My Crazy Cat, Sussie the Pussy.

My dear, darling and naughty cat, Sussie. Difficult not to love a creature like her and yet all her crazy and usually very un kitty like antics makes a mess of our house and I pause to wonder...what did we get ourselves into???

Let me list some of the strange things that she does, some of which is done while we're asleep. And I shall compare it to normal cat behaviour in similar situation.

Situation: Toy rat is idly lying on the floor. Cat spies it from a corner of her eye.

Normal cat will... pause and crouch down low in a hunting position and eye the target for a while before lunging at it and playing with it for a while. Cat may or may not roll around with toy rat but will eventually leave ratty alone in somewhat similar location.

Sussie will... see the rat and stop in her tracks. She looks around to make sure nobody is going to catch her in action (but we usually do) and lunges for the toy rat, grabs it by its neck and starts running around and around the house with ratty in her mouth, like a dog holding a ball. She will run at least 2 rounds into all the rooms of the flat before hiding the rat in a deep dark corner under our bed where I'm sure she does unspeakable horrors to poor old ratty. We may not see the rat for a few more days more.

Situation: Cat is under the sofa or bed, relaxing or playing.

Normal cat will...usually be licking itself, playing with some furball or toy it found or simply sleeping.

Sussie will... figure herself to be Ethan Hawke from Mission Impossible or that creature from Species and hang onto the bottom of the bed or sofa with all 4 paws so she is essentially hanging upside down and start crawling like that, sliding herself across back and forth the bed or sofa. She doesn't shred the underside of our furniture but just uses it as the medium that will allow her to do her 'spy-ish' activities. Once I caught her doing that under our bed cos she came too close to the outer edge and when we made eye contact, she froze for 5 seconds before running away. Cos she knows she'd been caught on a mission.

Situation: Cat wants to enter a room but has not been able to all night because room door has been closed. Now door is finally open and cat can enter.

Normal cat will... slowly and catiously walk towards the door, making sure that it is safe to enter before entering and surveying the room and doing who knows what it wants in there.

Sussie will... run like a cat high on Ecstasy towards the door but screech to a halt at the doorway and look around her very very catiously to make sure that neither me or the husband is going to chase her out or scold her before she rushes again under the bed, which in her mind is the safest place possible.

Situation: Nice new blanket has just been bought from IKEA and placed at an accessible spot on the sofa in case of chilly TV nights.

Normal cat will... perhaps consider it warm and cosy and paw the blanket into a comfy bunched up shape before curling down into it and sleeping away.

Sussie will... eye the blanket all night and when husband and I are asleep, pull it from the livingroom into our bedroom deep under the bed where she will paw it into a comfy bunched up shape before going back to the livingroom to sleep on her already comfily bunched up towel under the sofa. There will be no trace of new blanket the next morning when we wake up and all I have is a strange feeling that something is missing while standing in the middle of the livingroom. Blanket is found later in the day when we realilse what exactly is that missing something.

Situation: Potted plants are placed in various locations all over the house.

Normal cat will... consider it fun to paw into the dirt in the pot since it's an indoor cat and doesn't get to play with dirt very much. It's like a kid and mud. We understand. What one will be left with is a dirt-y (heh heh. no pun intended) mess all around the affected pot with trails of dirt where the cat headed to after it's fun with the potted plants. And after a while cat is relatively clean since it then spends hours licking itself of the dirt.

Sussie will... consider it fun to paw into the dirt in the pot since she's an indoor cat and doesn't get to play with dirt very much. But what I am left with is a dirt-y (heh heh..again pun not intended) mess all around the affected pot but no trails. My cat manages to make a mess at the scene of the crime and then perhaps tiptoe off before leaving a spot of dirt 3 meters away or more often in the next room. And yet not a speck of the plant dirt anywhere else but that lone spot a good 3 meters away. To this day I still wonder how the hell she does it. And after a while my Sussie is relatively clean since she spends some time grooming except for a spot of dirt at the tip of her nose, revealing what she'd been up to. Did I also mention she likes to eat dirt?

Situation: After a wild night, the house is littered with colourful confetti. Cat is given some treats and wet food is put into the food bowl.

A normal cat will... run for the treat and perhaps meow for it if one is too slow in handing it out. Then cat will possibly head on to the food bowl and attack the wet food. It had been a wild night after all even for a cat.

Sussie will... look at the treat with some suspicion, eye the wet food and give that some consideration. But ultimately, she will turn and spotting some loose pink confetti lying on the ground, run to it before gobbling it down like it was the best treat in the world. Did I mention that my cat likes to eat paper and chew on book covers?

That is the story of my crazy cat..or at least part of it. As she grows she will hopefully tone down a little in craziness but one never knows. But for now, it's just fun to see what else she can come up with.