Maxie the Radio Hunter

I ran into some computer trouble last week and had to send it in for reformatting twice (yes, I'm IT challenged). Trying to convince the proprietors to reduce the cost of the reformat, I bought some baubles that I didn't need but the cost of which were cheaper than the reformatting.

One of these was a mini portable radio. Since it is usually quiet at home in the evenings, I surmised I could put some music on anyway, so it was "win-win".

How is this relevant to Her Highness Maxie the Magnificent, you ask? Well, I'm not sure if I've made any reference to this before, but kitty has a certain fascination with water, especially running water. She could sit and stare at flowing water for minutes on end (considering her attention span, anything more than 5 minutes can be considered as hours in relativity).

When I first decided to try my new radio on, I was in the middle of running my laundry and predictably, Maxie was caught admiring the view...  

Running water! Ooooooh!!! It moves, it flows...fascinating!!!

Normally, nothing short of my physically picking her up could distract her from the flow, unless she got bored of course! However, when I turned the radio on, she scampered into the bedroom and made big eyes at me.

What's that noise, daddy?

Tiny radio, Maxie. Why are you so surprised?

I do occasionally play music on my laptop, so kitty isn't completely unexposed to music. Funnily, she seems to find the sound coming from the radio to be infinitely interesting and refused to leave me alone.

It sounds different!

Since she was meowing continuously in her "I want that!" voice, I gave in and let her inspect the radio.

*bat bat bat*

*cheek rub*

*bite*

When she started biting the antenna, I took it away from kitty. I was not yet prepared to have her despoil my latest acquisition. You can imagine Her Kittiness was less than amused. She kept pawing at my leg and demanded her new toy.

When her cruel daddy refused to give in to her again, she started pacing impatiently, and before I knew it, hopped onto my computer table and started hunting for the radio.

WHERE IS IT?

I humored Maxie and let her sniff around. Finding she had trouble navigating through the clutter (Yay! Messy desk 1: Paw of destruction 0), she gave up and hopped off. Woohoo!

Pretending to lose interest in the radio, she wandered off to do what cats do when their owners snatch their toys away. However, when bed time came around and I stored my laptop away, I spotted the sneaky feline back on the hunt.

 

I want that radio!

 

Found you!

Suppressing my laughter, I turned the radio off. Without sound and blinking lights to attract her, the silly kitty lost interest quickly and jumped off the desk in disgust.

I gave Maxie some treats to let her know I'm not annoyed at her, as she had that furtive look about her when she knows (or assumes) she had done something wrong. We made peace and prepared for bed.

No pics of the following bit of story as it was in the middle of the night and I didn't want to get my phone for picture sessions and risk Her Highness's wrath...

My kitty's nickname of Tsundere cat (thanks, Iwashi) was not idly given. She simply abhors public displays of affection to me. If she was on the couch and I joined her, she would leave. If she was on the bed and I laid down near her (the definition of near is arbitrarily decided by Her Highness), she would wake up, shoot an irritated look at me, and go curl up elsewhere, anywhere as long as it's farther from me. If I hugged her, I had a 5-second grace period before she starts wriggling like a snake.

Due to the hot weather and haze, I sometimes sleep with the AC on at nights. I woke up that night (with AC on) to find kitty stretched out luxuriously right next to me. You can imagine my joy and excitement, since this is a very rare occurrence (I can remember when it last happened: never). She usually slept on a corner of the bed, 2-3 feet away from me. I tentatively gave her a few strokes and she stirred but didn't move away. I went back to sleep.

I have sleeping problems and find myself waking up every few hours every night. That night, I woke up repeatedly to see I was slowly backed towards the edge of the bed as kitty pushed me further and further away. Heh.

It finally struck me that maybe she actually wanted to snuggle near me! So instead of falling off the bed, I moved a little closer to my cat. I thought that perhaps this was a breakthrough in our relationship. We were maybe an inch apart when she jolted awake (I was very gentle in my movement, mind you), and stared at me. I whispered silly endearments at her. She yawned mightily, stretched lazily, walked imperiously over me and hopped off the bed in catty disdain.

*sigh*

I guess it was still wishful thinking on my part. I was nothing but a heat radiator for kitty, truly her slave. :(