Frankie’s Follies

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Lately, Frankie has been napping a lot on top of a crate that we keep in the cat’s room. That used to be Chris’s crate as he would spend a lot of time inside it or on top of it, but Chris now naps in his cat bed on the living room floor.

Recently, Frankie puked on the pad that was on top of the crate and I had to remove it in order to wash it. While it was in the wash, I took a cat bed that nobody uses and put it on the crate. I then noticed that Frankie had pushed the bed off the crate and was lying on top of the crate with just a towel to buffer the wires and handle connected to the top. I let him be since he was sleeping but a little while later I saw him lying on the cat bed.

Before I knew it he was back on the crate.

And then back on the bed again.

Cats can really be funny sometimes.

The Friendly Feral

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Here is a Feral story for Throwback Thursday. This is from early May 2016.

Charles Huss's avatarBad Cat Chris

My mother-in-law, Elaine, has been feeding several feral cats in her neighborhood for several years now. Currently she has about four, perhaps more, that hang out near her home. Sometimes we go there to visit and there is a cat, sometimes two,  hanging out under her carport. She has even been able to coax a couple of these ferals to come inside at least part-time. Her current cat, Pumpkin, is not too keen on an outside cat coming in and sleeping on the bed, but that’s how it goes sometimes.

We went to visit recently and saw a gold cat she named Benny and I was amazed at how friendly this cat was for a feral. It’s possible he was a pet at one time but that would be unusual since the pattern seems to be feral cats in that area. Thankfully, Elaine has done a good job getting the cats…

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Frankie the Tree Climber

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On a recent walk, Frankie decided to climb not one but two trees.

Taking the second photo was not very smart on my part because Frankie was getting ready to ascend this tree. I stopped him just in time but if I had not I might have needed to call the fire department to get him down.

You may remember another tree climber in the family.

Bad Cat Chris in a tree.

That was Chris during his tree-climbing days. Who else has climbers in their house?

Two Snakes in Two Days

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As I mentioned in yesterday’s post, Frankie and I came across a snake on our walk the other day. Frankie didn’t notice it until it was slithering away. The next day, we saw another snake. This time Frankie noticed it about the same time I did. Unlike the last snake we saw, this one stood its ground. It just stared at us while we stared back at it.

It seemed like Frankie was preparing to attack so I picked him up and put him back down about twenty feet away. That was the end of that.

Our Unobservant Cat

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For a cat, Frankie seems to miss a lot of things that you would think cats would notice. I mentioned in another post how he missed seeing a stray cat, more than once. I saw the cat and the cat saw us but Frankie was oblivious. It happened again the other day.

We walked past the house that is behind us and one over, which is a corner lot. Frankie was busy sniffing plants and didn’t notice the cat watching us from a screened patio.

There were people inside the patio so I dared not try to get a better photograph.

We continued walking for a block but a dog barking and people talking loudly caused Frankie to reverse direction. We passed the house again with the cat, still unnoticed by Frankie, then walked behind the house toward our house. The cat moved to the back door and continued to watch us. This time we were quite close but Frankie never looked left.

Frankie wasn’t ready to go home so we continued on toward the pool area. Halfway there we came upon a snake. I saw it first. Frankie saw it too but not until several seconds later when the snake decided to retreat.

In Frankie’s defense, he is not completely oblivious to the world around him. He does seem to have an uncanny ability to notice squirrels. He also caught a rabbit once after he escaped. Besides other cats, he’s not very good with reptiles. Frankie could never compete with Chris when it comes to lizard-catching ability. Chris is also the snake catcher in the family.

Frankie Asking to Go Outside

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I usually take Frankie for a walk on the weekends and he knows when it is the weekend because I am home longer that usual. Two weeks ago, my work went out of business so, until I find another job, I am home everyday. This means everyday is the weekend as far as Frankie is concerned and he won’t let me be lazy. Here he is demanding to be taken out for a walk.

Floki the Player

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Of our three cats, Floki is the biggest player. At almost seven years old he still runs around the house with toy mice and loves his turbo scratcher. He has become very good at spinning the ball around the track. The video below shows some of the skills he has in keeping the ball in motion but it is nothing compared to what I had seen when there were no cameras around.

Chris Demonstrates Dominance

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For Throwback Thursday, here is a post from late April 2016. It is Chris holding Puck by the neck. After we lost Puck he started doing that to Floki occasionally. I know some animals do this while mating but that is not what this is.

Charles Huss's avatarBad Cat Chris

I have been around cats long enough to be able to predict their behavior somewhat and not be surprised by behavior I didn’t predict. Of course, predicting behavior and understanding it are two different things and I sometimes think I will never understand why cats behave the way they do.

Chris, for example, will often straddle Puck and hold him down by the neck and then he will wash him like nothing ever happened. It seems like he’s showing his dominance but Puck never challenges Chris’s position so I don’t know why he feels compelled to do what he does. If anything, Frankie is the one that challenges Chris leadership but Chris doesn’t hold him down by the neck although he does whack him from time to time.

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