Kittens are blind at birth, but the touch receptors in their noses are already developed. Rubbing noses with their mother may help them feel secure. My cat likes to touch its nose to my finger when I stretch my hand towards her. I wonder what she's saying.

There are more than 20 muscles in each ear to help cats rotate their ears in many directions enabling them to easily find the source of a sound. A cat may be ignoring you, but their ears give them away. Feline hearing is five times greater than us humans.

The gene that results in the orange, tortoise-shell coat pattern of a calico cat is linked to the cat's gender, which is usually female, but occasionally it will be a male. My mother-in-law had a male calico. She named it Tootsie after the movie.

Cats step with both left legs then both right legs when they walk or run, and they always walk on their toes making them quiet hunters.

Never give chocolate, anything with onions in it like gravy, anything with garlic in it like hamburger to your cat. These things are poisonous to them.

What you can do is give them lots of love and feed them a healthy diet. Talk to your local veterinarian about what's best to feed your cat. Different cats may have different needs based on age or health problems, etc. Most of all enjoy your cat.

 Our feline friends love their humans as much as we love them. We show it by: keeping them safe, feeding them, snuggling, caressing, understanding them as best as we can, playing with them and providing a clean toilet. This is not an exhaustive list by any means. Cats will show their love in may ways such as: sleeping on our laps and purring, rubbing against you to say you're theirs, giving us a slow blink, even the position of their tail is telling you something. Cats love it when you talk to them in a sweet voice, which our furry bundle seems to find it comforting. When your cat gives you a slow blink remember to give a slow blink back. It says, "I love you too." Every cat has its own personality, so you can likely expect variations on the theme. A senior cat will react differently from a kitten. A nervous cat will behave differently from a confident one. Each one has its own quirks that you get to know and identify with your own cat. So, let's enjoy loving and learning something new each day. I also have another blog at alongredemptionroad.blogspot.com for you to check out if you so wish.

It's sometimes difficult to understand what a cat is communicating. It must think that we are quite stupid in not being able to comprehend its language. The language of a feline is very different from human language. Cats mostly talk with body language. The shape and position of the tail for instance. If the tail is down, the cat may be indicating disapproval. If the tail is pointed straight up, it may be a happy cat. We had a cat who would go out the back door, scratch at the front door, and with its tail pointed straight up, go through the house and straight out the back door. I could never figure out why it did that but I'm sure he thought it was funny. That was Simon. He used to do lambie pie too. If I picked up a stick in the garden and I held it toward him, he would walk along with me wherever I went with his tail pointing straight up. My wife thought it was marvelous. I don't know why he did that for me, but he seemed to enjoy it as much as me. I could tell by the position of the tail. So, as you can see a cat's tail is very useful in communication. Something that us humans lack, obviously. Maybe if we had tails, we would be better at communicating with each other and with our friend, the cat.

 I will talk about my cat, Nya again and how she points. When she wanted to play with a string she would go to the kitchen closet and stare at the door until I opened it and get out the string. I would say, "string, Nya?" This way I taught her to understand the word string. When she points with her eyes at her cat dish I know she wants to be fed. I say, "crunchies Nya?" So, I give her some crunchies. I also give her some soft stuff. She doesn't know that word though. She doesn't meow. That's kind of interesting because Nya means "meow" in Japanese. She makes other interesting sounds which are impossible to type with any degree of accuracy. She points at a lot of things with her eyes. Since she makes very few sounds, this is one of the major ways she communicates with us, and makes it easy to teach her to understand some words. Some of the things she points at with her eyes are: the back door, up the bedroom stairs, down the basement stairs, and my lap. She'll look at my lap until I pick her up and let her purr in my arms. Sometimes if she's looking at me, I'll look at my lap until she comes near so that I can pick her up. More on communication with Nya next time.

 Well, I'm back after a long hiatus. I will try to post something weekly. Thanks for all your moral support. I have been able to teach our cat, Nya, a few words. Of coarse she knows her name, but besides that I have been able to teach her the word crunchies. She knows I'm talking about feeding her because she gets really excited when she looks at me and goes to her dish. Although, in typical cat fashion, she will ignore me if she's not interested in food. 

She also knows the word birdies. I taught her this with my computer. Nya likes to watch bird videos with me. I would associate the word birdies with the birds flying around in the videos. She also likes to watch "birdies" out the patio door and the front window. Her ears perk up and her eyes widen when I say the word birdies. She will turn and look at me like I said the magic word. If my laptop is handy, Nya will point to it with her eyes.

 Every time I let Nya out I would say the word "out". Now she may go to the door if I say, "Out". Unless she's sleeping, she may respond in this way. I'm now teaching her the word "by". When I'm going out the door I say, "By Nya". So far there is no response but I'm working on it.

Wee, I hope you liked my return to the blog. May you and your cat be a match made in heaven.  

One Cat

Here we are now with only one cat. She adjusted fairly easily to being the lone feline. She gets all the attention now. She greets us at the front door when we come home. Nya is much more relaxed and eager for us to throw a paper bally her way or draw a string across the floor for her to chase. She likes to be fed treats from my fingers and even stands up on her hind legs to get them. She sleeps on our bed at night and likes to be with her family when together. On the other hand, there is only three people in the whole world that she likes: my wife, my son and me. We are feeding her pumpkin cat food to lose weight; dental cat food for her teach; and treats to make her life interesting and to help get her in from the yard. When we shake the treat bag she comes running. We only let her out when: we are home, the weather is nice, and never at night.  Having only one cat has kept the expenses down considerable from when we had four cats. The dry cat food is $15 a month instead of $85 a month. The litter box is not as dirty, so the cost of kitty litter has decreased a lot. With the weather improving, I expect to see the kitty litter cost even less. The moral of the story is that having only one cat has been a blessing for us and the cat.

We were watching a documentary about the discovery of a 13 thousand year skeleton of a young woman found in a cave at the bottom of a an underground lake. They named her Naia and sounds the same as the name our cat Nya. The girl was named after a Greek mythological water nymph. My son tells me that Nya is Japanese for meow. In our book of baby names, Nia means precious one. Nya is a very fortunate cat to be rescued from the freezing cold one February night a few years ago.

Missing Teddy

I'm back after a lengthy time of coming to terms with the passing of one our cats, namely Teddy, a strawberry blond orange male. Teddy got sick. He wasn't eating or drinking. My wife took him to one of the vets near us. They put him on an IV, kept him overnight while we prayed for the best. The next day there was no improvement so we waited for the next day. There were small signs of improvement but nothing major. That evening my wife called me from the vet while I was at work. She said that he seemed a little better. I told her that whatever decision she makes will be the right one and that I think she is making the right decision. Next thing I knew she had put him down.
She was devastated. She cried and cried for days until her eyes became inflamed. She had to see an eye doctor and get special drops for her eyes. She already had eye problems - dry eyes, but this was much more. Her eyes are better now.
She found it hard to know if she had made the right decision. I think what helped the most was being able to talk about it. First she talked to me, then her mother, then some church friends, then a kind friend she met while grocery shopping.
She said she wants  a new orange kitten. I don't think that now is a good time. We are thinking about moving from our house to an apartment sometime soon; it may be sooner than later if my back and feet continue to give me pain. Also we are looking after my wife's dad, who is 88 years old, and my dad who is 84. Neither one of them are well and they take a lot of time traveling to nursing homes. Then there is my  mother-in-law who needs some attention. My wife and I both have part time jobs, therefore I don't think we can devote the time to a kitten that it needs. A new kitten could never replace Teddy.
Teddy would curl up beside my wife and rarely leave her side all night. I remember him as full of energy and life. He could jump 4 feet high when he was chasing a string. He loved to go outside into the green belt and be gone for an hour or two. Nobody ever knew where he went, but he always came back for his afternoon nap and his supper. He was the top cat among three at the time of his demise. No one could figure  out why he got sick. There were lots of theories, but nothing concrete. It remains a mystery until this day.
We have happy memories of Teddy and they will be cherished always.