Friday 24 February 2017

15 Facts About Missy Cat

Last week Kerri wrote a post titled 15 Facts About Sir Pork Chop (her hamster, for those of you who don't read her blog - although if not, why not?!) and I thought "aha! The perfect opportunity to bore on about Missy!" So, here are my 15 facts about Missy the Cat.

1. Missy will turn six in May and she's a domestic shorthair cat. We adopted her from our local RSPCA rescue centre, where she'd languished for months, in June of last year.

2. I don't actually like her name but we didn't have the heart to change it as, rather than a stray who the RSPCA named, she came into the rescue centre with it.


3. Before we adopted her we asked to have a one-to-one session with her in their 'meeting' room. This ended up not happening as, such is Missy's hatred of being handled, no-one could wrangle her out of her pod. Rather than put us off, this just made us want to adopt her more. Adult black cats are the hardest for rescue centres to rehome, and an adult black cat who was a bit feisty and grumpy struck us as especially hard to rehome, so we were determined to give her one.

4. She's still not a great fan of human-cat contact unless it's on her own terms. Things she likes include head rubs and chin scritches, giving us head boops to say hello, and little wet nose kisses when she's feeling really affectionate. She won't tolerate being picked up, being stroked for too long, or any hand-belly contact whatsoever.


5. Her favourite toys are, in order, an extremely ratty pink stuffed mouse, a second extremely ratty pink stuffed mouse (which we bought when the first one went missing for a while - later found hidden under the sofa), and an old leather shoelace.

6. One of her favourite places to sit is on top of our fridge freezer. Unfortunately, she often forgets how to get down and miaows pitifully from up there.

7. When she first arrived she was pretty much silent, but as the months have gone on she's become more and more vocal. Her range now includes an "I'm so happy to see you!" miaow, a "give me food NOW" miaow, a "where are you?" yowl, and a "why can't you make it stop raining?" grumble (which is very similar to her "leave me alone, I'm sleeping" murmur).

8. We suspect that Missy isn't the brightest of cats, as she can't seem to learn that head-butting a door she wants to go through will close rather than magically open said door. That being said, she was really quick to take to her cat-flap, so maybe she's not entirely hopeless.

9. Despite being a skittish and nervous little thing, she's not aggressive at all. She'll give a warning nip if your hand strays too close to her belly, but she's only ever scratched me when getting over-enthusiastic about Dreamies. Her more common form of warning is a hiss (or, weirdly, an open-mouthed silent hiss).

10. Her favourite game at the moment is to race up and down the length of the upstairs hallway, popping her head around the bedroom door every so often to check that we're watching.


11. She seems to have adopted me as her Person (it's common for rescue cats to be more wary of men, and with Thomas standing at 6'3" and hairy, he must seem very male to Missy) and will often follow me around the house, standing and staring at me until I give her a head scratch. Thomas calls her my shadow.

12. She's not a great lap sitter: the conditions need to be optimum (ideally her favourite yellow cushion will be ready on the lap for her to perch upon) and she rarely settles. It took her until October to sit on my lap and since then she maybe comes for a snuggle once a week, at most. Still, it makes those moments all the more special.


13. She is a great one for trolling us. Twice now we've made a vet appointment only to cancel when it becomes clear that no, she doesn't have a disastrous eye infection but instead is holding one eye shut while mewing pitifully for obscure reasons of her own (said reasons being to get food, I suspect).

14. Our nickname for her is poeshoofd, which is Dutch for cat head. Blame Thomas for this spectacularly unimaginative name.

15. Finally, she is (as we tell her daily) the best little cat in the world. She has immeasurably improved our lives and we are both completely obsessed with her. Remembering what a sad and angry little cat she was in the RSPCA makes it all the more lovely to see how happy and settled she is now.

25 comments:

  1. She sounds perfectly catish in every way. I like her, I'd think we'd get on.

    ReplyDelete
  2. What a lovely post, Missy sounds lush :)

    ReplyDelete
  3. We also adopted a black cat from the shelter. His name is Jack, he doesn't like to sit on laps, and we are pretty sure he thinks he is a dog. My husband is his person. If I pull into the driveway he doesn't bother standing up but if my husband pulls in Jack meets him at the door and begs for attention.

    Missy is very cute. I don't know why no one wants black cats.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I know, I don't understand either - they've got such great characters!

      Delete
  4. Aw, she is a cute little character, so happy she has settled in so well with you guys! I like that you respect her boundaries (I guess you kind of have to with a cat!). I think if a rescue animal isn't perfect and cute all of the time too many people give up hope/feel like they got a raw deal on the adoring pet front. I relate anyway as my Mom's dog is very Missy like; everything needs to be on his terms and he has never gotten over being a skittish slightly aloof weirdo, but we have learned to love him for it! :-)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. He does sound a lot more like a cat than a dog! I loved the stories on your blog and Instagram about him taking himself off for a walk.

      Delete
  5. Love her! She is so lucky to have found her forever home with you and Thomas. x

    ReplyDelete
  6. Beautiful. When you rescue a cat, so too do they rescue you x

    ReplyDelete
  7. Ahhh I loved this! I really want to get a cat one day and a black rescue cat is top of the list. We're waiting to escape London first though...there are some seriously vicious cat gangs in our local area... C x

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. We are so lucky that Missy rarely strays from our back yard - any further and I'd worry about her constantly (and especially with the horrible stories you hear about cat killers. How anyone can do that is beyond me)

      Delete
  8. Ahh she's so sweet, I'm glad she's so well looked after.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I can easily see how people become crazy cat people with 30 cats - I want to go back to the RSPCA and adopt them ALL!

      Delete
  9. Oh this is such a great post! I love all of the little idiosyncrasies that cats have, they truly do have individual personalities. Juno isn't a lap sitter at all but she has her own ways of showing affection :) How cute are head boops?! A year later and I'm still not over it.

    ReplyDelete
  10. This is lovely! I can't believe you don't like her name- SHE'S A DOCTOR WHO CHARACTER!!!!
    Just don't get a cat called Clara...
    x

    ReplyDelete
  11. I just wish I could have a cat, she sounds excellent x

    ReplyDelete
  12. Ah the cutest!! What a character! Who wants a boring pet when you can have one with a little character like Missy! Who knows, maybe in a year or so, she'll love snuggles!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I am keeping everything crossed that she realises how much fun snuggles are.

      Delete
  13. I love how individual cats are (I have two). Great pics!

    ReplyDelete
  14. Aww this made me well up a bit at the end - what a lucky thing she is to have found such doting humans. I always assumed you chose the name Missy! Sally and Mavis were called Buffy and Tash when I first got them (no idea which was which) and I didn't hesitate to change them!

    ReplyDelete