My Nyoka: Not the Sharpest of Cats Anymore
It is tough getting old. This is being demonstrated to me more and more everyday by my gray tabby Nyoka. When I first got her as a six month old kitten she was a feisty and spookily smart animal that liked to dive bomb me from various high points around my house, looking very much like Kay Aldridge’s character in the serial of the same name and so I named her Nyoka. I can still remember the time she dismantled our Christmas tree the first year we had her. I put the tree up and the next morning found it scattered evenly all around the living room with a very pleased tabby laying in the middle of it. The next year I bolted the tree to the wall. Hearing noise coming from the tree in the middle of the night I went to investigate and found her hanging from the tree, holding her breath and pretending to be an ornament. I can’t even begin to describe the number of cat nail trimmers that have disappeared. I once found one that was taken apart. How an animal that has no thumbs or the ability to use tools unscrewed the screws holding the blade in I don’t know, but there it was.
Sixteen years later and she is now old, crabby, and not too quick on the uptake anymore. This was sadly brought to my attention last night. We lost power, as did most people in Ohio did Breaking out the candles I had given up trying to read by candle light and was sitting in a chair, using my battery operated portable DVD player to watch Batman. Nyoka gets up on the table to investigate the flame (I thought animals were supposed to have an instinctive fear of fire). I shoo her off. When she goes to to get down, her tail swishes through the candle flame and sets the fur on fire. I grab her and put out her tail. Apparently she has no feeling in the tail as she doesn’t cry out or run away, she just sits there perplexed and sniffing the air, trying to figure out where this strange burning hair smell is coming from. And then to top it all off she gives me an accusing look as if I’m the source of the smell.
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