From: jonathan@chpc.utexas.edu (Jonathan Thornburg)
Subject: Re: It's Raining Out! (was RE: baths)
Summary: stories about cats who *don't* like rain
Keywords: wet raining cat fur damp sodden
Organization: The University of Texas System - CHPC
Date: Thu, 13 Aug 92 00:45:50 GMT

>In article <1992Aug11.231417.26387@chpc.utexas.edu>
jonathan@chpc.utexas.edu (Jonathan Thornburg) [I] writes [wrote]:
> [ The late Mortina (I) ]
> ... objected *very* strongly to getting wet (she would swat me if
>it even started to rain outside, this presumably being my fault),

In article <1992Aug12.173324.13273@ncar.ucar.edu>
vicki@stout.atd.ucar.edu (Vicki Holzhauer) writes [replied]:
>Oh, yes.  Don't you just love the looks on those little faces when you
>open the door to let them out and they stick a paw outside, only to
>discover that IT'S RAINING (or, worse indignity, SNOWING!).  They look
>at the outside, look at you, and almost implore you to make it stop!
>While I was living in the house I just moved from (for four years) and
>this happened, Zarabeth would then go to the *back* door and ask to be
>let out there.  She always seemed very confused that it was
>raining/snowing there as well and would meow piteously at me,
>obviously hoping that I could make it stop ... :-)

Mortina did that too.  (And Mortina II continues to do it now.)
If she finds it's raining at one door, she'll go to the other
and ask to be let out, presumably thinking that the radio forecast
"scattered showers" was meant to be taken *very* literally...

However, both Mortinas were/are smart enough to detect rain without
getting so much as a whisker wet, let alone a paw.  Just the sight/
sound/smell of rain, seen through the open door, was/is quite enough!
And if there's a wind blowing into that side of the house, especially
a strong, cold (wet) wind, that makes for an even faster feline
"executive decision" not to go out.  (Living in the Pacific Northwest,
and on a hillside with the favorite "cat door" opining to the southeast,
right into the face of the prevailing winter wind, this happens a lot!)

If it did/does turn out to be raining on both sides of the house :-)
then both Mortinas got/get quite irate.  But neither of them have
ever been smart enough to realise that the sound/smell of rain, heard
while sitting in an open but screened window on the downwind side of
the house, implies that it's going to be raining outside.  Both still
make the attempt...

The funniest part, though, is the following scenario:

	(kitty goes out)

	(it starts raining)

	(several hours pass, rain continues)

	(piteous meow heard at door)

	(open door)
	(kitty comes in like a shot, makes a bee-line for
	her food dish, and starts gobbling frantically)

	(human closes door, then walks over to pet kitty,
	saying "ohh, you poor kitty, so thin and frail,
	all wet, battered by the cold, cruel winds, etc
	etc")

	(kitty turns out to be hardly damp, probably due
	to having spent the last several hours under an
	overturned boat or another building with open
	cement block footings)

Mortina (I) was very good at working this racket, especially when
she was about 12-14.  At that time she was rather fat, so much so
that we started calling here "the porcine pussy-cat", and we referred
to her food dishes as "the feeding trough".  (In memory of this we
still refer to Mortina II coming in for a quick snack and then going
back out again as "having a pig stop".)

- Jonathan Thornburg and Mortina II (alas 4000km away on an island in Canada)
  <jonathan@einstein.ph.utexas.edu> or <jonathan@hermes.chpc.utexas.edu>
  University of Texas at Austin / Physics Dept / Center for Relativity
  and (for a few more months) U of British Columbia / {Astronomy,Physics}
Newsgroups: rec.pets.cats