Chicken, Dreamies and Lickelix - the Excellent Cats form a disorderly queue

[TheBroonOneAndTheWhiteOne]

..... behind Gizmo, of course.

Calling all cats! Come and get some chicken.

America sang 'horse with no name' though I do like this rather sweary joke, hence putting 'sensitive image' on it as it contains a naughty word

I'm currently in a very local Greek taverna, which has the usual number of resident cats, i.e. lots. So far, they all seem very clean, plump and healthy. And they don't seem particularly fond of the guests, which is good - they obviously don't need to pretend to like us to survive. Will try to get some photos, but they're too busy doing cat things to sit still and pose....

We were in Greece last week - most of the cats seemed well fed and in good condition, so instead of doing my usual spend of €€€ on cat food I have given a donation to the local cat charity that has a TNR scheme as it definitely seems to be working well

The cats were not interested in being photographed. There was netting around the gardens to give them safe spaces from tourists ooo'ing and aaahhh'ing at them, too. All with ear clips. I've seen 1 young-looking cat in the past week and no little kittens. The tnr programme here seems to be working well, too.

My sister is in Menorca right now and she's just sent me some photos- all of lovely cats!

DH is away and I thought I'd try having the cat on my bed. I don't know what I expected, but I really should have known that he would have started purring and licking me at 5 am because that's what he did last time we tried this. And he continued on and off until 7.30 because I could never quite be bothered to get up and shut him out.

Ah well, lesson learned. Not for the first time but let's hope it sticks this time.

Luckily he's not too tired because he's unemployed and able to nap. I can't say the same for myself.

@Esgaroth my DH is going away at the end of this week and I have learned nothing from your experience as I'm hoping the cats may join me on our bed to keep me company. (We always have our bedroom door open overnight, but the cats never come onto the bed at night.)

It's so nice to fall asleep with a furry little ball on the bed but so not worth it to me if the price is a 5 am wake up call 😴

Lenny usually wakes me up at about 4.30 for a fuss, accompanied by loud purring and stamping about. He does it for about 10 minutes then gets bored and jumps back off the bed and goes for a kip. That's just enough to ensure I'm fully awake...

I had enough of this shit with my babies! Admittedly a purry affectionate cat is more charming than a wailing baby but I am done being woken up before 7 am.

And I'd stayed up late reading the new Strike novel so I'm bloody knackered 😄

The last time the cats woke us up in the middle of the night was when we closed the bedroom door (because there were overnight roadworks going on).

Snowcat doesn't ever come into our room at night but that apparently doesn't mean it's okay for us to take away the option!

Kitty was really confused when I stayed up half the night reading the new Strike novel. She comes & complains if she thinks I’m taking too long in the bathroom before bed but she’s really not used to the light being on half the night. I ended up stroking her while reading.

DH has always worked an early shift, often getting up at 5.30 am. This has trained our cats to wait for his alarm and then start running around excitedly.
They all charge downstairs with him, and then One and Two or Three come up to sleep on his side of the bed or snuggle next to me. Four will sleep on the blanket at the foot of the bed if Two is somewhere else.
When we first got Three he would climb onto DH’s chest and stare at him anxiously if he didn’t immediately rise on the alarm, but now he is confident that the food train runs efficiently.
On the weekends we get scampering at 7.00 or Cat One will knock something off the bench downstairs to indicate we’d better get serious with the food.

It's quite absorbing isn't it? And long overdue!

Someone sent me this, and I immediately thought of Linney, though it goes for any white cat:

At the moment, only Raven stays in my room at night. Lex, Frank, and Ghostie are happy in the lounge, Toad is permanently perched in the back of a big chair I have, Vix and Fred spend their time in the kitchen.

At the moment, poor Frank is exhausted from communicating with the spirits and he's fallen asleep mid summoning.

I'm only half way but it's another hit for me, I'd say. I feel so lucky that I grew up with Harry and then JKR so thoughtfully started writing for adults once I was one!

All white cat owners on this thread, please do this. @TheBroonOneAndTheWhiteOne @RumNotRun @stormsandsunshine

Sorry if I missed anyone!

Thank you for this Esgaroth, I confess to knowing most of the cats here better than their slaves, in my defence I get distracted by the gorgeous pictures...

If Fred ever gets down from the fridge and falls asleep somewhere else, then I will definitely do this!

I'll give it a go, although I think that Linney will be outraged if I place an orange on him while he's asleep.

I'll report back.

You can put anything on Kettle. He just gives you a slight WTF look and goes back to sleep. It is amusing, but he's not white enough to be an egg.

Kitty thinks that because I get up at 5 three mornings a week to go to the gym, that’s the time I should be up every morning. It’s a shame cats can’t tell days of the week.

Herbie seems to have different sleeping places according to the season.
He is sleeping on our bed now it's Autumn again.
Which does mean being woken by his slurping whilst having a wash at 5am, or him jumping on our feet around 5am!

Why are cats so lively at 5am?!

I do like the white cat/fried egg picture!

I read somewhere that they’re crepuscular, which means they’re liveliest at dawn & dusk. I think they’re supposed to be the best hunting times.

I’m sitting under a tree in a square in Bari eating.a mozzarella & tomato pasty. Not seen any NMCs yet but lots of very handsome NMDs being walked.