While there may be exceptions, this is contrary to most cats I have observed, even by my friends that have house cats. The cats barely give the humans arounds them a notice, with the exception if the human has some food to offer. And with regard to the head butting and rubbing, I have always heard that it was the cat trying to exhibit his/her dominance as they do in the wild.
Until someone develops a cat translator as mentioned up thread, I’m not sure we will really know.
I said a hundred, but that’s pushing it.
Our cat was a stray.
One night the kids came to me crying; there’s something wrong with the cat.
I found her writhing on the deck and screaming. Run over, I suspected. I opened the door, and she jumped up, ran to the couch, and started the whole act over again.
Long story short, (too late) Ms. Estrus Kitty puts me in a dilemma: be a punk and kick her out to make more strays, or be socially responsible and fix her.?
Even with a damn coupon from some S/N outfit, it still cost me $500. I’m not poor, but it sure rubbed me wrong.
She’s lucky to get a rabies shot from now on, and she’ll stay out of traffic if she knows what’s good for her…
I know I’m not going to change your mind. I intend 2 things. One is to shed light on that fact that you’re only interested in how much people are willing to spend on their cats so that you can get a metric for how ridiculous they are and as a corollary, to confirm for yourself how rare and wonderful someone with your “good common sense” is.
The other is to get you to continue to describe and expand on your beliefs to make your attitudes clear to other readers and let reason take its course.
Have a nice day! 
I’ve owned and lived with many cats in the past and my casual observation has been just the opposite, but neither really matters in the long run - science frequently conflicts with casual observation. A lot of behaviors domestic cats exhibit are only found in juveniles or between juveniles and their mothers in wild cats, like meowing, suckling, kneading, social grooming, playing and so on. Adult wild cats just don’t do them, but adult domestic cats do. It’s called neotenic behavior, retaining juvenile characteristics into adulthood. Cats do it because it’s paid off for them evolutionarily to show us behavior and affection that a wild cat would only show its mother and litter mates, and then only as a kitten. It’s not because we’re awesome, it’s purely biological.
I can’t really answer this poll. I would be willing to spend more than $1000 but the number is not unlimited. More importantly, I would be concerned about how much my pet would be suffering through the treatment. So if it involves many operations or something like that, I would not want my pet to have to endure it.
This is exactly how I feel about it. I’ve got two cats that are over ten years old and I would have to very seriously think about spending over $500 to treat a disease or injury unless they’d be completely cured or have a good quality of life until their deaths. As they get older, everything costs more. When I had to have my old man cat’s teeth cleaned, there were extra lab tests and such because he was an old fart. I also have a youngish cat, about 3, and I’d go to greater lengths to fix him because he has more natural life left.
Someone just asked me yesterday if I’d be willing to spend up to $2,000 on vet care for my dog if she needed it, and I unhesitatingly said yes, with the caveats expressed above.
Cats behave differently when a stranger is in the mix. Even if you visit frequently, they know whether or not you are a colony member, so to speak. I’ve noticed that even my “velcro cat” will be standoffish when I have guests in the house.
I will agree that some of the feline behaviors we identify as loving or affectionate are being misinterpreted or are a result of humans essentially keeping the cat in an extended state of kittenhood.
(Good lord, I look at LOLcats far too often. I automatically began typing “kitteh” instead of “kitten.”)
Now that’s a given. I don’t need confirmation of that. 
They’re social behaviors, but not dominance related. Allorubbing (head-butts and similar behaviors ) are generally friendly gestures designed to reinforce group bonds, in terms of both tactile stimulation and in scent-marking. While cats do scent mark for purely territorial reasons, in this case the scent-marking is used to establish familiarity by creating a “group scent.”
If you see two feral cats casually head-butt each other, it is a sign that they are old companions on good terms with each other, rather than two individuals trying to establish dominance. Contrary to popular belief domestic cats are facultatively social. Not pack animals like dogs, but not dedicated loners either. Ferals frequently form affectionate social bonds in the wild.
I’d love to hear more about this if you don’t mind. What kind of pets, what do you feed them (specifically), and where do you get the “food”?
Actually, you do come across as judging people here (I haven’t read the other thread).
You misread (or mischaracterized) what pbthh said. I consider my cats to be part of my family, but I don’t think of them as human. Why do you think that families are limited to 1 species?
I just do.
If you feel judged by that statement, please accept my apologies.
Yes, this is true. We feed three feral strays who were born on the property where we live now (they’re furry amenities that came with the house) that are littermates. They’re bonded to each other like you wouldn’t believe, constantly rubbing against each other, headbutting softly, walking side by side with their tails intertwined like they’re holding hands.
They also wait for each other before eating - whichever one arrives at the food first will come to a screeching halt a scant two inches away, then pace around (occasionally letting me scritch) until the other two get there, then they all dig in together out of the same bowl. It does no good to feed them in separate containers either - they all have to eat out of the same one, their ears and forehears in constant contact.
Anyone who says all cats are standoffish loners doesn’t know cats very well.
I’ve spent around $3000 on a cat who lived for a very long time afterward, and I don’t regret a penny of it.
Up to $1,000. This was put to the test when I found out my cat had some rare kitty bone disease about 4 months after I got him. I paid $150 to the emergency vet, $500ish for the surgery, $200ish for meds, and $100 or so for the follow up appointment. I just couldn’t bare putting him down, and without the surgery his bone would have basically rotted from the inside out. Gross, yes, and I’m a bleeding heart and put his surgery on my credit card. It’s been 3 years and he’s healthy and hasn’t had any other issues.
When I was a kid, my cat at the time “somehow” got kicked down the stairs by one of my sister’s drunk friends and the vet estimated $8,000 for a surgery that had a 50/50 shot of working. We opted to put him to sleep. I didn’t exactly have a choice in this situation, but I wouldn’t have paid that much for a surgery, either.