Not really a problem, it is just weird?

We have a nine month old orange spotted/striped tabby that we adopted along with his sister back in May of last year. Both have intermingled into our cat family fairly well and we don't seem to have any attitude problems or anything along that sort of line.

But, Sampson, the orange tabby with a wonderful and outspoken personality, seems to have this rather strange way of drinking water. I am quite certain that none of our other cats taught him this and his sister doesn't do it, so we are perplexed how this came about.

When Sampson drinks water, he raises his right foot and slowly puts it right down into the water bowl and stands there, drinking away, with his foot completely emersed in the water. About 50% of the time, he not only lifts and places his right foot in the water bowl but he will do the same with his left foot. We always keep the water bowl filled with fresh water, so if you can picture this cat of ours, with his two front feet and legs, knee deep, in the water bowl as he drinks water, it is quite a sight. It doesn't seemed to bother him at all, when he is through he just lifts his feet out, gives a shakes or two, and he is on his way.

Both Sampson and Delilah (his sister) have always been water kitties. In fact, when we first brought them home from the shelter, they would actually get in the bath tub with my husband when he was taking a bath. Not swimming around or anything like that, they just liked to walk upon my husbands chest to get as close to the water as they could.

I am just wondering how common is it for a cat to actually stand in his water bowl. There are somedays, when I can telling he has been playing in the water bowl, because the bowl is empty and there is water everywhere. His right foot constantly stays wet which is okay except for when he wants to surprise you by jumping up on your lap for some love and then you find yourself and your clothes with big giant wet spots from his drenched paws.

I am just curious as to why he does this "standing in the water bowl" thing?

LOL, that's too funny!! I don't think it's really common just because of the amount of cats I am exposed to and havn't seen that yet. My best guess on why would be to know where the water level is or to ensure the water doesn't move. I think thats a good pic for his scrap book though

I can't tell you jow many times I wished I had my camera near me. By the way, at first we thought his foot might be some sort of depth tester or temperature gauge of some sort, but this crazy guy puts his feet in the water after he has already started drinking. Go figure?Someday I will get a picture of this little feat, excuse the pun, and post it here for all to see.
He is a darn crazy cat!

I was going to save this next one for a later post but I will go ahead a tell you now. Sampson does not only stand in his water bowl he does something else that no other cat I have ever had or have ever ever come into contact with has done. Sampson like to ride "papoose" style on your back, without a "papoose", that is. When I am sitting in my chair at my computer. Oh, ever so quietly, he will sneak up, and then when you least expect it, BAMM! You have a cat on your back, who has his front legs wrapped around your neck (like we would have our arms hugging someone from behind), and remember one or both of these arms is usually soaking wet.

Anyway, as he hangs there purring the whole time, no claws extended whatsoever, he then proceeds to nuzzle your neck, then he will give you a few head butts on the back of your head, then a few nibbles of your hair and scalp, and finally he will rest his head on your shoulder looking straight ahead and if he could, he would fall asleep right there. You see, he puts his back feet right in the groove of your waist so he can support himself. Of course, he much prefers that you have jeans or pants of some sort on so he can actually cling onto the waistband with his back feet. I have gotten up from my chair, walked around the house, up the stairs, down the stairs, and the wholetime he is riding "papoose" style on my back.

What do you think about that! He is certainly an unusually talent cat. At least, I am sure that is how he would describe his actions.

Well, I was going to say maybe he has a depth perception problem and stands in the water so that he can judge where it is, but the fact that he gets in it AFTER he starts drinking kind of nullifies this theory. However, I do have to say that it's one of the funniest cat stories I've heard in a while, and the papoose is even better! What a delightful little guy.

I don't suppose you could post a picture of him?

My oldest cat Baby will do this when drinking too and then will lick the water from his paw instead of sipping from the bowl....

I wish I had a cat that wanted a 'catty-back' ride

As Sampson is now attached to my back as I sit here replying to your posts, the only picture I have of him was when we first brought him home. But, even this picture should give you an idea of this little guys personality. So, here goes!

How adorable!! It's obvious that he's just FULL of personality!

He is so cute! My Terrell will often put his ball in the water bowl and play with it..gosh does it upset my husband to find the dripping wet ball lying around (lol). No matter where we hide it, Terrell finds it. My baby girl will chew on my hair when I am sleeping. It is so frustrating. It got to the point where I would wrap a pillow case around my head at night, now I catch Seminole doing it. They all have their own personalities for sure!

Our cats (eight in all) are the topic of our dinnner conversation every night. They are all feral rescues and all are related to each other in one way or another.

Some of them, of course, have personality plus and then some are, well . . . like Sampson, you almost have to see them in person. Well, maybe not quite like Sampson, he is pretty unique, but they all have their funny little ways of doing things.

This is Mrs. Clown, we named her that because she has the most perfect black diamond nose that we have ever seen and with her long hair she reminded me of a circus clown. By day, she acts like a little old lady, the long feather like hair on her legs makes it look almost like she has bloomers on when she is walking away from you, i.e and you are looking at her backside sort of waddling along. She is the mother and grandmother to five of our eight cats. When we found her, she had just become pregnant and she was just on the verge of being totally feral.

She was left behind when someone in our apartment complex was kicked out for having pets and so they would not face this hassle at the next place they moved to they just left her behind to fend for herself. We think she was on her own for maybe about 3 months or so before we came along. We couldn't get her spayed until she trusted us enough to let us come near her. Unfortunately that didn't take place until she had her second litter. We found homes for all of her first litter, except one. We named him Junior. No sooner did she wean the first litter than the same Tom got her again and she was pregnant with her second litter. We found a home for only one of her second litter, thusly we named the remaining kittens Ray (of Sunshine), Betty Boop, Ms. Red, & Ms. Muffit. Well here we were in a no pet apartment with 6 cats, Hummm, not good. Well, things were getting bad at this apartment complex, so we decided to by a house. We found a beautiful home our first day on the market looking and 30 days later we were moving. We had to hide the all of the cats from the apartment manager, which is hard to do when you leave for work and you have five kittens inside your apt. But somehow we managed and finally we packed up all of our belongings including the cats and moved to our new home.

Mrs. Clown and Junior were spay and neutered before we moved and when we got settled in our new home, about two weeks or so larer, we began the process of spaying and neutering the rest of kittens. There is much more to this story but there is always more to tell when you have cats, right?

Anyway, here is Mrs. Clown and if I am allowed I will try to post a picture of Ray, he is real photogenic.

Here is Ray, he has a heart Murmur, and yet he has the biggest heart out of all of our cats. He worries himself to death when one of the cats has gotten themselves into a pickle. Ray knows how to knock on the door and then he leads us to where ever the problems is, lets say, Red got herself locked in one of the bedrooms, Ray will lead us to that bedroom, or Sampson has knocked something over, Ray will lead us to the problem area.

Jewelcat...sounds to me like you have a 'gem' of a family there!
What a nice story!

Your cats sound so incredible. I understand the apartment thing, our landlords know we have 3 cats, not 5. However, there used to be a lady that lived in this community who had 10. I think that they don't really notice how many, I try to hide my kids if I know they are coming

Yes, we feel our cats are very special. But then again I think every cat has something very special about them.

I have saved the best Sampson story for last. Hold on to your hats on this one.

Each and every night, my husband has to take our Sampson hunting. Now, this is not the regular "hunting" that one might expect, it is definitely something that derived out of Sampson's unique personality.
Everybody knows how much cats like little flying bugs and things, right? Especially moths and flies.

Well, one evening back during the summertime, Sampson was getting really frustrated because he saw a moth flying around one of our kitchen ceiling lights. He was becoming really aggravated that he couldn't reach this moth. No matter how hard he tried to find an avenue up to the light on the ceiling, he couldn't get anywhere near the little moth.

So, feeling sorry for our little guy, my husband, who is pretty tall, over 6 ft, picked our little guy up. He had Sampson's bottom in one palm and then held Sampson's chest with his other hand. Sampson sort of looked like he was sitting up on his haunches and he had full use of his front legs and paws. My husband took him over to where the moth was flittering about and held Sampson high above his head close to the ceiling. Sampson stretched out his front paws and began swatting at the moth, trying to pin it against the ceiling with his paws. Within only a matter of a few seconds he had it pinned underneath both paws, then he slowly cupped his two paws together and brought them slowly down to his mouth. Chomp! He finally succeed in his quest.

Well, apparently Sampson thought this was pretty cool and when my husband tried to put Sampson down, Sampson's had a fit. Meowing and meowing, saying to us, "Hey! You guys! There are more bugs up there! Take me back up there, I want to do that again." We figured out what Sampson was telling us and so my husband picked him back up and had to actually take Sampson around the entire house. The whole time, Sampson would be looking up to the ceiling, scanning his head from side to side, looking for possible treats to eat. When Sampson would spot something, he would give that little chatter that cats do when they see a bird or squirrel, and my husband would go in that direction, following Sampson's every direction. Needless to say, that night there wasn't a moth left in the house.

We thought that this was just a one time event. Oh! Were we ever so wrong. My husband has to take Sampson hunting just about every night. We became real concerned when winter started to settle in, no moths during the winter remember. Well, if Sampson sees anything closely resembling a moth or fly, he will give his directional chatter, however now it is mostly nail holes that he sees. But it doesn't seem to matter that much, whether or not he actually catches something, I think it is just the fact that Daddy and him are doing something together that none of the other cats get to do, and I think that this makes him feel special.

But, I think when Springtime rolls around, Sampson will be ready. One thing is for sure, he certainly isn't out of practice. I wish all of you could just see the delight in his face when he and dad go hunting.

That is so hilarious! My kitties try to chase moths and bugs too, but they haven't convinced Jake to take them hunting. However, my baby Archie chases shadows!! I mean, any shadow. She sometimes jumps about 5 ft. to get a shadow, and the flashlight, well I dont even need to go there!

That's so funny! I know what you mean by that chattering...my cats do that when they see birds...it's the weirdest noise and the way the move their mouths...our little innocent kitties show their hunting side and it isn't pretty either!! OMG! One night I went out of the house because I heard this blood curdling scream! I knew they had something, what I don't know, but something! So, I looked and saw this bullfrog in Job's mouth! I was totally appalled! UGH UGH PUKE I had to chase him down all the while this bullfrog or whatever it was screaming at a high pitch! I never knew they made sounds like that! Enough was enough, I caught him and releaed the darn thing! OMG! That was sooo horrifying..PSYCHO III!

In a world filled with hate, contempt, and the senseless destruction of life itself, I am sure that everyone will agree that our families, whether they be human, feline, canine, or any other species, they truly do bring joy and happiness back into our lives and somehow they show us what true love and understand really means.

Jewelcat, I absolutely LOVED your stories. You tell them so well, too!! You have some really special kitties. Enjoyed the pics.

-Jacquie

Thank you, Jacquie.

But in all honest I don't deserve the credit, my cats do. I have so many wondeful and funny stories about our cats, everyone always tells me that I should write a book and each chapter would be a different short story.

For instance, Chapter One - "Where in the world are those darn kittens hiding?" - (hint - our gang had barely been weaned and everyday, after they ate, they would disappear somewhere in our apt. and we couldn't find them anywhere. Back then, we had our TV hooked up to our stereo speakers and we watched a lot of movie videos, "in Surround Sound", i.e. very loud to get the full effect.) Where do you suppose all 5 kittens went after they ate?

Chapter 2 - "Ray? Has anybody seen Ray?" I was getting ready for work one morning and all of the kittens were milling around in the kitchen. They were all still feral at this time, so for them to stay in the Kitchen when I walked in was a little on the strange side. I counted heads as I did every morning, just to make sure everyone was accounted for. Oops? Missing someone. Who is it? Its Ray! Ray where are you? Come on, here kitty, kitty? Ray was the tough guy of the bunch, always beating up on the other kittens. He was a bully for sure.
All of the other kittens were still milling around the kitchen. Okay, guys, have you seen your brother? Kittens still kept milling around the kitchen, but I now notice that they seem to be milling around the little playmate cooler. Hey wait a minute! We always air out the coolers after a weekend at the pool, why is this one closed? I know for sure that we left all of them open last night . . . . . . . Uh! Oh! Maybe I ought to pick up this little cooler and just see if by chance it weighs a little more than it should. Hummmmm? It seems a little on the heavy side for an empty cooler. It seems like it weighs about 3 more lbs. than it should. Hellooooo? Anybody in there? I hear a faint and muffled, "mew, mew". I wave the magic wand over the top of the cooler. Slowly, I begin to slide the lid back over to the side of the cooler and then . . . . **** Shazam!**** Out jumps one of the most scared little kittens you have every seen in your life. From that point forward is when Ray became our sentry. He always knows when someone is in trouble and needs help and does his very best to remedy the situation.

Chapter 3 - "Betty the Thief", Chapter 4 - "The Cat Who Joined us for Thanksgiving Dinner", Chapter 5 - "The Gingerbread Cat", Chapter 6 - "Anyone Care to Go For a Swim?", Chapter 7 - "The Cat's Version of a Haunted House", Chapter 8 - "Are We Having an Earthquake, or
Cats in the Boxspring . . . Again?", Chapter 9 - "Mrs. Clown and the Tomato Worm" (the worm was yucky, but she was so cute), Chapter 10 - "Betty Shows Us Her Favorite Dance, "The Curley Shuffle", and there is plenty more. I guess I could write a book? Ah! Well! Someday when I have the time, maybe I will.

Hey, I'd buy the book!!!! I cant get enough of cute critter stories!!

Too cute; go for it!

-Jacquie