You have not seen any videos of our two cats posted on YouTube and you probably won’t. Ever. The reason is very simple: they don’t do anything weird, strange, unusual, un-feline, or athletic like the cats in cat videos do. Video cats jump up into amazing places, squeeze into tiny containers, fail their jumps and drop to the floor, play with dogs, intimidate dogs,  play with squirrels and rabbits, make funny noises, walk on their hind legs, and try to talk like humans.

Watching her territory

Seeing these amazing video cats performing their feats has made me wonder why, with two cats in the house, we do not have any feline antics to put up on YouTube. The answer is simple. Here’s what our cats do:

• Eat
• Sleep
• Go out
• Come in
• Poop and pee
• Demand patting as needed for an amount of time determined by them.
• Go out
• Come in
• Go out
• Come in
• Eat
• Sleep
• Repeat, etc., etc., etc.

This is not the stuff of videos that go viral. This is not the stuff of videos that anyone not in a coma would watch. Why are our cats useless in the social media department? Well, they have other priorities—their own priorities, of course. 

Mystique’s Priorities

For Mystique, that focus involves hunting chipmunks. She is diligent, persistent, patient and remarkably successful at this occupation. Despite her age (she will be 15 next month) she spends hours and hours next to a chipmunk hole just waiting and watching for her chance at one of the occupants.

The great chipmunk hunt

A few days ago she came up on the deck with a live chipmunk in her mouth. I would have made a video but when she put down the poor thing it looked so traumatized — like it was screaming silently — that I just wanted to help it get away.

Shocked and in pain it ran under the grill and I hope it stayed there until she came in for the night. It must have because I didn’t find chipmunk bits or a fresh bloodstain anywhere and she didn’t upchuck the chipmunk.

Sometimes Mystique gets a bird, so I don’t fill the bird feeders until the fall, when she spends less time outside because the days are shorter. Our neighbor across the street once found her tangling with a wild turkey and chased it off. She got pecked on the head, though.

Mystique goes out every morning to patrol her territory. She spends a great deal of time making sure that her territory is safe for cats despite the parade of dogs that goes by on the sidewalk pretty much all day. She visits the neighbors and sits on their porches. If they’re not careful she will sashay into their houses. As far as she’s concerned, it all belongs to her because it’s all her territory and she watches over it carefully.

Teela’s Priorities

Teela, on the other hand, is oblivious to wildlife. She hunts nothing. To be fair, hunting would be difficult for any cat that only has two teeth. Teela rarely goes off the front porch or the deck except to walk from one to the other, depending on which one is sunnier. She never jumps higher than the couch. She eats anything that isn’t nailed down and a few things that are—but only as long as they are in a dish and have, preferably, come out of a can.

Teela on the stairs

After my previous post about her misbehavior in the house I’m happy to report that Teela has gotten better. Peeing and pooping now mostly occurs in the litterbox and she doesn’t scratch up the house any more. Phew! That’s a relief. We all get along better although, again, this is not video material.

But hope springs eternal. I watch them to see if one day they will demonstrate video-able behaviors. Maybe they’ll wake up filled with the desire to walk on their hind legs, attack the bulldog next door, or miaow the National Anthem before baseball games. So far, not so much. If you want to watch the two cats sleep, though, let me know and I’ll post a video. I promise it will be short.