Think back to Bill Murray in Ghostbusters, carrying on about how bad things will be i they are not let out of jail to fight Gozer: “Dogs and cats, living together!”
I was out at my brother’s house last night for dinner. My step-sister was in from Seattle so we all got together for some homemade burritos (don’t ask). My brother lives on about 90 acres a few miles east of OKC. After dinner, I was outside enjoying a smoke and noticed a bit of a commotion out on the driveway. My brother inherited a tomcat (two, actually, but I took one) when he bought this house a few months ago. The previous owner couldn’t take them, so he asked my brother to look after them. Brother couldn’t care less. He’s not too much of a cat person. Anyhow, I noticed Tiger, the tomcat I didn’t take, circling something out on the drive so I walk out to take a closer look (it was starting to get pretty dark). My dog, Buster, a German Shepherd/Rottweiler mix, follows me out (he goes everywhere with me) and we find a little half-starved kitten, mewing pitifully and keeping a wary eye on Tiger. Buster, who thinks cats are pretty neat, other than the sharp claws thing, slowly walks up and takes a sniff of the kitten. He then proceeds to start licking this kitten from head to tail. I have another cat at home(Spot), besides the one I rescued from my brother’s inattention(Pete), and Buster tries to sniff and lick her all the time, but she generally won’t have much of it. Pete, OTOH immediately makes his disapproval of dogs in general and Buster in particular well known any time he happens to get within 5 feet of him. Anyhow, this little kitten had apparently not had any traumatic experiences involving dogs at this early stage in its life. It immediately took to Buster (who weighs about 120lbs, btw) and started rubbing up against his legs and purring while he continued cleaning it.
I’m a bit of a sucker for animals in distress (as evidenced by Pete) but I try very hard to steel myself and maintain a manageable household. Last night I couldn’t help myself, so I took the kitten home and gave her a bath. I had intended to try and find her a good home, but this morning I woke up and saw the most amazing sight. The kitten, which insited on going to sleep in the crook of my arm, had climbed up on top of Buster and was sleeping on his side as he laid there, quite complacent with his little pet using him for a bed. I now have a dog that has his own cat. She likes me pretty well (other than the bathing thing last night), but given a choice, she seems to prefer the company of my dog. I think I’ll keep her. Now to come up with a name…
I decided to fire up the webcam. Check this out.
OK, so I staged it. I put the kitten on Buster’s back (lower right) but she stayed long enough to scratch (lower left) and then got down on the floor and laid down next to him(upper right).
Um, TwistofFate, it’d probably be more like chairwoman Miaow.
That really is too cute, but you know when you make statments like: "Ok, now I’ve seen it all…" You’re just asking to get hit by lightning or something.
Yeah, dogs and cats are the funniest things sometimes. When this little orange cat came up to the house, my daughter immediately adopted ‘Tigger.’ Then it was time to find out how the little one would fit in with the two dogs and two other cats. [sub]no, i am NOT running a shelter! my daughter, on the other hand also has four fishies …[/sub] The two cats, of course, were quite miffed. Nothing unusual there. The two dogs? Tigger just loved to get chased by them. For real, if they wouldn’t chase him, he would bug either or both till he started getting chased. He would get on the coffee table and bat at them with his paws, jump down & run around, get back on the table and do it all over again.
Huh. But now he’s getting older and is turning out like all cats, ignoring all until you try to sit down and read or walk across the floor, then there he is.
The title was a bit leading intentionally. I just had to share this.
I think Screech-owl came up with the perfect name: Keaton. They are quite funny together.
Since this is MPSIMS, I’ll share a bit more mundane stuff. I’m not trying to turn my house into a shelter, but I really do like my animals. Spot I’ve had for about 8.5 years. My ex-wife and I got her as a kitten about 2.5 years before we got divorced. All I got in the settlement was my recliner, clothes, computers, car, and Spot. I had to fight hardest for Spot, but I figured that since she was getting custody of our son, I should get custody of our cat. She’s usually a great companion but she’s been pretty snippy lately because of Pete and now Keaton. She looks pretty much like a slightly larger version (she’s pretty small for an 8 year old cat at 6.5lbs) of Keaton but with a big white spot on her back. She’s pretty tolerant of Buster except when he gets clumsy and steps on her.
Pete is a relative newcomer. I’ve had him about two months and I’m thinking about finding him a new home. He’s not a bad cat, but he isn’t adjusting well to Buster. He’s HUGE, about 20-22 lbs, solid white, with one blue eye and one green eye. No one knows how old he is, but he has great teeth so he is probably under 5.
Buster is my best friend. I’ve had him about 4 years and I got him when he was about 2 years old. He is incredibly intelligent and knows a good number of tricks (sit, lay down, put your head down, roll over, speak, heel, gimme five/other side, go to bed, get in the truck) and is the best frisbee dog I’ve seen that weighs over 50 lbs. He almost never misses. He loves to ride and has a permanent place in the cab of my truck. Most of my friends and family don’t care much for Spot (they’re just not cat people, I guess), but everybody* loves Buster.
*except my ex-wife. The first time he saw her, he barked pretty viciously at her. Did I tell you that I love Buster?
I just wanted to say that in the webcam pics, despite your having put the little cutie on top of Buster, her climbing down and going to sleep, Buster appears to have not moved a muscle during the entire process. He looks to be in exactly the same position in all three photos. I laughed at that.
Yep, Keaton is the final choice. (Thanks, Screech!)
Buster is a pretty good house dog. He is rambunctious and payful outside but once in the house, he calms down and mostly just sleeps. It’s pretty funny to watch Keaton climb all over him while he moves little more than an eyebrow. This evening, she kept climbing back and forth over him and he never even looked up after the first time.
My parents had a dog that adopted an orphaned kitty early on. She had a litter of her own at the time, and the kitten just lined up with the pups for her share of nipple. Apparently a lot of things cats do are learned behavior, not instinctual - this kitten NEVER ‘meowed’ when it grew up, just made weird yipping noises, and it ran like a dog.
My wife’s family had a lamb that was raised with the dogs. It, too, tried to “bark” (or at least it made some weird noises), and used to chase cars. Just to imagine a fully-grown sheep chasing a car makes me laugh.
