You’ve got to understand, I’m a life-long cat lover. We always had a pair of cats when I was growing up, and I’ve got a pair of cats now, and there have been several pairs (serially) in between. So when my husband’s aunt broke her leg and needed to spend many weeks in a rehab center (she’s old, frail, and has many health problems) I was happy to agree with hubby’s suggestion that we take in her cat ‘Bubby’ until the aunt can go home again.
I mean, how much trouble can one extra cat be? Hah. I should have suspected what I was in for the first time I laid eyes on the cat. He’s a neutered male, about six years old, long and lanky. All black, with a single yellow eye – lost the other one in a fight long ago – glaring at me balefully through the mesh of his carrier while hissing like a pressure cooker on the verge of exploding.
This cat is demonic. I should have guessed that “Bubby” is just a nickname for Beelzebub. And, no, I’m not just prejudiced against all black cats, one of my own is all black as well.
What does this cat do? Well, every evil, bad, nasty thing you’ve ever heard of any cat doing, wrapped in a single scrawny body:
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He refuses to use any of the litter boxes in the house – we have four, spread over three levels, all of which are scooped at least daily. Guessing that the problem might be Bubby’s not used to living with other cats, we got a fifth litterbox AND bought the brand of litter he was used to, and put it into a spare room and closed him into that room by himself over night. In the morning we found a ‘tootsie roll’ RIGHT BESIDE the lstill-pristine itter box, plus a couple of odorous wet spots in the carpet.
He has also baptized two beds and the couch, the little bastard, as well as many other more easily cleaned up places. -
In just two weeks he has shredded the runner on our main staircase to the point we had to remove it for fear of tripping on one of the holes he’d ripped in it.
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He continually hisses at, and ATTACKS our own cats. Including Toby who is thirteen years old, WAY over weight, and possesses all the vim and feistiness of a bean bag cat. :mad:
He has also chewed up a woolen lap robe and deliberated knocked some china ornaments off our mantel piece – I know it was him and deliberate because I was talking on the phone and saw the bastard DO IT.
All that is minor compared to two other habits:
- The damn cat yowls. All the time, morning, noon, night. I’m not talking about “I want my dinner” yowls, no, this guy screeches – that’s what it sounds like, a nasty ear-piecing sound, worse than any tom cat outside the window of a queen in heat yowling – ALL THE TIME. Open a cupboard – he yowls. Enter the room he is in – he yowls. Leave the room he’s in – he yowls. The phone rings – he yowls. Try to watch TV – he yowls. On and on and on, it gets on my nerves so badly I’ve screamed at him to shut up …which makes him yowl louder.
No, he’s not in pain or sic – he’s got a beautifully glossy fur coat, he eats like horse, has boundless energy, and the vet has said he’s fine. He says the cat might be part siamese and thus ‘talky.’ TALKY??? This cat is SCREAMY.
And, worst of all
- The damn cat continually tries to escape from our house. He’s learned the sound of our cars/footsteps, so whenever one of us approaches the door he is pressed right at the corner that opens and tries to shoot out the second the door is open just a crack. And then, since he of course doesn’t come when called, you get to spend a merry hour chasing him around the yard, and the neighbor’s yards, before he finally tires and lets you corner him and pick him up…whereupon he tries to bite and scratch you. (Yes, I had to get a fresh tetanus shot two days after he came to stay with us.)
I’m tempted to just let him out and say “Have a nice life” but a major highway is less than a 50 yards away AND we have coyotes in the neighborhood, so that would be equivalent of killing him. As I say, I’m tempted, but the catloving part of me has so far forced me to chase him down each time.
The thing is, I can’t stand living like this. I hate not being able to simply walk into or out of my house instead of having to prepare to fend off his crazed escape attempts EACH AND EVERY TIME. I hate being driven from room to room trying to get out of ear shot of his yowls. I hate that my own cats are becoming fearful and upset to the point I don’t get to spend any pleasant time just snuggling them as I watch tv or read. :mad:
I realized yesterday that I was deliberately spending extra time at all the stops as I ran errands, just so I wouldn’t have to go home and deal with the demon just yet. That’s sad, isn’t it? To have your home, your castle, your refuge from the outside world turned into a place you dread to go?
What’s worst, I think I’m stuck. It looks like Aunty will be in the rehab place quite a time, but she’s healing and is expected to go home. Meaning I can’t just get rid of the cat in any permanent way. And who would adopt the bastard anyway? I’ve made a few calls, and it seems like kennels won’t take cats for long term boarders, so that route’s out.
What I really need is a stassis box.
