My mutt for a dog has a thing with her blankets. She can spend over an hour fussing over sculpting the folds and wadding to get it perfect. I doubt she ever does, it usually ends up with her slumping on it in exhaustion and sulking before falling alseep.
Our new kitty, Marigold, eats almost everything. She’s particularly fond of cheese, which she will sit up and beg for, but anything meat- or dairy-based is fair game. She has even been known to jump up on the countertops to eat mashed potatoes or pumpkin pie. She also loves to fetch and hunt for things, and seems to have boundless energy in doing so.
All in all, she is the most dog-like cat I’ve ever known…the shelter said she was a barn cat, so maybe she learned her behaviors.
Where to begin?
Weezer, the pugamo, loves to watch television. He spends most evenings either sitting and watching nicely (rare) or growling and barking at the TV. He especially gets riled up about animals. He even hates the cartoon versions of animals. He also hates cell phone commercials. At first I thought it was just for one brand, but no, it’s all of them. Especially Alltel, though. Thank goodness they don’t make wizard commercials anymore. He despised that wizard. Oh, and last Christmas when there was an Alltell ad with cartoon versions of Chad and those other guys he knew it was them, too. It always makes me wonder what subliminal messages the cell phone companies are trying to send us that we can’t hear but the dog can.
Weezer also loves to swim. Not too unusual for a dog, but he will stand in the water for an hour or more, just pawing around and playing with rocks. On the other hand, he hates baths. After the bath, he will run laps around the coffee table. Same goes for brushing. One time after a bath I gave him a slice of pepperoni as a treat and he took it in the other room and started rolling around on it. He must have thought he smelled nasty after that bath and wanted to smell awesome like pepperoni instead.
Then the cats:
Fuzzy is a strange cat. As a kitten she ate kitty litter. Fuzzy has never been one for toys, but a couple of months ago I bought a pair of slipper socks at the dollar store that had a pink ribbon around them. Somehow Fuzzy got the ribbon and it has been her favorite thing ever since. She carries it around the house in her mouth wherever she goes. The last time I was at the dollar store I bought another pair of socks that were tied with a ribbon, this time in silver. Although she’ll play with the silver one a tiny bit if prompted, she still prefers the pink one.
When we used to have a hot tub, the scent of chlorine drove Fuzzy crazy. She would often lick and bite our legs when we came inside from sitting in the hot tub. Fuzzy also loves to help me get ready for work in the morning. She waits for me to open the door after my shower and comes rushing in. Often she drives me insane by licking the shower curtain and the bottom of the tub.
Buggy is our drama queen. He’s also a digger. He digs forever in the litter box, by the kitchen door, the basement door, you name it. He even digs at the side of the aquarium to try to get to the clown fish. That’s about the only weird thing I can think of with him, unless you count the constant crying and screaming.
Poopy can’t meow. When he does meow, it sounds very rusty and squeaky. He loves boxes and bags. You can put in in a plastic grocery bag and carry him around and he thinks it is wonderful. He also loves popcorn. When we eat popcorn he’s right there by the dog begging for it.
you have to log in to facecrap to see the pictures.
Oh, sorry. I thought I’d set all of my photos to “public.”
My oldest cat, Bubba, is chock full of…personality. He has so many oddities that it’s hard to pick. One is that he likes to sit in the freezer. He doesn’t check out the food and he does it regardless of whether it’s hot or cold in the house. He just likes to hop up and sit in there. He’s done this since he was a kitten and he’s going on eight now. He gets really mad if you try to get him out before he’s done too.
At my old apartment, the bedroom closet had a shelf that he would periodically jump up on and run back and forth repeatedly in a crazed manner. This made a huge amount of noise and many times woke me out of a sound sleep, thinking storm troopers were pounding down the door.
I called it the Rabid Buffalo Run and I really really hated it. My current apartment also has the same kind of shelf but for some reason, it doesn’t appeal to him. He hasn’t done the RBR since I moved and I haven’t missed it a bit.
Another weird thing he does that I really hate is that occasionally he’ll leap on the bed when I’m sleeping and start gnawing enthusiastically on the back of my head. Sometimes I worry that he’s actually a zombie cat and that’s why he tries to eat my delicious brains.
He has an absolute fetish for plastic bags. He doesn’t lick them. He likes to stick his face inside one, press it against the plastic, and just look out at the world through his plastic wall. I don’t understand the appeal but at least it doesn’t cause me shock and pain like the brain-eating thing.
He also has a fetish for washing others. I used to wake up to find a hefty cat holding me down and giving my face a very thorough washing. The cheeks and nose were bad enough but I can assure you that it’s a very weird and painful way to wake up when you have a cat washing your eyelids.
He’d also wash the inside of my ears sometimes. I’d sometimes get small scabs on my ears from it. It’s not a proud moment when your coworkers ask how you could get a scab on your ear and you have to tell them it’s from the cat washing it. You can imagine the kind of looks this would earn you.
Happily, since getting his “brothers”, Boo Radley and Bogey, he has transferred this fetish to them. He gives me the occasional token washing but the brunt of his devotion to cleanliness is directed toward them.
Bogey has plenty of his own quirks, the most prominent being a fanatic addiction to playing fetch with his stuffed mice. It’s cute and funny how much he loves his game but it does wear. There are times when I’d rather gnaw my own eyebrows off rather than see him bring me that damn mouse for the 348th time.
Boo’s main quirk is that he’s exceedingly polite for a cat. His main weirdness is that he’ll actually stop doing something when you tell him to. For a cat, that’s downright peculiar. He did used to like to jump straight up and down against various walls but he hasn’t done that in a while.
Jasmine’s an odd kitty. She’s almost 9, but still acts like a kitten in many respects. Her favorite thing to do now is rub her nose against plastic shopping bags. She can do this for hours.
Our oldest cat, Lotta, is a Paper Shredder. She’ll shred anything left on the bed, so I’ve learned to be careful what I put there.
Our newest, Hermes, acts more like a dog than any cat I’ve known. He’ll entreat you to play by standing on his hind feet and putting his front paws as high up on you as he can. He loves to play fetch (which I see other cats in this thread do). He plays tug-of-war, which I’ve never known any other cat to do, holding on tenaciously with his teeth and racing himself against your pull, and actively seeking to play again.
I’ve had mine go for q-tips sometimes but what really drives Riff crazy is makeup sponges. I tried putting them in various things to keep him away from them but he manages to take them out of my makeup bag, knock down a closed plastic box they were in causing the box to pop open (that was a great day as it had both q-tips and sponges) and he gas even opened the medicine cabinet to get to them. He also likes Mr. Clean magic erasers, I have to hide those , too.
My cat likes to come into the bathroom every morning while I’m in the shower. She always pokes her head around the side of the shower curtain and watches me for a minute or two. What a pervert.
Mija, hubby’s little tuxedo kitty, is a weird thing. Whereas her fellow indoor-only cat-roommate Inigo will bolt if the door is left open to go explore and eat green things (and thus takes some chasing), we know we don’t need to chase her. She will run about 5 feet, then plop on the cement sidewalk and rollrollrollrollroll.
Inigo is Dying to Death if he can see the bottom of his food bowl. Could be 50 kibble in there off to one side, but if he sees the bottom, he’s in starvation mode. Inigo, BTW, is a dog in cat’s clothing. He comes when he’s called, does tricks (sit and sit up), loooooves people and attention, and will walk on a leash.
My mare, Ferrana, will chomp the living shit out of her bit when she has to think. I call it the Ferrana Barometer: it tells me exactly how anxious she is. I’ve had a vet examine her, and an equine dentist does her teeth every year. I’ve tried various bits and have come to just realize–this is just like someone who bites their fingernails. It’s just a habit. A loud, noisy, CHOMPCHOMPCHOMP habit. Still, makes it easy to tell when she’s relaxed.
Also has taught me she’s like a kid about being corrected–“I wanna do this!” “Um, no Ana, no dice, you’re doing THAT.” CHOMPCHOMPCHOMP
Beetle had a sort of nervous tic where she’d pull out all her fur. There was one time when she pulled all the fur out of her tail in a perfectly straight line, like a stripe of skin running down her tail. I should try and find the picture my dad took of it, it was the most bizarre behavior I’d ever seen in a cat.
The fur-pulling got so bad that we had to put her on medication to stop it. She still does it every now and then, but not nearly as often as she used to.
I’ve read that this is a form of “marking”, because when a cat rubs against something, scent glands are releasing extra powerful marking chemicals. So the cat doesn’t love the smell of your work feet, but instead wants to cover it up with its own scent.
Don’t think I heard it anywhere reputable, but I’d be interested in other dopers’ opinions.
No, I’ve read the same thing. Cats apparently have scent glands in the area around their lips and, I think, around the jowls. When they rub their faces on you or other things, they’re marking it with their scent.