Moky

Moky

      Moky is the oldest of my three cats (14 years old as of May 28th of this year). He has a few quirks that define who he is. One quirk confirmed by his doctor is talking (meowing for those who don’t have pets). Ever since Moky was a kitten, he has talked. Most cats do not talk very much. Recently, a friend sent me an ÜberFact about cats and meowing, “Adult cats only meow to communicate with humans – They rarely meow to other cats or animals.” I think Moky is the exception to this rule. Moky talks. He talks to me, he talks to the other two cats (Gypsy and Stormy), and he talks to no one in particular (upstairs in the hallway). His talking to the other cats is usually when Gypsy tries to grab at him. He is whining then. Maybe that would be considered talking to me because I’m usually in the room when Gypsy swipes at him. When we first moved into our newer apartment, Moky often went upstairs and talked, but no one was up there (no humans and no other cats). He still, occasionally, goes upstairs to talk.

     Often, when Moky verbalizes, he doesn’t care who hears him. This is especially true when I take him to the vet’s office for his annual shots and checkup. He “sings” to me when I pick him up, put him in his carrier, take him out to the car, strap him in (I use a seatbelt to secure the carrier on the car’s seat), drive to the vet, take him out of the car, walk in to the vet’s waiting room, sign him in, sit down waiting for Moky to be called in to the examining room, walk into the examining room, and wait for the doctor in the examining room. He continues to talk while the doctor is examining him. About the only time he doesn’t meow is while the vet is giving him a shot (or two). He is also quiet on the way home. That’s probably because he realizes that the visit wasn’t as bad as he thought it would be. His memory is short because the next time he visits the vet, we go through the same old routine of Moky talking, whining, and singing.

     Another idiosyncrasy Moky has is that of batting box flaps. When I lived in the older apartment (pre-April 2011), the living room window had vertical blinds. Moky often batted at those blinds. There are no vertical blinds in this current apartment, so he has only box flaps and the occasional loose piece of paper sticking out from a pile. Moky enters what I call a trance when he encounters a box flap (open box lids). He bats continuously at the box lid until he tires of it or until I say something to him to snap him out of his trance. Sometimes, I purposely set up a loose piece of paper because I know he will bat at it with his paw. This trance he goes into amazes me sometimes because he’s the only cat I’ve ever had that has done this. Several years ago, I researched autistic cats because he was displaying a common characteristic of autism. I didn’t find anything and chalked it up to Moky just being Moky.

     A third eccentricity Moky possesses is that of scratching everything but products made for that purpose, and there are plenty of scratching posts in my humble abode. His favorite pluckable item is sneakers. I used to let Moky pluck my sneakers when I came into the apartment (usually after getting home from work). This became a routine for him. When I bought new sneakers, I decided not to let him pluck my shoes, but I kept the old pair. I would put my hand in one of the old sneakers, and he would wholeheartedly scratch it (the sneaker, not my hand). His second favorite scratching object is any one of my rolling backpacks or suitcases. As a matter of fact, I keep an old rolling suitcase in the downstairs hallway just for him. As for the rolling backpacks I use for work, those are covered with a beach towel so he won’t touch them (except to maybe walk on them). I’ve discovered, through the years, that if I put a towel or sheet on objects I don’t want Moky to pluck or scratch, he will not touch them (out of sight, out of mind).

     Moky is afraid of the noise plastic bags make when I shake them. When Moky was knee-high to a grasshopper, he became curious about the contents in a plastic Wal-Mart bag that was lying on the floor. I had just returned from grocery shopping at the local Wal-Mart, and I placed many of the bags on the floor. As is most common for cats, his curiosity got the best of him, and he sniffed at a bag and poked his head through one of the bag’s handles. When he tried to pull his head out of the bag, he couldn’t. He panicked and took off running with the bag around his neck. His head was through the handle, but the bag was not over his head; it was hanging around his body like a necklace as he was dashing around the apartment.

     When I heard the ruckus, I shouted to him, “Moky, what are you doing?” I poked my head out of the kitchen and noticed he was standing on the table by the living room window, and on his body was one of the Wal-Mart bags that had earlier been lying on the floor. I had my hands full of canned goods and ran to him. By then, he was on the couch, panting. I dropped the cans onto the couch and grabbed Moky. I had to pry his claws from the back of the couch in order to hold him. I removed the bag and cuddled him, telling him everything was okay. He was quite the scared kitty.

     Since that time, whenever he is getting into trouble, I shake a plastic bag near him so that he stops the trouble-making. Bubble wrap is equally terrifying. When he is doing something he should not be doing, I grab a sheet of bubble wrap that I keep near my desk. Sometimes, all it takes to make him stop misbehaving is grabbing the bubble wrap because, to Moky, the sound is the same as that of a plastic Wal-Mart bag. I shake plastic bags or pop bubble wrap bubbles when he misbehaves because squirting him with water is useless.

     Moky welcomes water squirted at him. Before Moky became my cat, he lived with my friends. They bathed him when they thought he was dirty. In my opinion, cats do not need to be bathed because they can do that themselves. By the time Moky came to live with me, he had grown accustomed to water so whenever I needed to discipline him, I couldn’t squirt him with water.

     Sudden loud noises scare animals, so I don’t make it a habit to make those loud noises when I’m around my cats. When I have to empty the plastic-bag-lined trash cans in the apartment, I move the cans away from the cats so that when I shake out and open a clean trash bag, they don’t hear the loud sound it makes. The only time I make loud noises, such as from shaking plastic bags or grabbing/popping bubble wrap is when Moky is being mischievous. He is not always misbehaving; usually, the requisite NO! suffices.

     Moky is a “mama’s boy.” He loves to be near me. Just a moment ago, I couldn’t find him. I searched his favorite hiding places, both upstairs and downstairs, yet he was nowhere to be found. Then, I remembered a new spot he likes – on the bottom shelf of the bookcase near my computer desk. After traipsing all over my home, looking for the elusive Moky, I bent down and peered into cat eyes staring back at me, saying, “I’m right here, Mommy. Where did you think I would be?” He’s catching up on his late afternoon Zzzzz and is, as always, near me.

     Usually, he is sprawled out on my desk while I’m playing games on the computer. When he approaches the desk, he stops and stares at whatever is on the desk – the spot where he lounges. If I’m typing on the keyboard, he will stand next to me (on the other part of my L-shaped desk) and stare at that keyboard as if doing so will make it disappear. When I push the keyboard under the monitor stand, Moky walks to that empty spot and lies down. 

     Moky loves water, and, at times, he doesn’t seem to think he gets enough of it. At night, my choice of beverage is ice-cold water that I keep in a frozen drinking glass (one of those keep-it-in-the-freezer plastic glasses). I have had to make a koozy for this container because Moky tries to lick the condensation on the outside of the glass that the cold water creates. When he can’t lick the condensation on the outside of the glass, he tries to drink the liquid inside it. I have to keep a lid on my glass at all times because if I don’t, he will take that as an invitation to drink from my glass. 

     He’s quite the funny cat while he’s lying on my desk. He moves himself as close to my glass as he can get. Perhaps, he thinks I can’t see him slowly moving toward that glass. He slowly lifts his paw and tries to flip up the lid that sits on my water glass (sometimes, he uses his nose to hoist up the lid). I tell him, “No, Moky.” He then puts his paw down and waits a bit until he tries it again. If I’m in a good mood, I just keep saying, “No, Moky.” If I’m in not such a good mood, and I’ve uttered several negatives at him, I finally have to yell at him to stop. Mostly, though, he makes me laugh when he tries to flip that glass lid. When he realizes he cannot drink from my glass, he gets off the desk and goes to the kitchen to drink water from his fountain (yes, my cats are spoiled).

     Moky has other quirks that make him unique to me. I’m sure other people have cats that behave similar to Moky. After all, he does behave like a typical cat, for the most part. Moky has been in my life since August 1999 – when he was a mere three months old. For a year and a half, he was the only cat I had, and he relished all the attention I gave him. When his sister, Gypsy, came into the family in April 2001, Moky’s jealousy reared its ugly head, and he was not very happy to share my love with another cat. However, I love Moky and his sisters equally. That will never change no matter how many quirks my cats have.