Perdita
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This is a picture of one of my cats, Perdita, occupying the best spot on my bed. Trying to get her to move was just not worth the effort...
Perdy was given to my family by a friend of my sister. She was forever getting abused by her original owners, and we'd fairly recently (I think) lost our old cat, so we jumped at the chance of having a new one. Perdy was a temperamental little animal, who'd be purring contentedly one minute, and scratching your eyes out the next. She didn't like visitors much, either.
She was put down on the 29th January 2001, just a few days after this photo was taken,
having suffered from a
badly enflamed bladder for quite some time.
Ginger
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This is a picture of our second adopted stray, a technically nameless Ginger tom, who arrived on our doorstep while Perdy was still around. As I'm sure you can imagine, a mature, spayed female and young tom who had not been neutered got along famously. Ginge was forever creeping up on Perdy, and she was forever rejecting his advances in a hissing flurry of tooth and claw. Every time this happened, Ginger's face took on a look of hurt innocence - "Did I do something wrong?".
He was always the more daring and playful of the pair and, after one adventure, returned home nursing a broken leg. We took him to the vet, who put pins in to fix the bone and then neutered him 'for the best'. I mean, OK, we don't want a litter of kittens suddenly appearing at our doorstep one day, but I'm still against neutering/spaying. In case you're wondering, his leg healed well, and he was perfectly able to continue leaping around like a mad thing.
Ginge now had a very cute habit of battering at doors and windows with his paws when he wanted to come into the house. Also, his claws were never fully retracted, so a playful swat from him could send you running for the antiseptic. Another of his cute tricks was when he decided to chase nonexistant things around the assault course of table and chairs in the dining room, swatting at air through the gaps in the backs of the chairs, pouncing on the table legs, and then acting innocent when he noticed you were giving him a funny look.
