Harvey

I have two cats, who I totally love and I think it's time I unveiled their little personalities and shared this with the limited audience that may peruse this blog...


Harvey.

Ginger. Overweight. Cute.

I saw him from 6 weeks old, when my mum rescued the mum cat and the 4 kittens, that were about to be drowned in a river (I'm not making it up for dramatic effect by the way).

As soon as I saw Harvey I realised I needed to have him as my cat. He was bolshy and pushed all of the other kittens out of the way to get his mothers milk, he was the boss and he just had a "little shit" feel about him. Normally I would want to steer clear of a cat that possessed these qualities - heck I'd steer clear of a human who possessed all that, but something about him made me laugh. He was also a bit clumsy and very affectionate. Also he kept coming to me, more than the other 4 kittens. It could have been because he figured I am a soft touch, so he'd be on to a winner with me. True but at the time, I simply figured this was fate and he had chosen me.

So how to get him? My aunt who is not evil and old ,but for the purpose of this blog she is, swooped in, casting a suspicious and critical eye across the litter and did some low level conversing with her boyfriend. In my stomach, I felt a pang of sadness. I know she would want my feisty ginger. The sadness was swiftly replaced by a combination of anger, determination and manipulative thoughts. No, oh no. This wont be happening on my watch I thought.

As my gut instinct indicated, she did indeed hint at wanting that cat, but wanted to return again to decide. My chance. Mwah ha ha. Running on adrenalin I devised a plan to blacken this kitten's name. I unsubtely hinted how much of a terror this kitten was, scratching at everything, nipping and biting and how I could see him turning into a bit of a nightmare pet. Previously unaware of my persuasion techniques, I had this in the bag. She took in everything I said, I geared her towards one of the other kittens very successfully and off she went. With my new kitty in my hands, I petted him and carefully watched her leave. Don't look back aunty, the deal has been done. You've got your cat, keep walking, that's right, go now.

Anyway...it is only upon recalling this rocky beginning, that I begin to realise WHY I believe in Karma. You see, the cat I directed my aunt towards, ended up becoming very vicious and turned doolalley and had to be put down after biting one of their daughters. My Harvey, although still so lovely and loyal to me, had severe medical problems in the ole nether regions, having to have the anatomy removed and therefore cruelly dubbed "post op ginger tranny" by unmentionable people.
The name calling subsided, the peeing on the floor regularly began and I can't say I've looked back. It's a funny thing when cleaning up cat piss actually becomes so much a daily routine, that it doesn't even shock me anymore. The smell is abhorent and arguements do start when my boyfriend steps into a puddle of pee, barefooted and sleepy, but I try to gloss over it as best I can.

The thing I love about my cat, is that during all my moving; I get restless and tend not to be able to live in one place for too long, he is always with me. He loves to cuddle up for ages and headbutt me (means love apparently) and just be where I am. He's my buddy. He makes me understand responsibility and how nice to come home and the first greeting I get is from him. He is always waiting for me and sometimes it isn't food he's after.

I take him places too. Once, I was picking a friend up from town. I was sober and knew she was gonna be off of her face and I thought how amusing it would be to take my cat with me and mess with her head. It worked too. I didn't say anything, but made her staggered self hurry into the car, as obviously the cat escaping wouldn't have been too funny. Not on Oxford Road in Reading. He would have become a gangster prostitute overnight. No one wants to see that happen to their cat. So she staggered in, belched and said "I need a kebab". Yes I did say "she"...
Then she turned around to a small "miaow" and started staring. "Is that your cat? HAHA. Am i seeing your cat in the back?" she was hiccup giggling and I said what are you talking about? Youre so drunk!
But when you're drunk you have to prove your point don't you? "Oh my god, you're cat, you're cat is in the car, how the hell did it get here? Oh my god, oh my god!" We had to go home pretty quickly after that, Harvey started really crying out. I really think Oxford Road just frightened the hell out of him. I mean it wouldn't have had anything to do with being in a car unstrapped and driving for 15mins....

So this March, Harvey will be 10. He's an indoor cat now, so I've automatically increased his life span by a fair few years. He's a slow careful eater, so no digestive tract problems envisaged and I think he is a cool cat. So many of my friends love him and some of them don't like cats. But see he's a clever one, he "works" people. He knows that everyone is flattered by flattery. So he's nice to most people and we are a team. He is all around them, I say "Wow, you're lucky he doesn't do that to everyone" and then they love him, stroke him all evening and are nice about him to me. Everyone feels good.

As per the picture, I like to get creative and set up scenes to make him look cooler. The picture shows him sleeping under the duvet after having clearly read through Glamour mag. It's all in the details.