Tag Archives: cat

Floki Turns Seven

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My wife is on a business trip in Virginia right now. She texted me last night to remind me it was Floki’s birthday and to go out and buy him a new toy. I’m usually the one in the family that remembers important dates but I dropped the ball this time.

I don’t know exactly when Floki was born. When we got him on the fourth of July I was told he and his brother were about six weeks old when they were found on Memorial Day. At the time, I figured April 18 would be a good day to call his birthday.

Here he is at the vet’s office where we adopted him.

kitten

Here he is on the first day home with Chris.

Our kitten Floki

Ten days later he was quite comfortable in our house.

Floki the kitten sleeping

He gradually developed his dark color.

kitten Floki in sink
Chris and Floki
Siamese cat sleeping on lap

And he filled out a bit.

He has become an important part of the trio.

Today I will be off to the pet store, but what do you get a cat that has everything?

Frankie’s Long Walks

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Frankie sometimes likes to go far on his walks. I almost always pick him up and carry him home before we get too far away because I don’t want to have to carry him too far. Earlier this year I let him go to see how far he would walk. I did eventually encourage him to turn left after we reached the farthest point he has ever gone, but I did not pick him up or force him in that direction. Eventually, we walked a very large loop and ended up back home.

Saturday morning we went out for one of the earliest walks ever. I don’t remember the time exactly but I think it was around 6:45. It was about a half hour before sunrise.

You can see the artificial light from the street lamps.

Since it was not hot outside yet I let Frankie take me on another long walk. This time we did a large loop in the other direction. By the time the sun came up, he was ready to “stop.”

But we pressed on and made our way to one of the main streets where Frankie turned left toward home. When we got close, Frankie saw an old friend.

Frankie was interested but she ran off in the other direction. Probably because I was there.

After the first long walk, I checked Google Maps and it said we walked eight-tenths of a mile. I drew both walks on a map and found them to be similar distances.

The blue path was the first long walk and the green path was from Saturday. I looked up how far an average domestic cat travels and found one website that says a housecat will travel between a few dozen feet to a little over a half mile per day. A feral cat will travel farther. Since Frankie walked almost a mile, twice, in about forty-five minutes, I would say he is not an average housecat.

Frankie the Lizard Hunter

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Chris is not the only lizard catcher in the family. Frankie, while not as good as Chris, did manage to snag a lizard on Saturday.

He carried the lizard around for a minute and then set him down so he could have fun catching him again. Unfortunately for Frankie, the lizard was faster the second time.

By the way, that is not blood on Frankie’s paw. It’s some kind of plant matter that he picked up with the lizard, like the leaf hanging from his mouth.

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.