her overnight and I took her home the next day. Unfortunately, she continued to throw up, wouldn't eat, and was lethargic. I was worried about her but didn't panic until I saw she was bleeding from her bottom. Since it was a holiday, I had to take her to an emergency clinic. They examined her there and discovered that she had two infected bites near her tail. Since Tigra is strictly an indoor kitty--never goes outside other than in her cat carrier on the way to the car and never comes in contact with other animals--I had to conclude that she had been bitten on her overnight stay at the vet's. The emergency clinic said the bites were consistent with cat bites, but they couldn't believe that she had been bitten at a veterinary clinic.

I switched vets and Tigra recovered. Even the new vet said he couldn't understand how Tigra had received the bites. It couldn't, he said, have happened at a vet clinic....

vet tales, part I

The vet has featured prominently in my life with Tigra. I was living alone and catless in Turkey when I saw an English-language newspaper column written by a vet. At the end of the article, Dr. Ates mentioned that his clinic had free puppies and kittens to give away to good homes. After an exchange of e-mails and a phone call, I arrived at Dr. Ates' veterinary clinic to choose my cat.

There were two females and their brother, all six weeks old and covered in varying shades of tufty, tabby-colored kitten fur. I finally chose the little girl with the black and grey stripes and white paws and chest. I was later told that she was the "bossy" one of the litter and the most "talkative." Yep, that's my Tigra!

I knew Dr. Ates was the vet for us when he finished examining Tigra and kissed her right on her little face. There are large numbers of stray cats and dogs in Turkey; in fact, the dogs sometimes roam in packs, and Dr. Ates told me that the large stray cat population means that cats in Turkey have diseases that don't even exist in Europe and the U.S.

flying fur

Tigra's begun shedding her winter coat. Actually, she sheds all year long, but it's only with the arrival of warm weather that I fear being buried by an avalanche of fur. Do you remember A Charlie Brown Christmas and the pathetic little Christmas tree that Charlie Brown brings home? The tree is shedding pine needles the whole way and there's one scene in which--whoosh--the remaining needles suddenly fall off in one fell swoop and there's just a spiney skeleton left behind. In between brushing the relentless fur off my clothes, I might worry that Tigra would be subject to a similar fate. Could I be left with a spiney skeleton of a cat? But, no, like manna in the desert, Tigra's fur is always replenished.

I never really gave much thought to the origin of the phrase "the fur was flying" until I got a cat. Or, more specifically, until I took my cat to the vet. There's nothing quite like riding in a Turkish taxi with an unhappy cat who's just had her temperature taken rectally and is rapidly disrobing.

a morning in the life...

At 2:00 A.M., Tigra's up and about, ready to play. It begins with the brush of whiskers against my arm as she sniffs my elbow. I can't imagine what olfactory delights there could be on just an ordinary elbow, but she soon moves on to attacking my toes under the covers. I'm not so sleepy that I don't find this amusing for a minute or two until she bites a little too hard and I tell her, "Go to sleep!"

Being a cat, she pays me no mind other than to explore other parts of the room. She's in search of paper to shred--anything will do, but she has a special affinity for school notes and assignments. I try to put everything shreddable away, but she has discovered that if she stands on tiptoe under the desk she can reach the back of the drawer and tease out a piece of paper or two. I threaten her with solitary confinement in the bathroom (if she's been really naughty, that means behind the shower doors since she knows how to open the bathroom door and, with a bit of luck, can do it in 5 minutes or so). Owing less to my threat and more to the call of nature, she makes a restroom stop. I hear her scratching in her litter box and know that this is what has had her so wound up. She'll calm down now and curl up in her bed or at my feet. I fall asleep.

We're up again at 5:45. She knows if she makes a bit of noise with paper or plastic that I'll get up and put food in her bowl. I meet my mistress' demands and fall back into bed.

8:00. I'm up and she's dozing, content to have me scratch under her chin. I'm always amazed at how much her little chin resembles the chin of her much-larger cousin, the king of the jungle. She purrs loudly. I decided some time ago that I'm waiting to meet a man who can purr. I'm still single.

We're in the shower. Well, I'm in it and she's on top of it. Her latest trick is to sit on the back of the toilet, eye the top of the shower door ("She's doing the math," my best friend says), and then make the leap to the top. From there she can keep an eye on me, safe from the spray of the water. She used to come into the shower and walk around the farthest edges of the tub, but occasionally she slipped and found herself a little too wet. She's recently decided she prefers a higher vantage point and, like a first-rate gymnast, patrols the metal balance beam. After a bit she lies flat on her tummy on the narrow ledge, one paw dangling in a demonstration of cat sangfroid. She seldom stays longer than a minute after I finish with my shower--what's the point with no one to admire her cat cool?

kitten dreams

kitten little
whiskers twitching
tail swishing
eyes wide and oh-so-ready
to chase
to race
to pursue kitten dreams

of grasses on the plain
and the whisper of prey
hiding
waiting
to be caught
by a wiley cat
not a kitten little

If Tigra were human...

If my cat were human, she'd be a teenage girl: the rapid mood swings from wild exhuberance to poutiness, the tendency to stay up late and sleep all day, the quick boredom with something that was new and fascinated her only the day before.

When she's in trouble (which is often), I sometimes have to play the stern parent, barely keeping myself from laughing aloud at her response to my reprimand: as I shake my finger at her and say "No!", she puts her ears back, frowns, and swipes her paw at my pointed finger as if to say, "You can't tell me what to do!" If she were physiologically able, I swear she would put both her paws on her hips.

just a beginning

My cat, Tigra, was born in Turkey, where I used to live. She was just six weeks old when I got her and a year old when I brought her back to California with me. A cat on a plane, especially one with Tigra's disposition, is quite an experience.

Her disposition, you ask? That's for the next posting.