Vegas gets a lot of e-mail and likes to hear from her friends and fans. Sometimes, we get some really interesting or touching stories about other people and their pets. Their stories are retold here for your enjoyment. Thanks for visiting Vegas the Cat. Do you have a touching or funny story about your pet? (i.e.. where or how you got your pet, something funny or extraordinary they did). Send your stories to Vegas for possible use this feature! Click HERE to send your story.
"Vegas sortuh reminds me of my cat, Raisen. Raisen was - as David Alderton's book pictured her, anyway - a "Non-pedigree Blue Cream Shorthair." A version of the calico. Strong body, soft fur, and very pretty. Nicest, smartest cat I've so far had. She died October 18th, unfortunately - while sleeping behind me on the bed...near me as usual. She was only 7-1/2 (human years). Still getting over her. I don't think I ever will. She was my best friend, my child, really. I took her death as hard as any human death. There were no noticeable signs. She died of hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (thickened heart chamber). I'm told even if I'd known about it...there'd have been nothing that could have been done - aside from heart replacement. And apparently, cats being so small, they don't take to that kind of surgery too well. Her sister was shot with a pellet gun by a jerk delinquent kid who used to live next door to us. Her mother - nothing of Raisen in her at all. Both my babies...gone. I can't help but regret now having them fixed. I might have had something of them carrying on.

Raisen had rare smarts. Unlike most cats, Raisen could think, reason, anticipate, and invent a solution. She was curious about everything I did. And she payed very good, close attention. She didn't need to be trained to do anything. I just had to show her once, and she'd repeat it exactly as I showed her. (My very first experience with it was when I was kidding around with her once. I was lying flat on my chest watching her eat from her food bowl. Kidding around, I used my fore and index fingers and "pawed" a few pieces of her dry food into the neighboring water bowl, and proceded to "dunk" them a few times. Then I made "tasty" sounds, and pretended to eat them. I made it sound real "yum-yum" to her. Damned if she didn't turn from watching me, look right at the food bowl, then at the water bowl, then back at the food bowl, and then start pawing bits of morsels into the water, right there. She ate like that for the rest of her life. She was always happy and excited about life. She loved being outside. She was "in-tune" with the wind. She had a favorite tree in the back yard, too, which she always liked to sit from beneath and watch everything going on around her. She loved climbing it. She also had a sense of "humor." Her favorite trick was hopping/running next to me as I'd run. As I'd do so, she'd pat my ankle - in a sort of tag game. Of course, to avoid injuring the little fur-faced poof-ball, I'd end up doing all sorts of out-of-the-way fancy footwork to do anything to avoid accidentally trampling her, and I'd usually end up tripping myself and falling on the floor or something. Thereafter, Raisen would stop, sit, stare at me for a second, and then proceed to lick her paw, almost as if proudly. Sometimes, I could almost SWEAR I could hear her snickering. But, I'm sure I was just imagining it. (grin)

Very interactive and very vocal. Her voice rather reminded me of that of a Siamese. It was not hard to tell her emotions from her voice alone, or what she wanted. She had a rather large "vocabulary" for a cat. And I understood every little "word" - all the varied inflections and intonations, and what variation of a "word" that they meant. She had polydactyl front paws. She learned well how to use that "thumb," too. When we'd share a soft drink (don't ask), she'd wrap her thumb aroundthe straw as she drank (yes, from the straw).

She had strong arms. In a "spat" with her mother, once, I actually saw her - while in a sitting position - take one arm and flip her mother around in mid-air. There was no movement in her body as she did so, either. (Mom was given fair warning, beforehand, too.

She always wanted to know what it was I was eating. If it seemed like I liked it, then she wanted some, too. Didn't matter what it was...pizza, a gyro, or Captain Crunch. As long as she could eat it with me. Her most favorite food in all the world? ...Jello-brand Vanilla-flavored pudding in the cup. I'd use a spoon, and she'd dip her paw. Hard part was finding the right timing so that you could actually GET a spoonful for yourself. She liked it so much it was sort of a non-stop pawing motion, almost. We'd share a Coke or a Pepsi in this way, too. She had some rather odd food-likes for a cat. On her birthdays she'd eat at the dinner table, napkin tucked under her collar. I'd put out a little glass of cat food with a candle in the center of the heap. She drank water from a dribbling faucet turned on just for her on demand, of course. (She had me trained very well.)

She could walk on a leash, and outside, in our woodsy back yard, she used an elaborate runner setup that I'd made for her and her mother, Muffin. I decided to keep the cats tied on a runner because in the past I've had people do some cruel things to my pets, and I don't trust them. I wanted Raisen to die with perfect ears, for once, for example.) We'd walk around the block on the leash. (As a kitten, I used to walk with her on my shoulder.) Sometimes we'd walk to the restaurant a mile away. We'd sit out front at the tables out front of it and share a meal. She loved riding with me in the car. Pet carriers were no problem, either; and she'd hop right in when I'd open the door.

Take care,

Todd "
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