We won’t talk about my earlier life. We’ll start when I was deposited on the farm like a parcel being delivered. I was not happy about this because I was a “lost” cat, an abandoned cat, an injured cat!
In my ‘lost’ and injured state I struggled to a stranger’s door. They fed me and took me to the vet as my tail was badly injured. By the way, that’s how I got my new name. “Bobbie” because I now had a bobtail. During my convalescence I overheard my saviours planning to ‘move me on’. I was distraught at the idea of again being ‘taken on sufferance’.
Delivery day arrived and I was transported many miles and introduced to my new owner who was asked to take me ‘on approval’. If I hadn’t been so upset I’d have had a lot to say about that.
Anyhow back to the story. I skuttled under the sofa from where I could observe what was happening around me. I gave that new owner what for when she tried to pat me under the sofa. My claws struck flesh and she knew not to mess around with me. But to say one good thing about her, she did provide me with a bowl of nice dinner and some water and kept it up for the next week. I started to sniff around and it all began to feel safe and even friendly. Well there’s something my mum taught me a long time ago and that was if someone is nice to you, you must be nice to them. It’s reciprocal. So gradually I roamed out from under the sofa and explored the whole house.
Then I looked round the garden. Then I realised this lady was kind and she really wanted me to stay. Well, I can bend a little, so I decided to be nice but wary in a touch me not sort of way. None of this curl up in a human’s arms, drool and purr stuff, no, none of that for me!
In case you want to know, I stayed with that lady for another 13 years. I let her know she was ‘on appro’ and that she lived with me, not the other way round. When we got that established, things got moving along smoothly, things like the sort of food I liked to eat – none of that tinned crap. And another thing. Milk! Some idiot told her not to give me milk as it was not good for cats! I got her attention when she caught me drinking the milk out of her cereal bowl – before she got to start on it. One thing I can say about her nibs. She was a fast learner. From that day on, I had regular milk. I even managed to have her leave some milk in the bottom of her cereal bowl every morning so I could finish it off. How did I do that? Easy-peesy. I sprawled on the cupboard in front of her cereal bowl, my nose a fraction away from it and stared her into capitulation. There’s something great about making someone feel guilty. You get results.
I spend a great deal of my nap time pondering over how to do things, then when the opportunity arises, I am ready with my strategy. I’m more than a smart cat, I’m a clever cat, and don’t you forget that. Just don’t be fooled by the photo, I’ve got my ear on what’s going on around me. Cute aren’t I? That’s your opinion, not mine. I’m noteworthy. And if you’re smart, you’ll realise that’s not me now, it was probably me before I lost my tail. I manage. I’ve got enough tail left to thrash it about so folk get the message about what I think.
I eventually came to terms with my new home and the lady who lives there. Actually she is very nice and caring and has shown me a lot of love. It took me quite a while to accept her and a long time before I could climb onto her knees, curl up and have a snooze. I realised she needed love as much as I did. When I got that sorted out, living there became a special treat. See, I can bend when I need to.
Living with someone always requires a few rules to make it all go smoothly. We soon got rid of that ‘kitty litter’ nuisance. Who wants to see what you pop out the other end anyway. She made available her fernery for me but I soon explored under the house from there and found a netted exit up the other end. It was easy to get out but then I had to get back in! This is where I became particularly clever. I had to position myself slightly to the side, then I had to use a claw to flick the door towards me. I had to do this several times to get a swing up until I could poke my head behind this gate. After that, I could wriggle myself into the space and then calmly walk back along under the house, into the fernery and then into the house.
While I was doing the flick bit it made a twanging noise and anyone in the house would know I was on my way back into the house. They told me I was very clever to do this because of the direction the ‘gate’ opened. I found out later that it was where people go to look under the house for any faults or repairs that need doing. I also heard that once, before the gate was installed that a wombat crawled in under there and got stuck while the people were away. When they got back they could hardly enter the house because of the smell. So they decided very quickly to put a wombat-proof gate on the entrance. Wombats aren’t smart like me because they cannot open gates towards them, only push through in their direction of movement. This all happened before I came to live there.
Did I tell you that this place is a farm? Oh the lovely smells and things that move that I can pounce on! I especially like prowling around at night to see what is going on out there. There are lots of night birds that have special calls and furry animals, small and large. Near the house is a large pile of rocks and when I went looking over it, I found that some pesky rabbits had decided to make it their home.
Nobody likes rabbits around here so I made it my mission to remove them. I had so much fun chasing them round in the dark and I’d catch one every so often and have a late night snack. I was sad that the lady wasn’t having as much fun as I was, out there chasing, so one night I caught a big one, more her size, and decided to take it home as a present for her. I dragged it home and then came the dilemma. How was I to take it inside and present it to her! By this time, she had put a lovely Cat Door in the wall for me to come in and out easier than the wombat gate. So, I grabbed a big mouthful of the rabbit and pushed my way into the space. My present was nearly as big as me so I had to empty my lungs to make myself smaller and then pull and push and pull and push until we popped into the house. Then I dragged it into the living room where I planned to place it on the carpet in front of her chair where she could see it and get a lovely surprise. However she saw me before I could do this. She laughed when she saw my present and thanked me in such a lovely way with a smile and a special pat. Then she said it couldn’t stay in the house because she did not have a proper place for it and she hoped I wouldn’t mind if she put it out in the carport. She was so gracious I decided that this was O.K. So the present went back outside, but through the door this time.