How would you like it? Nico speaks out...

It was a peaceful July evening and I was minding my own business when I heard my human parents rummaging around in the basement. Since I consider the basement to be my personal territory, I immediately began to slink down the stairs to see what was going on down there.

Before I could sneak through the pet door into the utility side of the lower level to take a peek, the door opened and my human mom came out, carrying the dreaded thing. I don't know what it's called, but it's a sort of torture device. You can see it pictured above.

Now, I remembered the thing from previous occasions. This is how it works: to get me to go inside its teenie tiny space, they put my favorite blanket inside and plant a few treats and toys inside, counting on my curious nature. Once I go inside, they slam the door shut and lock it, leaving me inside. What happens next is unspeakable. They carry it outside to the car, put the thing on the back seat, STRAP it with the seatbelt (are you kidding me??) and drive me to a secret location, bring me inside some stranger's lair, and relegate me to a restricted area called a "kitty condo, "where they leave me for days, weeks, years (I have no concept of time). It might have been a day, but I have no idea; maybe it was a year!

The stranger who took care of me was very nice and it was from her that I found out why I was there. Apparently my human parents were on a thing called a vacation.

I was stranded there without access to my blog, so since I just got home yesterday, I wanted to let you all know that I'm alive and well and already planning my revenge.

I was subjected to the final indignity of this misadventure this morning: my human mom weighed me and announced to the whole world that I had gained half a pound! That might mean that I was gone for more than a day because I couldn't possibly have gained 8 ounces in a day.

Now, I ask you, how would you like it? If you know what the thing is called, let me know so I can refer to it by its proper name.

Keep it clean... Nico speaks out about hygiene

There is nothing I enjoy more than keeping myself clean and neat. This is pretty amazing when you consider that I lived in Brooklyn with two young ladies, my first mom and my second mom, and to put it nicely, the place was euh--- euh--- ummmm---shall I say ---uniquely maintained. Voilà le mot juste!

Here you see me grooming myself, which is something I do whenever I get the urge. I'd have to say that I lap at myself constantly, except for when I'm sleeping. If I get bored, I lick myself. If someone touches me and ruffles my fur, I groom myself. If the dog brushes by me, licking is the solution. If I've just used the facilities, I clean myself again. I would compare it to a human who might eat potato chips out of boredom. It's hard to stop! Maybe I'm OCDC? Nah, just kidding!

You should see how much spit I can transfer from my tongue to my paw! 50% of my waking time is devoted to cleaning and grooming myself. I like to concentrate on my white fur, which is immaculate, if I do say so myself. Actually someone who was visiting me recently exclaimed over my handsome features and blindingly white fur. Well, maybe she didn't exactly say "blindingly," but she did think it was exceptionally bright white. I maintain my exceptional self with just my own saliva, no special brightening or whitening like you humans sometimes have to do to your ugly, rectangular teeth. That's something I've always wondered about... how do you eat with those things? I love my sharp, pointed fangs. I'd look rather strange with choppers like yours. Ugh!

Thought for the day: With the qualities of cleanliness, affection, patience, dignity, and courage that cats have, how many of us, I ask you, would be capable of becoming cats? - Fernand Mery

Someone will pay for this! Nico speaks out...

Yes, that's me wearing the magenta scarf. As you can probably guess, it was forced upon me, which is why I have my eyes half-closed, pretending that I was invisible. It's pretty embarrassing, but don't worry-- the person who did this to me will pay!

Magenta may not be my color, but damn, I do look handsome, don't I?

Does it make me look fat?

How I looked when I escaped...

I thought you'd all like to see me walking through the screen. As you can see, most of my body is through; it's just my gigantic derrière and tail that have yet to make it. The long string-like thing you see to the left is called "spline." It's used to hold the screen in the channel of the door frame. I found it quite amusing when the male human was fiddling with it, trying to get it in place because I knew I was going to undo his work within seconds.

I'm not quite sure what he was muttering when he found me prancing around the deck, but I do believe it might have been something derogatory about me.

Nico, the king of home decorating

Nico has done quite a few things that have added to his mystique and celebrity, or should I say, notoriety. In case my daughter has forgotten how mischievous her crazy cat is, here are a few items of note.

Nico cannot stand having any decorations on the mantle in the living room. At Christmas, I had garlands of holly framing the fireplace and spent quite a lot of time getting it to look just right. Nico was observing this and seemed quite captivated by batting the garland until he was shooed away. My mistake was in believing that he would lose interest in the decorations. Wrong!

A few minutes after I had moved on to another decorating project elsewhere in the house, I heard some suspicious sounds and returned to the living room, only to find Nico lounging on the hearth, surrounded by fallen holly garlands, looking totally innocent, as if to say,"Who, me?" As I approached him, he sprang up and began playing hockey with the push pins that I had used to keep the holly in place. Fearing that he might swallow one of them, I took them away from him and put the holly back in place, all the while wondering how he had managed to knock everything down. Loco Boy was watching me, pretending to be bored, but he was plotting his next move. My mistake was to underestimate his determination.

I waited until he went elsewhere to shred carpet or whatever he does to entertain himself, and put everything back together. Stepping back to admire the effect, I was almost knocked over by him as he rushed past me and sprang onto the top of the mantle. Before I could remove him, he sank his teeth into one of the garlands and tore it completely off, then jumped down and ran away. I could hear him batting more push pins in the kitchen, and since they posed a potential danger to the little darling, I went to take them away from him. He let out a loud and annoyed "Meow!" before racing back to the living room and getting another push pin from his secret stash under the coffee table.

Guess who gave up eventually ? I'll give you a hint -- it was not I! The garlands were removed and put away. Nico obviously has high decorating standards which I did not achieve. Apparently, Christmas stockings also offend him because he kept knocking those down as well. Perhaps he objects to them for religious reasons because he's of a different faith?

I guess I'll try again next year and hope that maybe his fat cat derrière will prevent him from reaching the mantle. I'm still finding push pins in odd places. Hey, at least he liked the push pins!

Success, in Nico's own words

Nya, nya, nya, nya, nyanyaaaa!

I just wanted to report my most recent success in the escape department.

Shortly after my human father came home from work tonight, he fixed my screen flap, effectively preventing me from leaving the premises at will. Those of you who know me, my loyal followers, know that I wouldn't let him get away with that. So...



I waited until he had fixed the screen (again!) and put away his tools. Then I pushed as hard as I could against the screen, and eureka! I was outta there! The best part is they didn't even know what I had done. They were busy blabbing in the kitchen, not even paying attention, getting ready to cook food that they'd never share with me. And they call themselves "parents!"



I walked around the deck, sniffed those alluring flowers again, and made the plunge, diving off the deck onto the lawn. It felt like green velvet, very nice, and actually rather tasty as well. I nibbled a few blades of grass, wandered around the yard, checking out the scenery, and then I heard it... the unmistakable sound of the slider door opening. The humans had discovered the gaping opening and were searching for me.



I couldn't help it, I froze. Yes, I know this makes me a wimp, but I panicked, and stupidly looked up at them as they grabbed me in a most undignified manner and unceremoniously dumped me in the kitchen. I was having none of that, and did my best to escape, but alas, they were quicker than I was. They slammed the kitchen door and when it was reopened, what did I see? The screen was back in place. Had I realized they were going to bring tools with them, I would have put up more of a fight or given them a good bite, just to make a point.



They may think they're pretty clever, but I will do it again, and soon. The screen that can keep me in hasn't been invented yet!

I should mention that my tasty grass hors d'oeuvres made me vomit, but I managed to do that on the kitchen floor. That'll teach them!

Freedom... almost!

To all my avid followers,

I want to announce that after several days of poking and pushing at the screen on the slider door that looks out onto the deck of my luxurious home, I have managed to tear away the screening! I have been planning my escape for months, ever since Spring arrived.

Whenever the humans with whom I reside happen to leave me to my own devices, while the slider door reveals the screen, I take the opportunity to stand on my hind legs and stretch my long (and I must say, beautiful) body by putting up my paws and leaning into the screen. At first, nothing happened, but then I noticed it... the gateway to freedom... a small space between the frame of the door and the screen!

Although I was shooed away, which, by the way, is so darned insulting, I managed to sneak back and do it again and again and again. I am nothing if not sneaky! In fact, my keepers call me "Sneaky Neeky." By the time I was through, I had torn away an eight-inch area of the screen.

Unfortunately, I was caught. My human mom was sunning herself on the deck when I actually broke through by creating a flap through which I was able to pass. It was hyper-cool! I just pranced through the opening and walked out onto the deck, sniffing at the flowers that have been beckoning to me through the screen.

The scent of the flowers was too much for me. I got so excited that I jumped up onto my mom's lap, startling her. The dolt hadn't noticed that I had escaped until I blew it. She picked me up, brought me back inside, and closed the slider door, preventing me from getting to the screen. Foiled! But that's just temporary. I'm going to do it again as soon as I get the chance.

I'm going to keep working until I attain my goal. For all of you out there who may have goals and dreams, I suggest that you follow my way of thinking. Here goes: "Think little goals and expect little achievements. Think big goals and win big success." As Andrew Carnegie said, "If you want to be happy, set a goal that commands your thoughts, liberates your energy and inspires your hopes."

I think I'll ponder that while I lie on the couch and lick myself.

Where you go, I will follow...

Nico MUST be where I am at all times. This extends to the computer desk. Whenever I'm working, he jumps up, lies down between the monitor and the keyboard, and falls asleep. He becomes indignant when he is removed.

The problem is that he's getting so big that when he attempts to occupy that space, his swinging tail or huge paws end up on the keys, making for some crazy typo's. I pick him up, put him down, and within moments, he's back.

One of his favorite things to do (if he can stay awake) is to stare at the monitor and watch the cursor move. The only problem with this is that I can't see the screen to type my words! This picture shows him doing his thing, but he's so much bigger now, and likes to lie facing the screen with his very large derrière covering half of the keyboard.

It's so nice to be irrestistible in my cat's eyes. Where I go, he MUST follow.

Nico says, "Reynolds Wrap saved my life!"

You might wonder about the dramatic title of this blog, but it really is true... Reynolds Wrap has saved my life. Let me explain...

When Nico came to live with us, he was almost a year old. He had certain bad habits of which we were unaware, the most annoying of all being a love of using the bathtub as a giant litter box. This was discovered within 2 weeks of arriving at his new home.

When it first happened, I spoke to my daughter and she feigned shock, telling me that this had never happened when he was living with her. "Never?" I asked? "Never!" was the reply. She commented that maybe I wasn't keeping his litter box as clean as I should. Thinking that this was a fluke, I continued to leave the bathroom door open, only to discover that he did it again a few days later. Trust me when I say that his litter box was pristine.

I continued to keep the bathroom door closed until I hit upon a solution: Reynolds Wrap. This is what I have been reduced to doing -- I keep a long sheet of wide Reynolds Wrap in the tub. Nico hates the sound and feel of it, so he stays out of the tub. I don't like having to do this, having to remove the wrap each time we shower or clean the tub, but it seems to be the only deterrent. I cannot imagine what people would think if they were to pull the shower curtain aside and see the shiny silver lining, but then again, if we had peeping guests, it would serve them right!

By the way, my daughter eventually admitted that the cat frequently did his "thing" in the tub, adding that she didn't want to tell us because we wouldn't have taken the cat into our home had we known.

Our crazy boy has had his wings clipped and is now a reformed tub pooper.

Insanity update

S simulated image, not really my crazy cat

If my cat could talk, this is what he would say:



"For reasons known only to myself, I have developed the habit of hiding behind a chair so that I can leap out and grab a human leg that happens to pass by. I find it relaxing, as well as a way to assert my rule over the humans with whom I dwell."

Since he is a recovering biter, he has to restrain himself from biting me when the urge strikes. He opens his mouth and makes his move, but stops short of executing the bite. I really have to admire his self-control, but then again, sometimes he falls off the wagon and gives in to his urges.

Bird slayer

For many years, we had a white dove ornament that we hung on our Christmas tree. It had luxurious feathers and looked very nice.

Apparently, it was a little too realistic for Nico the crazy cat because he stole it from the tree and left it on my daughter's crimson rug, totally disemboweled. I must say that leaving it on that particular rug made a statement.

My only regret is that I didn't grab the digital camera so I would have proof of the bird slaying. I won't make that mistake again, rest assured.

My cat loves me too much, perhaps!

I never had any pets when I was growing up, but love animals. My husband and I had cats for several years, but had to give up being cat owners when our daughter was diagnosed with asthma. She was not allergic to dogs, however, so we added a Sheltie to our family and absolutely love the breed.

We thought that having a cat was a thing of the past until ...

Our daughter went off to college and ended up with a cat that her roommate had brought into their apartment. When the asthma made it intolerable for her to share her living space with the cat, my husband and I took Nico the cat to live with us rather than have him reside at a shelter.

This cat is seriously insane, but adorable. In an attempt to lead me to the area where he gets fed, he bounds down the stairs, runs between my feet, and can actually get from the top step to the bottom in just a few leaps. The sound of his paws hitting the steps would have you convinced that a 50-pound creature is on the staircase! I can see that a serious fracture could happen if I ever forgot for one moment that he is a "stair master."

He follows me around like a dog and absolutely HAS to be wherever I am. He MUST sit on me, next to me, or with me. He has huge legs and a very long body and is "able to leap tall buildings at a single bound," as the saying goes.

One of his favorite things is to lie across my keyboard, occasionally standing to swipe at the cursor on the screen. He thinks it's a bug or something.... You ought to see his beady (just kidding) eyes following its movement. When he parks his derrière on the keyboard, he always manages to do something that changes the set-up or adds all kinds of symbols to whatever file I'm working on. And he refuses to move.

As annoying as all this can be, I love him, and I love telling my daughter all about his antics. In this blog, I'll be sharing his escapades for all to enjoy.