When You’re a Princess and You Know it…

Mac(aroni) is a princess. Not only does she always have to be in the middle of whatever action is going on in the house — even if it literally means butting into the attention another cat is receiving from the human — but she also thinks she owns most of the cat beds on the premises. She has actually tried to occupy two of the fluffy puffs positioned next to each other at the same time by sprawling across the top of both so no other cat could get in one of the beds. Heaven forbid another cat lie next to her royal highness without permission.

Another thing Mac does is if she sees another cat sleeping or reclining in one of the beds she believes she owns, she shamelessly chases that cat out of the bed and any other bed the cat subsequently attempts to occupy. In pure Brat Cat mode, she then doesn’t lie in a single one of the beds. Of course, she’s also famous for waiting for Pepe to leave one of his many boxes and then hopping in and refusing to leave, causing Pepe to camp out beside her until she departs. Meanwhile, she sports a smug expression and tries to wait him out.

In the morning, while Corky, Pepe, and Taz are yowling up a storm in an attempt to get the human to dispense breakfast faster, Mac remains upstairs curled up and sleeping in one of the kitty beds. Then, several hours after all the other cats have had breakfast and the human is lashed to her keyboard working, Mac shows up and demands special treats. After all, she couldn’t possibly eat the same food as the other cats. Her favorite snack — which she wants to eat exclusively all day long — is freeze-dried chicken breast. When the human can’t or won’t dispense any more of those treats, the Merkitty shreds the sides of boxes, stands up and digs forepaws (and claws) into the human’s hip, and has been known to hop up and land on the keyboard to prove her point.

Whether out of boredom or some other reason, the smirking Merkitty also delights in scooping water out of the water bowls. She floods plastic trays and absorbent dish-drying mats and often floods the surrounding floor. That leaves the other cats without clean water to drink and gives the human yet another task to perform multiple times daily. Such a meow!

(c) Copyright 2024, PeggyMalnati. All rights reserved. Image my own.

Shahjah’s Turn at the Vet

Just as Shah Jahan was starting to trust the human again after his scary visit to the vet for a checkup and shots in late November, and after seeing his sister Mumtaz incarcerated in the bedroom for a week in early January, the bad human trapped him in the bedroom and off to the vet he went the next day for neutering.

Poor little guy was so scared but he came through the procedure with flying colors. He only required 2 days in kitty prison for recovery before he was freed. Since then, he and Taz Bird have terrorized the household and kept the silly human in stitches as the Tiger Babies get into one thing after another.

(c) Copyright 2023, PeggyMalnati. All rights reserved. Images my own.

Taz’ Very-Bad, Awful Week

Back in early January, poor little Mumtaz (left) was having a grand time running around like a manic inside the house, which turns out to be loads more fun than the (formerly great) outdoors. Taz Bird was chasing her biological brother and main squeeze, Shah Jahan (right), as well as Corky and Fireball, often tackling the bigger males and knocking them to the ground. (She’s a force of nature when she gets wound up.) And at 4 am one morning, she started making noises that — to the evil human’s ears — sounded like she was in heat…weeks ahead of time and weeks before her spaying surgery was scheduled. Worse, she had her butt in the air and the still-intact Shahjah was sauntering down the hallway with a grin on his face. When Taz went to relieve herself in the litterbox in the guest bedroom, the very bad human pulled the door shut and trapped her. That was early Sunday morning.

On Monday morning, the evil human brought her to the vet to get her second distemper shot and learned that they could squeeze little Mumtaz in on Wednesday for her spay surgery, so back to the locked bedroom went a very angry Taz. When Wednesday came, off to the vet she went again. When she woke up, fur was missing from her belly and she felt awful. Back to kitty prison once again she went. Worse, she had to have painkiller administered several times/day by the evil human, which did not endear the 2-legged to Miss Fierceness.

When one cat is locked up in the bedroom, the other cats have a sweet habit of bringing toy mice upstairs from the toy boxes and leaving them lined up outside the door. Taz was a prisoner for more than a week, so over that time a lot of little mice were deposited beside the door for her. It’s the kitty equivalent of get well cards and balloons or flowers.

When she was finally freed, off she went. Since then, she doesn’t let the evil human get too close. Clearly, that 2-legged creature is not to be trusted under any circumstances.

(c) Copyright 2023, PeggyMalnati. All rights reserved. Images my own.

What do You Think About…?

<<<What do you think about the annoying and noisy youngsters the human brought into our home?>>>

<<<She never asked, although I clearly expressed my displeasure every chance I got. You really can’t trust humans. They need constant supervision.>>>

(c) Copyright 2022, PeggyMalnati. All rights reserved. Images my own.

Kitten Avoidance Strategy (KAS)

The Tiger Babies have yet to be brave enough to climb up onto the big bed despite having explored (and wrecked havoc) on nearly every other area of the house. Still, while the Terrible Twins don’t venture here, The Foursome is taking advantage and getting some shuteye.

(c) Copyright 2022, PeggyMalnati. All rights reserved. Images my own.

Tiger Babies Settle in

The tiger babies are settling in and even have names now. The male is Shah Jahan and the female is Mumtaz Mahal. Although you see only one face, this image shows both kitties in one of the kitty beds. That’s Jahan looking very grumpy. He looks remarkably like Caesar, who also made faces at the human to show his displeasure.

Fortunately, while Mac and Pepe still occasionally hiss when the babies run up to them and try to make friends, no blood has been shed, no limbs have been shorn off, and a great amount of silliness has ensued. In the nearly 30 years the human has lived here, there have been no kittens, at least none this young and energetic. Winter promises to be a lot of fun this year.

Copyright 2022, PeggyMalnati. All rights reserved. Images my own.

The Evilness of Humans – Part 2

A feral female started bringing her 3 kittens by this spring. She’d eat, nurse them, rest, and then the whole crew would depart. After a few weeks, she started leaving the kittens to play on the deck all day. They scrambled up the human’s plant stands knocking pots off all over the place, then shimmied up the trunk of the ficus tree and cuffed each other. They pulled clotheslines down and dragged them into the yard (including into poison ivy, which the human is very sensitive to), and they gladly chased toys in which the indoor kitties had never shown interest. By early summer, the mother abandoned her kittens, who have spent the time growing fat and silly on the deck outside.

The human waged a slow and patient campaign to tame the kittens so she could capture them and find them a new home. Unfortunately, she got rather attached to the two that remain, and they had gotten fairly comfortable with her, nuzzling her hand, letting her pet them, and even venturing inside the kitchen. Three of the 4 inside kitties had come nose-to-nose with the interlopers. After several unsuccessful attempts, the human finally captured them 3 days before they were due to go to the vets for their checkup, initial shots, and bloodwork to check that they were kitty AIDs and leukemia free. They were. They have since been mixing with the foursome, who cannot understand what the crazy human was thinking about bringing babies into this household.

(c) Copyright 2022, PeggyMalnati. All rights reserved. Images my own.

Oh Human, What have You Done?

(c) Copyright 2022, PeggyMalnati. All rights reserved. Images my own.

Tummy Tuck

Corky has rules — a lot of rules — and one of them is that the human is NOT allowed to touch his tummy.

Now, mind you, that doesn’t mean he doesn’t regularly roll up on his back and show his soft white tummy to the human.

It just means the human is in a “look but don’t touch” sort of situation and must be on her best behavior.

Recently, as the 2-legged was trying to make her way from her office to the kitchen, an energetic Corky was trotting a few paces in front of the human’s feet. He flopped down on the floor and started rolling around.

Shockingly, the human was allowed to approach and pet his tum tum. She’s happy to report that it’s as soft as it looks.

(c) Copyright 2022, PeggyMalnati. All rights reserved. Images my own.

Recovery Time

Corky the Banu bear came through his dental procedure just fine. The human collected him and brought him home for a rest. He’d had some teeth extracted, so no hard food for a week (and no roughhousing with his brother). That meant more alone time. Fortunately, he had medication that made him sleepy. Plus, he got lots of attention from the human.

Still, there was only so much incarceration time Corky was going to tolerate. The other cats would have to deal with eating crunchies in water for a few days. After his third dose of medication, Corky was free.

(c) Copyright 2022, PeggyMalnati. All rights reserved. Images my own.

Corky has an(other) Adventure

It was Corky’s turn for a dental cleaning. Since the procedure would be done under anesthetic, he wasn’t allowed any food after midnight. That meant he had to be quarantined from the others the night before his procedure. (The angry ankylosaur is hell on wheels when he doesn’t have something to eat that he likes.) The next morning, the evil human scooped him up and placed him in a carrier <<<Stuffed me in a fabric box is more like it!>>> Off they went in the vehicle. <<<Never trust a human!>>>

(c) Copyright 2022, PeggyMalnati. All rights reserved. Images my own.

Disappointed!

The human picked the wrong type of crunchies for her furry masters. They were very disappointed and let the 2-legged know that. The chastened human went back to the store with a promise to do better.

(c) Copyright 2022, PeggyMalnati. All rights reserved. Images my own.

Return of the Bag Babies

The kitties had eaten their own breakfast and the human was eating hers. She noticed a takeout bag within reach and tossed it on the floor. Sure enough, Corky and Pepe came over to investigate. Pepe made it to the bag first and stuck his nose inside. <<<Potentially roomy enough to investigate.>>>

Initially Corky was also headed straight toward the bag, but got side tracked by Pepe’s bowl of breakfast. Of course, as soon as Corky paid attention to his food bowl, Pepe suddenly lost interest in the bag and prepared to move over and claim his property. <<<What’s mine is mine and what’s yours is mine. You have a problem with that?>>>

(c) Copyright 2022, PeggyMalnati. All rights reserved. Images my own.

Little Red Lion Kitty

Fireball adopted his best sphinx pose while patiently waiting for the human to finish her morning ablutions and head downstairs to dole out food.

<<<What takes her so long? Can’t she see we’re hungry?>>>

(c) Copyright 2022, PeggyMalnati. All rights reserved. Images my own.

Camouflage Kitty

When the human walked in unexpectedly and startled him, Pepe had opted for the rare camouflage look on a black & white blanket in one of the kitty beds instead of digging an opening in the bedding and sliding under the blankets and sheet for a snooze. Fortunately, all the human did was snap a pic and then move on her way (no paws were petted or heads kissed), so the Pepster was able to return to his sleep. <<<Whew!>>>

(c) Copyright 2022, PeggyMalnati. All rights reserved. Images my own.

Twinkie Twins

Mac and Fireball were chillin’ in the big pink puff when the human walked in. (Apparently, the Merkitty was feeling generous and decided to share the puff with the Little Red Bee.) The 2-legged started snapping photos in her usual annoying way.

Fortunately, no one was dangling their paws out of the puff, so the human and her camera posed little threat. (Note Fireball’s prehensile curled tail?)

A while later the human came back upstairs and found that the twinkie twins had changed places. However, this time someone had brought a little green mouse up on the bed and left it right beside the pink puff. Neither kitty looked like they were welcoming of attention, so the human left again.

(c) Copyright 2022, PeggyMalnati. All rights reserved. Images my own.

How Could You Let this Happen?

As you can see from Mac’s exasperated look, during the night the evil human failed to respond to multiple kitty pleas for more crunchies, since there was plenty of other kinds of food around the corner in other bowls. By refusing to wake up and refill the bowl, the 2-legged servant has let a catastrophe unfurl once again. There are only 3 pieces of kibble in the crunchy bowl. How it happened that Mac and Corky were able to eat kibble out of the bowl when the sides and bottom started becoming exposed is a mystery in itself. (Perhaps all the food was eaten by Pepe and Fireball, who don’t seem to have such qualms about eating out of a partially empty bowl.)

Still, if the human knows what’s good for her, she’d best get that bowl replenished — and fast! The kitties are not quick to forgive such malfeasance.

(c) Copyright 2022, PeggyMalnati. All rights reserved. Images my own.

Corky’s Adventures at the Vet

The bad human hasn’t posted in close to 2 months. That’s because we spent almost a month living a daily plumbing nightmare during a time when the 2-legged’s work schedule was really challenging. Nonetheless, the kitties, per usual, have been doing all sorts of cute things, which the human did record and now just needs to catch up posting about. Case in point, Corky had to go in for a checkup ahead of some dental work. He wasn’t very enthused about being put in a carrier and carted to the clinic, but he was a very good kitty nonetheless.

The first thing the vet tech did after we got him out of the carrier is put him in a curved tray and weigh him. The Corkster decided that he felt pretty comfortable in the tray and wouldn’t get out.

While we waited for the vet to come in, the human covered him up with the towel from his carrier, creating a burrito bear. The nice vet conducted his whole exam while Corky retained his spot in the curved tray of the scale. He even stayed there for his shot.

(c) Copyright 2022, PeggyMalnati. All rights reserved. Images my own.

Red Dot Fun

Fireball was visiting the human downstairs so, after a snack, she led him out to the pile of papers and the laser pointer. (Note the green mouse the kitties had dragged out and played with the night before.)

After pointing the red dot on the floor near the Copper Kitty’s feet, he saw it and started attacking the floor, pouncing and spinning around and generally having a good time.

Soon, the human heard a pair of kitty feet coming down the stairs and Corky appeared.

Once she ran the laser dot over by his feet, he too started chasing the moving object.

Pretty soon, both cats were dashing this way and that.

Fortunately, they were paying attention to each other, so there were no collisions.

(c) Copyright 2022, PeggyMalnati. All rights reserved. Images my own.

It was Bound to Happen Eventually

Mac loves solving puzzles, so the human knew that eventually she’d find a workaround for splashing water out of the tall, straight-sided water bowl. And right on time, she’s done just that.

It took a couple of months of frantic splashing, but she was finally able to toss water outside the water bowl the other day. It’s unclear if that’s because the human overfilled the water level, making the liquid easier to dislodge, or if the Merkitty has changed technique and found a way to lift the water out of the bowl and deposit it on the floor.

For now, the human has pushed the bowl further back on the rubber mat and dish drying pad. However, the 2-legged will need to ponder the latest development and see if she can think of another way to outsmart the Plesiosaurus.

(c) Copyright 2022, PeggyMalnati. All rights reserved. Images my own.