This is my meankitty, originally named Baldric Velcro, referred
to cooingly for a while as "kitten" but now referred to
as "you little bugger". I got her to replace my
half-wild but much loved Asimov, who had been run over a few
months before. I had gone in to the SPCA looking especially for a
docile lapcat (for a change) and my flatmate and I decided on the
tiny grey kitten who was curled quietly in her basket. It turned
out she was only docile because she was heavily drugged
post-hysterectomy. Since the drugs wore off (November last year)
she's been a ball of highly nervous, anxious energy.
Initially I tried to train her, with treats and toys, to sleep
at my feet during the night. She settled for attacking my
feet/sucking my toes for a few hours, then roosting near my neck
until I finally fell asleep. Then she would climb happily onto my
face, settle down and start purring. Six insomniac months followed
as I tried all different humane behavioral methods to change this
behavior. My boyfriend found a simple method: throwing her to the
end of the bed. I thought it was too cruel but she accepted it
with equanimity.
Kitten grew up in an enclosed room at the SPCA and as a result,
has never accepted that she could possibly poo or pee anywhere but
inside the house. Her litter box, cleaned twice daily, is in a
secluded corner of my room, but sometimes it's not quite good
enough. The bath is lovely and inviting, she finds. She has
decorated it on about 20 occasions. Also a discarded shirt of my
boyfriend's, and (recently) my assignment notes from Uni.
(Literary criticism, perhaps? The assignment got top marks, so I
was quite offended). She also vomits quite often, always inside,
sometimes through massively overeating and sometimes through her
interesting idea of afternoon tea (two mainly dead cockroaches
followed by a drink of toilet water). I change her personal
waterbowl twice a day, but it doesn't have that same savour.
Kitten lacks loyalty to her caregivers, is not highly
intelligent, and as previously noted, has some masochist
tendencies. She now prefers to sleep in my chain-smoking flatmate
Norman's sock drawer. Norman is a lad who picks her up and throws
her about, dangles her out of windows, smooshes her face around,
kicks her occasionally etc. Instead of hiding in her haven here
upstairs with the two flatmates who love her, she brings Norman
dead insects (and once, a dead bird) trophies and stays in his
room whenever possible. She also sits on his belly and purrs while
he chain-smokes in front of TV.
She has only caught animals once: when she happened on what was
probably a rat nest. Through an evening when several visitors came
over, she periodically would bring in one poor pink blind baby
animal, bat it about (they let out a pitiful "meep!"
each time they were hit) and would eventually eat them, unless i
rescued them first... Ugh.
She hasn't forgiven me for starting work a few months ago, and
recoils whenever I come near her. This morning was the first time
in a semester that she stayed around and came over for a purr and
a pat when I was in the room. Here is a photo of her when she
liked me (and my computer) a little better.
