Being the smartest(in my own mind) and bestest cat slave, I know house-cats ‘Shall NEVER be out of doors, yea, verily’
They are safer from varmints and disease. But theses cats REALLY want to go out. These snooty, snowflake purebreds would last, I don’t know, 30min out in the wild.
But, still, they howl and scratch at opened windows. They pace and meow in front of the French doors like caged tigers. Driving me bat crap crazy.
I live in a singular area where doors can only be left open a few times a year. Due to heat and bugs. Early spring is one such time. These 2 cats read my mind, like Madame Woo. They know i want to open the doors. What can I do?
This morning I had a flash of brilliance. I march myself to the nearest Walmart with a mission in mind. I need 2 harnesses for skinny cats. X-small, blue, to match their eyes. Coz you gotta look good stepping out.
Ist hiccup, no x-small, only ugly blue smalls.
I completely forgot I would need leashes. I got distracted by the 1/2 Easter clearances.
On the drive home I think of the leashes. Too late to turn back. Well crap.
I get home and break out some cat treats. No cat is gonna sit still for a harness fitting. I nearly lose a finger and get a gash on my forearm. Well crap, again.
Plan B,
I go online and look at dozens, no, 100s of cat harnesses. Gawd, how can you choose? I know, go for the prettiest blue. Ooh! Here’s a pretty one with diamonds (no, not real ones).
Holy crap $28 a pop. I keep looking, but man I love the bling-y ones. They are shown on skinny Siamese cats. Talking right to me, they are.
Hiccup #2, I gotta measure around the cats. This should be fun. I find my old cloth tape measure. Catch up a cat. The tape is now in 2 pieces and I still don’t have a measurement.
Back to the drawing board.
I opened the French doors to take the dogs out and out of the beams, comes a flash:
It’s a bird
It’s a plane
Nope, a cat. With flashy blue eyes!
I catch him and put the tape around his chest holding my finger where it meets, and…he’s gone like smoke.
I decide my girl is an inch smaller.
So back to the webz.
I ordered 2 baby blue harnesses with sparkly diamonds and a charm. 2 blue leashes (no sparklies:(),
And a sweater for the Yorkie. (What? It’s fixin’ to be summer in south Arkansas, distracted by sales again). I qualify for a free treat. Cat treat or Dog treat. I choose dog. Yay! The Beagle gets a treat too. It will be here Tuesday (yeah, right). What to do til then? Hmmmm?
I saw pet strollers online. Pricey! I still have a baby stroller around here. Maybe I could upcycle something? Who am I kidding? I can’t get them in a carrier with-out blood letting and possible drug use.
Stay tuned for the first trip outdoors with cats on a string.
Look on the bright side, Beck, at least you don’t have to deal with any carcasses! Kargan Dragonlord has decided recently that birds are the best toy. Sometimes he gets pulled inside before the execution and the toy flies away, sometimes I have to dispose of a headless bird.
While we’re talking about cats I might as well share a story.
About a week ago I was awoken at the ungodly hour of 6 AM (I have a weird schedule) to something thumping about outside my bedroom window. Now, it’s it’s warming up around here so I had my window cracked open, and I got up thinking “I’ll close the window so the thumping is quieter.” Then I heard a familiar “meow” and saw a familiar white-and-orange face and remembered that Kargan Dragonlord decided to roll around in the parking lot instead coming inside the previous night. I went into panic mode, adrenaline surging through my veins, throwing open the window, wrestling the screen out (it was not built to taken out in a hurry) and leaning out to see… the cat leaping, limbs splayed out, down to the back deck and landing safely. Naturally, I ran downstairs and let him in through the back door. Then I sat on the floor and spent a few moments petting him, just to calm myself down, before going back to sleep. When I woke again I was slightly surprised to see that it was not a dream and the window screen was leaning against the couch (yes, I have a couch in my bedroom, no one wants it and there’s no where else it’ll fit). Now, no one reading this can be expected to know what my place look like and, thus, how unlikely this is. My bedroom is on the second floor, with the roof starting about where the floor is, that is to say around fourteen feet off the ground or ten/eleven feet up from the back deck. Not insurmountable for a cat, except for the fact that there’s a two foot horizontal overhang. I have no idea how he got up there. Hell, I doubt he even knows how he did it. It all ended well, though, as long as he doesn’t make a habit of it.
Ghostly cats have their ways of thwarting the laws of physics. I don’t know how mine can get in the cathedral height beams in my living room without wings, but they do. And, furthermore how they get down so fast when the treats come out. Without a hair out of place looking cool and collected.
Here I am looking like I been on a bender for two weeks with my clothes on backwards, just because the trash needs bagging. Go figure.
ETA, I don’t know how you deal with the dead bird thing. Eeeekkk.
What I don’t understand, Beck, is what underlying aberration drives you to harbor this pair of Oriental feline thugs. It seems that these hellcats will viciously attack you at the slightest opportunity, the better to draw blood from any vital area. I admit to being biased against the species as I am, like most decent human beings, a Dog Person, but still, one is astonished. They seem more fit company for the แม่มด, or mæ̀md, the classical witch of their native homeland, intent on casting spells and curses. Basic decorum prevents me from detailing the course of action I would pursue in your situation, but suffice it to say that this particular chapter of household animal husbandry, as regards felines, would end very soon on my watch, and very abruptly. But as I say, I am a Dog Person, so pets that are hellbent on killing their owners is not an idea to which I’m accustomed. I suppose some may enjoy the experience.
I have two part-meezers. I can attest that they are LOUD as hell. Have fun!
I wuv my babies. They’re only evil because I don’t behave correctly or get up fast enough. It’s all my fault. I deserve the abuse.
I’m a dog person too. That’s why I got Siamese cats. Supposedly they are more dog like. The breeder agreed with me when I told her I read it. She assured me this was true. She also assured me 2 would be better than one. And, I wrote the check real fast, before I flunked her personal test as to my ability to parent/work for these 2 bundles of joy. They were just so sweet in those early days. Ah, I remember it well. I was flush with the excitement of new babies in the house. The tell-tale signs of the take over of my house and life were not visible. And now you find me at this point in my life. A total slave to their every whim. They’re just so pretty and sleek with lovely brown velvet ears and straight up tails, unless they’re mad, then the tail gets a kink. Oops, I should not have said that. Y’all gonna think I’m crazy or something.
Our Siamese is very friendly and never says anything. I don’t think I have ever heard her meow. She loves to lick the bowl if I eat chocolate ice cream (I know but it is just a tiny bit). Our tabby is the friendliest. She would spend all her time on my lap if I let her. When we got her she was just a few ounces and had an infection and nearly died. She used to crawl up my chest to snuggle under my chin and purr. I think I am imprinted as her papa.
Dennis
Isn’t there some sort of rule about pictures in a thread like this?
Many years ago (before we knew better) we let our cats go outside, which they loved. Then one got killed by a vehicle and we decided “no more cats outside”. It can be very difficult for a kitty who has been able to wander to suddenly be stuck indoors.
Our solution - we bought a prefab wooden frame shed. Roofed it with corrugated plastic roofing and used chicken wire for the walls. Abutted the whole thing up against a window and presto - instant cat play area. The transition to indoor only was seamless. The could still go out, sit in the grass, watch the birds and windy leaves blowing around.
But they were safe.
Yes, there is a rule: pictures!
Do you have a screened in porch? You could let them sit out there. If not, you could build a cat area on part of your deck or porch, so they can enjoy without disappearing.
There’s also aversion training. Invite them to go out when it’s raining. Even if they step out, they usually come right back in. 
I want an outdoor thing-y. I’m trying to convince Mr.Wrekker to build me one. He keeps saying he’s figuring it out. Hmmm?
He doesn’t see a problem. They hide when he’s in the house. He would dispute the fact that there are even cats in the house, most days.
Pictures? I’m not sure how to do it. I tried to download ‘Flickr’ and have not been very successful. I have very few pix of them. They are like trying to take pictures of apparitions. I am trying folks, I swear.
Watch out with kitty harnesses. As soon as they get to the end of the leash, they use it for leverage to twist out of it!
I love Siamese cats; loud, talkative funny beasts…I’ve had in my life two sets of two and they all lived to 17-18 years old. There was a point about 15 years ago where every single member of my family owned Siamese cats and those who did not own two…they were nasty unpleasant cats. They must need company or something. All of mine loved to snuggle and purred and talked all the time. I have a Bengal now and it has taken 7 years for her to warm up to me and she still won’t let me hold her for more than a few seconds and sitting on my lap is her idea only…I can’t pick her up and place her beside me or on my lap and have her stay. She’s really pretty and loves scritches but my next one will be Siamese for sure.
Oh, they aren’t nasty. But they are still evil overlords. Quite happy in their lives. When they lay in their beds on the dryer I can hear them purr allover the house. They love the dryer beds. Best idea I ever had. Maybe it was my idea. Now that I think back…hmmm?
Tried a harness. She shed even the best rated one in record time after flinging herself around and going through contortions and tantrums. Bought a pet tent, which has screened sides so she can see out without running off for a kitty adventure. Hated it. Meowed pathetically and rolled around clawing at the netting.
We have now finally gotten her to the point where she can go outside accompanied by one of us, and rolls around on the hot concrete, nibbles some grass, and chases the occasional butterfly, but sticks to the confines of the front yard as long as we’re right on top of her. Otherwise, she’s a house cat.
I’m losing confidence in my brilliant idea.
Friend of mine had a Bengal. He moved to an area where it wasn’t safe to let Tigre free roam, and got a harness.
Once Tigre made the connection between harness = time outside, and understood that being good while harnessed was his only shot at outside time, it was smooth sailin’. Damn cat walked on a leash like a dog.
Unfortunately, kitty must figure that out for himself, as we lack the ability to explain. Just something to consider, Beck.
(For the pics: I use Tapatalk on my phone, which has … drawbacks. But it’s stupid-simple to upload pics from my phone onto this site that way, directly into a post. Not a link, a visible pic pasted directly into the post. So see if you can get the Tapatalk smartphone app for message boards.)
Hey, I thought you were pet sitting a cute orange tabby? How did that go? Didn’t you fall head-over-heels?
My erstwhile benefactor – or more accurately, the person who was going to inflict this cursed feline on me – apparently thought better of it. Perhaps I had made one too many comments about exotic oriental dishes like cat-fried rice, raising concerns about honing my culinary skills at the mortal expense of the cat’s well-being, leaving it with less than its full complement of nine lives. The next thing I knew, I heard from them via email while they were vacationing in the Caribbean, the cat having apparently been dispatched to other – and ostensibly safer – catsitting accommodations. Quite honestly, though, I would have had no problem with catsitting for a while. But I think they were put off by the fact that I made it clear that there was no way this was going to lead to an adoption.
My doctor is down the train line in an urban area favoured by hipsters and greenies. No matter what day or time I go I pass an elderly couple walking their siamese on leads. They must spend all day wandering as the cats sniff everything. My moggy has a harness and lead, he is pretty good on it but we don’t walk the streets, just the backyard. It lets him roll on concree and eat grass without going over the fence or hiding under furniture when it is time to come back inside.
Beck, for pictures, use Imgur (it’s pronounced like it’s written, just like “gif”): https://imgur.com/
Imgur - New post - browse/drag picture - wait until it uploads - scroll cursor over image to make URL appear - Press “copy” - paste URL
Has someone mentioned a catio yet? Alternatively, a comfy spot in front of a screen door might satisfy them. I sometimes drag one of their cat trees or just a chair in front of the open balcony door Imgur: The magic of the Internet