His favorite time to have me stand patiently and watch him eat is around 11:00 or 12:00 at night as I’m getting ready to go to bed.  He’ll follow me to the bedroom, stare at me and slowly try to lead me to his food dish in the kitchen.  Lately, though, I’ve started to assert my independence and go to bed instead.

After I’m in bed, either reading or having turned off the light, Smoochie Cat joins.  He used to make himself comfortable near my feet so that I couldn’t move.  Now before he does that he spends some time sleeping on the pillow between Bill and me so that if I roll over I have my face in his fur.

He’s also taught me to give him more room on the sofa.   My sofa is a chaise longue and I stretch out on that when watching TV.  That has also become  Smoochie’s sofa.  But instead of taking over an amount of space proportionate to his size, he stretches out across the whole thing, leaving me to hang my legs over the side.

You’re probably asking yourselves why the hell I don’t just kick him off.  Well, he’s just too darn cute!

The Smooch on his sofa

We won’t go into the obvious things about cleaning out litter boxes or having a bowl of food and fresh water set out before him.  That’s normal protocol.  I mean actual training where I have learned to read his body language and the various nuances in his meows.

                                                            HIS MAJESTY 

Ever since he was a kitten he started my training.  He would leap on to the kitchen table (where he wasn’t allowed – and he knew that all too well) and would wait for me to start yelling at him.  He’d stand there staring at me until I got up off the sofa then he’d bolt and I would chase him. I caught him once or twice and either took a swat at him or grabbed him and threw him in the bathroom for a timeout.  He learned pretty quickly to evade capture and would then run under the table and chairs where I couldn’t reach him.  This, of course, became a game for him so every time I sat down on the sofa he’d hop back up on the table.  This went on and on until one of us (usually me) tired of the game.

Then I figured since I couldn’t catch him I’d buy a water pistol and squirt him with it when he’d escape under the table.  Well, believe it or not, this cat loved the water pistol.  I’d squirt him, he’d drink the water I squirted, then tap the pistol for more.  Oka-a-a-y, so that didn’t work.  I finally gave up trying to chase him (actually I couldn’t deal with the stress anymore) and he eventually tired of the game and stayed off the kitchen table.

Then, one day while I was running the bathroom faucet, he decided he wanted to drink from it and, like a fool, I let him.  To this day, the little bastard still wants water from the faucet. His water dish is his absolute last resort.  He’ll head toward the bathroom door, peering over his shoulder at me every few steps.  (This, I found out means, “well what are you waiting for, let’s move it!” in cat talk.)  If I don’t follow him immediately into the bathroom he’ll jump up on the vanity and throw a cat tantrum.  Did you ever hear one of those?  It pretty embarrassing when we have company and he starts in.  I have to run to the bathroom and turn on the faucet in order to shut him up.  Of course, this doesn’t sit too well with my husband and sometimes I have to choose whom to obey.  Usually Smoochie Cat wins out because he can be more disruptive than Bill.

To be continued . . .

Just because I’m standing near the chimney doesn’t mean I’m waiting for anyone.

                                       A litterbox?  You call this a present?

Hey, you wanna make somethin’ of it?

“Smooch, Smoochie Cat, where are you? Here kitty, kitty.” No reply.

I was getting panicky. What if he got outside and met up with a gator? No competition there. My Smooch would be gone for good. I was all set to go out and look for him when I heard a faint mew.

“Bill, I just heard him. He’s in the house someplace.” I turned toward where I thought the mew came from. In front of me was a bookcase placed catty-cornered (no pun intended) against the wall. I peered behind it and there he was looking helplessly up at me with his big green eyes.

“You dopey cat!” Bill said, moving the bookcase and setting him free.

Apparently he had jumped up on it and slid right off the other side. But did he learn his lesson? Hell, no! Not too long after that, he did it again. But this time we knew where to look.

Another time someone came to our door and we let him in. Smooch was hanging around, checking the visitor out. About an hour or more after the person left we, once again, asked each other, “have you seen the cat?”

Well, we searched the entire house, every place we could think of – no cat.

“Oh my God, what if he got out when that guy was here?” I said. I grabbed a pair of shoes and set out to scour the neighborhood. I got to the end of the driveway and happened to turn around to look back at the house. And there he was, squashed between the door and the screen door. He had to have been there, standing in place unable to move, for well over an hour.

Another time, after one of our searches, I found him shut in the dryer. I have no idea how he got in there and – no – it wasn’t running.

One evening we sat down to dinner and I heard the kitchen cabinet door banging. I didn’t think we had ghosts in the house and opened the door. Out he strolled, nonchalant as ever.

Below is a picture of one of his more recent hiding places. The towels on the floor gave him away.

You see, she was with me on a recent trip to the vet for his check-up and shots. Smooch does not like vets. Smooch does not like shots.

Mom and I accompanied him to the examining room. The second I set the cat carrier on the table he began growling. When the vet’s assistant opened the carrier top to lift him out, the growls became hisses and spitting. Drool ran from his bared teeth. When the vet, a young woman, tried to touch him he swiveled his head tracking her every move like something out of The Exorcist, prepared to rip off her hand. She backed off. My Mom just stood there, mouth agape.

There was no way I was going near him because I knew from my husband’s past experience with The Smooch that he WILL bite if frightened. (For your info, don’t ever hold a frantic, struggling cat in front of a running vacuum cleaner to show him it won’t harm him. Contrary to popular belief, desensitization techniques do not work on cats. Yes, there was a lot of blood – my husband’s.)

After unsuccessfully trying to grab Smooch by the scruff of his neck, the vet’s assistant threw a towel over him, hoping to pick him up and place him on the table. Not a good idea. He sprang from her grasp taking the towel with him and landed on a nearby chair. At this point, my mother who had been slowly edging toward the closed examining room door opened it a crack and quickly slid out.

I could tell the vet was nervous and I’m sure The Smooch could smell her fear as he stared defiantly at her with hugely dilated pupils, hissing and drooling. Then she got the bright idea of spraying pheromones around the room in an attempt to calm him. Yeah, that’ll work. The poor guy’s neutered – what does he care about pheromones?

After dancing around the room with Smooch for a half hour or more, the vet finally gave up. There was no way this cat was going to let someone stick needles in him and shove a thermometer up his ass.

He flew from the chair toward the closed door and I placed his carrier on the floor. That was the fastest I ever got him in there. He practically knocked me over on his way in. The vet suggested to me that I find a veterinarian who makes house calls. That’s probably like finding an M.D. who makes house calls. Anyway, I wasn’t charged for the visit.

A few days later, I went with my Mom to check out a veterinarian she had used in Port Charlotte when she still had her little dog. I told the receptionist I needed a vet who could handle The Smooch and was assured that was no problem. I made an appointment and my Mom and I took him there. You haven’t lived until you’ve had a yowling cat in your car for a half hour drive. I was ready to drive my car off the Peace River Bridge.

Once there, I brought him into the examining room and placed him on the table. My Mom decided to stay in the reception area and read a dog magazine instead. Well – were they ever prepared for him. The assistant, wearing a long Kevlar glove opened the carrier from the top and immediately threw a towel over his head. She then picked the hissing ball of fur up out of there and plopped him on the table, holding him down while the vet, another young woman, poked, probed and needled him. The poor cat never knew what hit him. Before either he or I realized it, they were done and we were free to go. Well, not free exactly.

When I got him home and let him loose little Jekyll and Hyde became his sweet self again and all was forgiven and forgotten – until the next time.