cat improvement

By mew

January 23, 2010

Tags: Booty, cat, cat improvement in the garden, cat portrait, cats as garden protection, elegant sculpture substitute, human trainers, Leo Chapo, vet visit

Category: Uncategorized

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“A cat improves the garden wall in sunshine, and the hearth in foul weather.”

~Judith Merkle Riley

Well, we don’t have a garden wall or a hearth.  But Leo regularly improves the look of this random wood pile back in the woods.  I suspect this to be the eastern boundary line of his territory, since this is typically where the screeching competitions with our neighbor’s calico cat take place.

And Leo definitely improves the garden, scaring away rabbits and chipmunks and mice, and bringing us some of his kills as generous “gifts” — although these do not improve the front porch decor in the least.

Both Leo and Booty also improve the look of the house, especially on dreary, rainy days like we’ve had lately.  They are like priceless, fine statuary, almost always elegant.

Although not quite priceless, of course.  (Must everything, even kitty love, have a dollar sign attached somewhere?  It seems so.)

Booty had to make his yearly visit to the veterinarian yesterday, and he was so brave and stoic through all the shots, but clung to my neck with steely claws and eyes wide with terror when it was all over.

He had developed a strange little limp in the last few days, favoring his right front paw, and we were concerned but could find nothing the matter, not even a splinter.

The vet found nothing, either, and suggested it was probably only a strain, giving us an oral anti-inflammatory, like ibuprofen for cats.  So Booty is laying around improving the furniture a little more often than usual today.

If you like to read about the adventures and exploits of my kitties (and I understand that some readers would rather not, on the whole), I’ll give you a link to two posts on my other blog.  Recently, I wrote here about how Leo was a touchstone of sanity during a routine emergency equipment test at the local nuclear plant.

And I realized while rereading an old post on this blog that I once promised to explain how Booty got his unusual name, and I did do so, but on the other blog.  (Oops!)  You can read all about it, as well as an inspiring tale of how he overcame his limitations when motivated by love, here.  Scan down for the subheading “Following my cat’s example.”

Would you believe that Leo is now interfering with the writing of this post, demanding my immediate attention and making it nearly impossible to type?  He has got me well-trained, sad to say, knowing by now exactly which behaviors will get me so annoyed that I get up to do his bidding.

This is his idea of human improvement.

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