Cats Under Your Feet

I have always wondered why it seems that cats wait for you to move in a certain direction and then decide at that very moment that they are going to walk directly infront of you, sometimes to the point where you almost have an accident and lose your balance or drop something.

Petunia is what I call a zigzagger, she will jump right infront of you and then walk from side to side infront of you making it almost impossible to move out of her way. Barkley on the other hand will jump down right into the path where you are walking and then just stop, forcing you to halt your movements so that you dont walk right into him.

Can someone help me understand this behavior? Im always looking around my path when I walk because I know one of them is close by and might dart into me as Im walking and I dont ever want to hurt either of them.

I read in a book once about a man whose cats did this--he thinks they do it because they KNOW he'll stop; and they like to see that he cares about them.

Well, I don't know about that, because after having a few tails and paws accidentally stepped on you'd think they'd steer clear of my feet, but they don't. I don't think there's anything in cat land that corresponds to this behavior; I think they just do it with humans.

That is what I hate, when I accidently step on one of them. At first I get mad because Im saying to myself "why would you wait until you see me walking with an arm full of grocery bags or hot tea/coffee to decide now is a good time to dart out infront of me like that" but then if I step on one of them and they holler I feel guilty

OMG! My spook used to do this all the time, I'm a hair dresser, one day I was doing someone at home, giving a hi/lite, using bleach. I accidently dropped some on the floor. He is an all black cat, he had been laying right
at my feet the whole time I was working. The next day I noticed he had
a light red spot on his front shoulder! I couldn't imagine what that was, after
about a wk. I finally put it together. He got into that bleach, probably just
rolling over!
We then said Spook has his hair hi/lited. It eventually grew off ...too funny!
GiGi used to really be bad at doing that but after I connected to her a couple of times she now runs from me. My mama cat is doing it now a little bit!
I just asscociated it with either they are wanting my attention or they are being loyal. If I am working in my yard G and Spook, sometimes Love! Will come to where I am and lay there pretty close, waiting on me to finish!
Reminds me of what a dog would do!

Originally Posted by carwashcats

Reminds me of what a dog would do!

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I promise not to tell your cats you said that.