Finally Scafflaw!

I can see now why the human has been doing everything in her power to stop me posting this. It's not nice to let everyone else in on the fact that you break rules, is it, human? But you've done yourself no favours. Taking me to the vet was a low blow in the war against Scafflaw, so I'm going to town on you. For all the rest of you, head on over to Fin's blogto read all about Scafflaws.

Rule 1: Tia should have wet food at least as often as you do. Once a day is not enough.

She flouts this one on a daily basis, and with very little care for the damage it does me. I mean, how am I supposed to become soft and cuddly without all those extra helpings? What's that you say? My huge fur makes me soft and cuddly anyway? Rubbish. Just think of how much more I could be with some extra food.

The human eats wet food at least three times a day, and what's more, she doesn't share! The night before last she was eating fish. It was still warm from the oven, just the way I liked it, so I politely stepped onto her knee, with the front paws only of course given that this is the propper polite way to eat, and dropped my head to the plate. She pushed me away! Undeterred, I tryed again, but this time she actually tapped my nose. Oh, the indignity of it! How can she be such a hipoocrite? And yes, I'm putting hippo there on purpose, because that's what she'll turn into if she keeps on like that. Human, I'm the one who needs to be soft and cuddly, not you. Now, share!

Rule 2: Dogs were made for swatting. You shall not tell Tia off when she follows the rule to the letter like a good cat>

I don't even know where to start with this one. I was following the rule so well that she didn't even realise what I was up to. Now that's skill! But then, stupid Dogman had to go and tell her. The arm of the sofa is a prime position to smack Molly as she walks past, but Dogman saw me do it. Now that he's told her, she watches for it all the time. I was on her knee yesterday while hoover lady and the other people who likes Molly were over. Molly was doing her usual attention grab, but as she walked past, I'd had enough. After all, I wasn't getting the attention. I reached out and smacked her good. But horror of horrors, the human, in return, swatted me! It didn't hurt. She doesn't have it in her to hurt even a stupid dog never mind a perfect cat, but I was so surprised that I leapt straight off her knee. To be honest, I half jumpd, half fell, but leapt sounds so much better, doesn't it? I dropped into the abject "I'm pretending I know I've done something wrong" pose then. This one always gets me cuddles and reassurance and treats, but as stupid dogbreath was in a "uh-oh, I'm a bit scared and am not sure if I can walk there any more" position, she got all the fuss. This was a major, major rule break, and probably worthy of a post all of its own! I should do the swatting, not the human, and especially not when I don't deserve it!

Rule 3: Whenever I miaow, you stop what you're doing, come to me, pick me up and cuddle me. Even if I miaow to get your attention then run away, you chase me, pick me up, then cuddle me.

She's mostly pretty good at this, except for at night time. I sing beautifully, especially at night. I'm only practicing Dogman's song for me, but I'll tell you more about that in another post. Anyway, I always miaow when I'm coming up onto the bed. I expect at best to be picked up so that I don't have to go through the effort of jumping before I flop on the blankets, or at worst, for her to show her need for my company by calling me. In the daytime, as soon as I miaow she's there, but at night, she'd much rather sleep than talk to me. This is unacceptable. I mean, why should I have to jump to get on the bed? It's a bit much to expect.

Rule 4: I am the most beautiful and deserve all of the attention.

I don't care if there is a really cute human kitten in the house. I don't care if the dog rolls over to show you her tummy. I don't care if the TV is really good. I am the prettiest, and whenever I so much as move, no, whenever I breathe even, I deserve fusses and nice words and, most importantly, wet food! My human is good at cuddling, but she still doesn't meet the expectations of this rule. Nor does anybody, really. Sure, when they come into the house, they usually comment on how pretty I am, but they spoil it by doing the same to the dog, then cuddling her lots, and all because she can wag her tail and bounce at them and pant a lot. Well, if it takes sinking to that level to get attention, I'll pass, thank you very much. I'm far too sophisticated for that. And no, I do not lick my human because I like her. It's called social grooming! Headbutts are a greeting, not a demand for attention. And miaowing? I've told you already, I'm practicing my Dogman song.

Rule 5: You shall not ever, ever laugh at me, no matter what I do.

Oh, my human fails miserably on this. In fact, she breaks it multiple times in a day. She'll laugh at me when I'm chasing a ping pong ball. It's a serious business, as I'm sure Whicky would agree. That ball needs to be caught, and as it's constantly running away from me, I don't really see it as a laughing matter! I don't know what she finds funny about it. She says it's the way I sprint after it, then get all confused with trying to run and catch it and grab it and roll over with it and kick it all at the same time. I turn into a confused bundle of flying fur and legs that goes nowhere and achieves nothing apparently. Well, if you'll believe that, you'll believe anything. I'm just following procedure. Everything would run smoothly if the blasted ball would stop running away for just a second.

She laughed really hard at me the other night, too. Her and Dogman had put the TV on. I've said before that the human doesn't do this all that often, and usually when it's on, I'm cuddling her. however, I'd just finished catching a ping pong ball and ended up in front of the screen. I was still in hunting mode, and there, suddenly, was a bird! Well, I dived. The human wants to give you a word picture for this, so here's her paragraph.

Out of the blue, Tia launched herself at the screen, except that it wasn't the typical launch. Instead of diving, she stood on her two back legs, while the two front paws, claws out, made futile swiping and grabbing gestures at the innocent birdie. She appeared thoroughly confused when her claws only met smoothe glass, and dropped back to study the screen intently. Then she was off again, except that this time, she was almost bouncing on those back legs. She was trying to grab the bird between her front paws as she does with the balls, but she just kept slipping off the screen and bouncing back. As soon as I started to laugh, Dogman as she calls him told me she turned around, gave me a confused, then disgusted look, peeped back at the TV, then strolled with massive and obviously pretend nonchalance away from it as though she wasn't interested anyway.

Human, for the last time, you are not allowed to laugh at me! Never, ever!

In other news, hoover lady told the human that the kittens are doing well. They're actually seeking homes for them now because they've become so friendly. They took another mummycat to the vet yesterday to have the babies taken from her tummy and made so that she couldn't get pregnant any more, but when they went to let her out, she just stood by the door and cried and scratched to get back inside. Hoover lady was surprised, but let her back. As soon as she went in, she headed straight for the babies, pulled them all to her and lay down. She's feeding some of the youngest babies, but when they took her, hoover lady said she didn't have any kittens with her. She's wondering if some of the kittens in the shed belonged to that mummycat in the first place. Even if they didn't though, it's good they have a new mummycat to look after them and give them milk.

That's enough from me for today. I need to watch the human for signs of more rule breaking.

Tortureshell Tuesday

My human couldn't believe this when she saw it on an advert, and just had to post the text. There's commedy and seriousness in this.

We would like to find a good home for our lovely cats Autumn a torture shel girl and Winter a white boy. Unfortunatly we have to find a new home for them urgently. We have a baby girl of 9 weeks old and she is allergic to them. The cats will come with catlitter, scratchingpost, feeding bowls and the catfood we still have. The cats are from April 2009. The girl is Neutered. If you want any more information please contact us ASAP. If you can give them a good home the cats will be yours for free.

Poor Autumn! Torture shell? How could anyone say such a thing! It implies that she, um, might be a rule breaker or something, and we all know we cats don't break rules. I'm considering creating a new event for the CB called Tortureshell
Tuesday where we torties show just how far we'll go to cause mischief. I'm not going to say break the rules. We've already discussed how that is an impossibility. What do you all think? Seriously though, if you know anyone who can give these two a home, please let me know. They're in the Bradford area which is in Yorkshire.

Also on a very serious note, I came across this link yesterday. It made me sad and my human absolutely mad. We need to catch the woman who dumped the poor cat in a bin. She needs to be stopped! Please read, and what's more, pass the link on. The more people who see this, the more chance we have of catching her.
Woman Dumps Rescue Cat in Bin After Befriending Her

Anyway, on to other, hopefully brighter, things. I was going to post happy things yesterday, like Dogman's song for me (I have one now), or a post for Fin's scafflaw week,
but nope, the human had other ideas.

For a few weeks now, she's noticed me scratching. This is pretty normal. If you've got an itch, you gotta get it, right? But this weekend, she noticed that I'd given myself a tiny scab, and then another, and another. Again, not too uncommon. I like to keep my claws sharp, so this occasionally happens. She'd also wondered if I was alergic to the wool I'm wearing. Show cats don't wear collars because it flattens our fur all in the wrong places, but because the human's eyes don't work, she needs me to wear a stupid, stupid bell so that she can tell where I am. She put it on a piece of wool instead, figuring that it wouldn't flatten my coat as much, and, if the worst happened and I ate it (it has been known), I'd not get sick as I could digest it.

Anyway, she came home yesterday and saw that I had a couple of lumps under my chin. I'm sorry to say, cat friends, that my human is a bit high strung at times, and she freaked. She kept muttering about how mummycat had been sick and she hoped I wasn't coming down with the same, but how could I be because she'd kept us separate, but better to be safe than sorry even if it was unlikely. This went on for a while, all while she stuffed me into the stupid carrier, took me in a car and then to the vet! I complained bitterly all the way there in the car, but of course, none of them listened to me. I can't say I'm surprised.

When we got to the vet there were a couple of massive dogs there who decided it'd be a good idea to bark at each other, just for fun, you know? Have I mentioned that dogs are stupid too? Anyway, I decided at that point that my carrier needed defending. This meant that I had to hunker down, scrunch up as small as I could and bury my head in a corner. Classic en-guard pose, don't you think? I was shaking because of the coiled spring effect, the same one that would have me shooting to the attack if one of those hounds came close. I wasn't scared, not me.

Soon though, the vet called us. Now,I've told you that I like our vet man before, but he wasn't there. It was a lady people instead, and to be honest, I'm revising my opinion of vets rapidly. I didn't like her at all. She poked me, prodded me, put a cold thing on my chest for ages, looked at my scabs. What's worse, she even stole my fur! No joke! She snatched me away from the human, hussled me into the back room, and, by force, removed some of my gorgeous coat! The irony is that she didn't really need to. It's for general tests to make sure i'm not carrying any horrible infections or fungus, which I know I'm not. The vet even agreed that it wasn't likely given the appearance of the scabs, but then said the thing the human had, "better to be safe than sorry". Well, I'd rather be sorry, thank you very much. That was my fur, woman! She didn't even tell me I was beautiful!

She thinks that the scabs are a bacterial infection that I've given myself by scratching. She also thinks that I could be alergic to the wool. Well, duh. I started scratching when the human put it on. The human said it didn't explain why I have them on my chin too, but the vet told her that often allergies present like that around the face. Anyway, she gave me antibiotics to clear up the infection which she says isn't serious and won't be transmitted to anyone else (thank goodness!), and the human has taken that stupid wool off me. I'm back on a normal collar, which I suppose I'll have to put up with.

We've heard no more on kittens, either strays or the new one for the human, but when we do, I'll be sure to tell you. If it hadn't been for the human, I'd have posted my Scafflaw by now, but that, I suppose, will have to wait till tomorrow. Anyway, I still need your thoughts on Tortureshell Tuesday, so fire 'em at me!