Thursday, March 04, 2004

In case you hadn't noticed, my wife and I are ailurophiles. We have five cats, the Siamese Twins, Chang and Eng, Lisa, Bart, and Oscar. Chang and Eng are beautiful cats; they are pretty obviously a mix of red tabby and Siamese. They're identical twins except Chang came out with only half a tail, while Eng's is luxurious and fluffy. They have blue eyes and the Siamese meow, and they look just like red point Siamese. Most of their fur is a creamy beigey white, and then the ears and the like are red. The thing about these two is they behave more like sheep than cats. They insist on being where you are, and if possible on top of you, ALL THE TIME. I've never seen more affectionate animals. Lisa is our only female, sweet and just a little shy. They're all neutered, but Eng likes to hump Lisa every now and then and she lets him, which is why the back of her neck always smells like cat spit. Her fur is interesting: it's white with black or gray tips, so when she lies down and curls up she's stippled with white. Bart is the boss now; he's a male in the prime of life, red tabby and white, and he likes to throw his weight around the house just a bit. He likes to sit on the top of the computer monitor, so he's often a witness to my typing here. Right now he's decided he prefers my lap. Oscar is jet-black and loves to sit on my lap too. When I wake up in the morning there are five cats between me and Remei, and Oscar is the one who'll be right under my chin. He's the most playful of all of them and the most curious; he's interested in almost anything and you can see his little kitty brain trying to figure out, say, how running water or mirrors work. The nastiest trick you can play on him is to use a hand mirror to project the sunlight onto the wall. If you move the mirror around a little the spot the sunlight makes moves too, and little Oscar just does not get the concept. We don't do that to him very often because it is kind of cruel to confuse the poor little guy. All of these are adopted off the street; we got Chang and Eng as adults and found the other three as kittens.

That's why I love posts with cat pictures. Check out this one from Snopes.com, the Urban Legends Reference Pages website and one of my very favorites. You ought to check out Snopes at least once a week to see what new rumors are going around; it's educational and entertaining, and they know their stuff and manage to be amusing too. Anyway, they confirm that these cat pictures are genuine. If you're a cat person check it out.

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