She's talking about her cats like they're people...

I love all animals. I love all creatures. The creepy crawly things. The slimy things. The bitey things. The scratchy things. The adorable and the ugly.
I collected snails, snakes and toads whenever I was at my grandparents house in St. Davids. They had an awesome place on the Niagara Escarpment. There was a small creek that ran down from the escarpment and through and around the property. They always had dogs and cats.

I remember a story from when I was 4 years old that the Mother once told me. She was in our kitchen and saw through the window a very little me coaxing a very large dog down the street towards our house. She said when I got to the back door, I opened it enough only to poke my head in and asked if I could have a friend in to play. When she said yes I entered the house with that big ol' dog.

I've always had animals of some sort. Fish, hamsters, mice, rats, guinea pigs, lizards, newts, hermit crabs, birds, ferrets, cats and dogs. The Mother says I'm an animal hoarder and I'm inclined to agree. If I had my way I would be bringing home a new animal every week. I dream of one day moving to New Zealand and living out my years on a farm. Just me and the sheep, pigs, cows, chickens, ducks and so on and so on.

I've always enjoyed the company of animals over people. (Sorry folks but it's true. People are simply exhausting.) I've found that cats are especially my favourites. They are cute, fuzzy, loving and most importantly, quiet. I have 3 cats. All with different personalities. They are all funny and at times, exasperating.  But I love them almost as much as I love The Kid. (They really are my furry children.)

This is Wicket. She is our oldest cat that was a rescue. She must be maybe 3 or 4 years old now and only weighs about 6 pounds. Wicket is a typical female cat in which she can be quite bitchy. She does not enjoy the company of the other cats anymore. Spaghetti is one of her favourite treats. We've nicknamed her 'Miss Scratch and Bite' for what should be obvious reasons...and her Native American name is 'Small Face Big Eyes'.

This is Senor Beans. Or just Beans. I like to give our animals official titles. For instance I've named our hamster 'Baron Von Muncherhausen' even though we just call him 'Munchers'. We got Beans from an ad on Kijiji. He was just a 4 pound fluff ball then. Now he is a 15+ pound fluff ball. He is a shy and quiet kitty. The Kid sings a song about him to the tune of "Beans, beans, the musical fruit". It goes like this, 'Beans, Beans, the cute little cat. Who's not so little cuz now he's fat!' We think it's a riot.

This is our youngest Misfit. He was only 4 or 5 weeks old here and weighed only 14 ounces when we got him. He has grown considerably since then. He is the perfect combination of adorable and pain-in-the-ass. He is Beans' best friend and worst nightmare. Misfit is also known as The Feline of Fury, usually named by weight actually as in 5 Pounds of Fury and so on, and Young Master Purrpants. He is, however, aptly named because of the 'misfit' things that he does that our other cats do not.

All three of the cats enjoy tuna fish. Big deal, right? We've discovered that Beans has a compulsion to eat curling ribbon. I found that out the fun way. Not by catching him while he was eating it but by cleaning up all the bile coated curling ribbon that he had harfed up on my carpet. Awesome. Misfit on the other hand must eat everything. Anything that you may be eating or drinking, tufts of cat hair, dust bunnies, live bugs, dead bugs, paper and drinking straws. I think he may also eat socks and underpants because we've caught him dragging those away but he may just be a thief or a hoarder.

Misfit WILL crawl into an open cupboard, pantry, garbage receptacle and refrigerator at every opportunity. Without fail. And when you yank him out he becomes very disgruntled. (F.O.F. people...Feline of Fury)

Have you ever seen the Stephen King movie "Cat's Eye"? I'm sure you've heard of the wives tale about cats stealing the breath from new born babies, right? Well in this movie there's a troll trying to steal the breath of a little girl and I think the cat gets the blame. (In the end the cat saves the day. Yay for cats.)

Anyway, Misfit likes to be fed his wet food at a certain time each morning. (Because he was so little when we got him we had to feed him the wet canned food. I've been trying to ween him off.) I don't like rushing to get it for him, especially at 4am. So I do my best to ignore him and go back asleep. Until he got wise. And I started waking up with a Misfit on my chest, with his cute fuzzy face in my face, just like that damn troll. This went on for about a week before he had to kick it up a notch. (Remember I'm a country mule.) He then moved on to purring and headbutting and then laying on my head and finally repeatedly jumping on my back and/or chest. (Depending on how I was sleeping of course.) I told you, pain-in-the-ass.

Misfit likes to attack me when I'm on the toilet. He enjoys the sound the toilet paper roll makes when you spin it. He enjoys to chase the toilet paper whether it be in your hand or wiping your bits. Misfit especially enjoys running down the hall towards the bathroom at the sound of said toilet paper roll and leaping full tilt, claws out right onto my bare thighs. Why don't you shut the door, you ask? I would but that causes other problems, like two cats digging and scratching at carpet and door jams instead of one cat scratching me. My scratches are cheaper to fix.

Who cares if they are a pain in my ass...they are too damn cute!!