Cat Drag Race

Cat mime

 Black and white kitty does that mime bit.

Cat hugs salt rock - no, really

Don't stop now. . .

                      Oh yessssssssss.

Bentley sleeps with his eyes open

Much as I love cats, there is something primitive, almost reptilian about their eyes. When Bentley is at a certain stage of sleep, his eyes are slits with the pupils rolled down (not up), with a glazed look. Sometimes his eyes are wide open like that. It's disturbing. I think predators have to be ready every second for the next kill, and thus don't even have to open their eyes to wake up.

Cat wrap: Bentley on a roll

It's been a while since I posted a Bentley video, so here is one. Like most cats, he does all sorts of funny, sweet, droll - oh, SCREW that! He is the only cat who does the fun, the pleasurable, the joyfully antic things that he does, warming our hearts and making our lives just a tad more meaningful. 

For Bentley came along when there was a cat-shaped hole in my heart, and I didn't even know it. Not until that particular puzzle-piece clicked into place did I realize how incomplete I had been.

Bentley does not meow. Bentley does not purr. He is nearly silent. Bentley will bite you as soon as lick you. Bentley has huge eyes that sometimes seem predatory, sometimes frightened, or that glimmer enigmatically. He sneaks up on you with great stealth. He is exceptionally beautiful. We think so.

Bill callls him "chum", "our boy", and (when he has been bad) "ya bum". I call him "pudsy", "pud-pud" and "pudster", or "Bentleykins". Bentley takes care of us. He is sleek and beautiful and warms my lap. He runs to the door to greet us when we've been out. The only time we've been away from him for any length of time, when we went to Hawaii earlier in the year, he stopped eating and nearly had a nervous breakdown.

So there, dog people, those who say a cat can't be attached to you in the same way. No, it's not the same way at all! Bentley is attached to us in a Bentley way.

Comfy, cozy cat

Cats are either double-jointed, or have such flexible bodies that their bones turn into water in a state of total relaxation. Bentley has assumed most of these positions at one time or another. I don't have too many of these, because I usually take action/beauty shots, but here are a few.

Bentley: white toots

VERY weird meow!

I don't know what it is with this cat. It's the weirdest-sounding meow I've ever heard. No information is provided. My hope is that there isn't something wrong, that the cat hasn't had a stroke or something. Meows vary enormously, so maybe this cat is merely old or has strange vocal cords.

My cat Bentley barely meows at all, and when he does, it's soft and gentlemanly. The exception is when he has to go somewhere in his carrying case. He knows nothing good will come of this. When we boarded him for ten days so we could go to Hawaii, we thought things would go smoothly because we boarded him at the same place several years ago, and he seemed OK. Maybe he remembered having a good experience.

Instead, he meowed piteously in the car all the way to the place, which is something like a luxurious cat hotel. He would have his own room, his own window, individual play time/attention each day. But Bentley didn't do well at the cat hotel, and even lost weight. When he got home, he sat there drinking water for five minutes. We will never leave him like that again - surely it's easier on him to stay in the house and have my daughter-in-law check in on him and feed him and clean his box. He'd still be lonely, but not so devastated. 

 

It's true that a pet can tie you down, but we don't have a lot of funds for travel anyway. People say cats are aloof, that they offer no companionship, but Bentley greets us at the door whenever we have been out, sits in my office chair, curls up on my lap (though he only "makes biscuits" on Bill's lap, for some reason), and loafs around on my bed. He never wants to be far from us. We never planned to have a cat - my little lovebird Paco died after I had had her for only a few weeks - and Bentley was a grown-up cat, not the kitten everyone advised us to adopt. But Bentley had his needs, and we had ours, and they somehow meshed. Now we can't imagine our lives without him.

Bentley on the kitchen counter

Sometimes all you wanna do is post a cat video. Everything else seems futile. I have given up. I suppose I am happier now that I have given up. This flies in the face of everything I have ever been taught. Be an activist! BE the change you want to see in the world. But my attempts to do this brought me nothing but misery, futility, and screaming abuse from those who did not agree with me, who were always vastly in the majority. 

Bentley knows how to do it, to be the way the world ought to be, right now, and always has. As for me, as for me - I am getting older now, and I am tired of falling on my sword. Very, very rarely do I reach more than a handful of people, and this is true of my entire writing life. Looking back, it's beyond disheartening, and can even be downright depressing.

Haven't I worked harder than just about anybody I know? Yes. I poured my entire being into my work for decades. I gave it all my hope. Was I a "success" in CanLit terms? Not even remotely. I let down three different publishers, with three different books that nobody read. 

But just look at what CanLit has become. Perhaps I was protected all the time by some invisible angel.

So I have learned not to get too upset about anything, because who's going to notice it anyway? There's enough noise in the world. Too many voices, too much yelling. The world wants to go in a certain direction, perhaps moving towards some kind of clarity, and I can see that. But right now it isn't happening, and increasing awareness only leads to increasing alarm.

I do care increasingly about the world my grandkids will live in, and I honestly do not know what is going to happen there. But for that reason, I refuse to doomsay, no matter how lousy I feel. I try not to think the worst. I birdwatch. I walk. I hold my cat. 

Kitty shows me his butt!

When a cat shows you his butt, it's supposed to be an honour (kind of like dropping a dead bird at your feet). Here, Bentley takes it a little too far with the head-butts, flinging himself at me in a way which is highly unusual for him. He can be a tad aloof and will not receive affection unless he is in the mood. In other words, he is a cat.

This video is a tad dark, but I'm using the YouTube editing program which is a bit primitive. If you lighten things up too much, they turn orange and pixilated. 

The last time Bentley did something like this was at the vet's. He stood there on the table and rammed his head under my arm like an ostrich. He has limits. Boarding him while we went to Hawaii was downright traumatic, and he barely ate (and wouldn't even drink, being incredibly stubborn). I guess here he has forgiven me at last. 

Another cat video? YES!!

This time, in the snow. 

Christmas ambush: Bentley attacks!

                          No, Bentley, NO!

Silent meow: must be the Jingle Cats!

A montage of my favorite moments from The Jingle Cats. Please provide your own meows.

Bentley the Waltzing Cat

 Bentley the Waltzing Cat - not exactly waltzing, but we love him anyway.

Bentley beauty shot

Bentley, who is affectionate only on his own feline terms (unlike my daughter's cat Mia, who flings herself at you, and my son's old fat cat Autumn who purrs like a coffee grinder), nevertheless seems to be aware of his own beauty. His eyes become luminous, his "moon eyes" I call them, and he holds his head nobly, as if having faraway visions. Visions of tuna, probably, but never mind, it makes him look noble.

Kitty up a tree (come rescue me!)

These rescued kitties all look alike - hugely dilated pupils, whiskers at full span, ears tensed, and they all meow in that "help me, help me!" way. 

Giant Cat Japanese Commercial (2014)

The only thing better than a giant cat head is a giant cat. For some reason, ads from Japan are so much more clever and imaginitive than anything we produce here. I guess this is an ad for gum, but who cares? It could be an ad for anything.

My cat attacked me tonight, and I'm worried about it. He's usually so gentle and sweet. He kept jumping up into my new office chair every time I got up to do anything. When I tried to pick him up to turf him out of it, the way his claws all shot out at once reminded me alarmingly of the shark's teeth in Jaws. He had taken such possession of my arm that I had to pull it back out of my sweater sleeve for self-protection.

Bentley!! 

Is it the fact it's a new chair and therefore foreign to him, weird-smelling? An intruder in the familiar territory of my office? Is he trying to protect me from it? I think it's more likely he's trying to own it. It got so bad tonight that Bill had to tip the chair almost upside-down to get him out of there. I was even afraid to go in the room.

We have since made up, but it was a reminder once more that no matter how sweet and loving, a cat's a cat. For a' that.

Cute Kitten Cleaning Baby Bunny

I was looking for the above classic cat-and-bunny gif, when I happened upon even more unbearable cuteness: a video of a kitten grooming a rather put-upon baby bunny. They both break the fluff-o-meter.

SPECIAL BONUS FLUFF! Don't ask me where I found this one. The original gif was popular about 6 years ago, so it was hard to find any additional material. I was hoping for a YouTube video, but haven't found one yet. Stay tuned.

Pete

                          PETE!!!