Dali's cat

I haven’t mentioned Misty for a while and I know that she has her fans out there in internet land.

So, how’s Misty doing?

She/he’s completely recovered from that little op and I have to say it seems to have done the trick. Misty is turning into a reasonably well behaved, loving, slightly crazy, puzzling, very clever cat. You may have seen the video of her trick – the ‘shake paw’ video? Well, I don’t know if it has anything to do with ‘the operation’ but she seems to have developed some even more interesting new skills recently.

She’s started to open drawers and cupboards and I’ll often come downstairs to find that she’s removed the contents of some drawer or other - and after she’s taken the stuff out she arranges it into…well, the only way I can describe it is – she arranges it into a picture. An abstract picture, but a picture nonetheless…and sometimes she seems to make ‘sculptures’ out of her toys, piling them one on top of the other to make very surreal shapes and forms.

I must be imaging it; seeing things that aren’t really there. They can't be pictures can they? Cats don't do art...do they?

I came down this morning to find my paint brushes (I keep them in the middle drawer by the sink) scattered all over the kitchen floor.

I wonder what she was up to…

‘They don’t understand me at all. They treat me just like some ordinary cat, some stupid moggie - they simply don’t understand that I’m as much a purrson as they are. After all, I have aspirations, dreams, hopes, needs, ideas, imagination just like they do! All they do is stroke me and want me to do shake paws like some pet or something! I’m not a toy! It makes me so cross when they smiley down at me – stupid keepers. Can’t they see that I need to express myself? Why don’t they talk to me? Why don’t they ask me what I need? They could at least try to understand me.

After all I only want some brushes, a few tubes of paint, some canvas. If I had those things I’d show them what I can really do! They need to know that I come from a long line of artistic geniuss’sis’s (or should that be genii?) They need to recognise how talented I am. Are they blind? Are they stupid? Can’t they see the patterns I make in my litter tray? What about the way I’ve scratched those intricate designs into the leg of the telephone table in the hallway, eh? Genius! Sheer hissing genius I tell you!

Artistic genius runs in my family. My great, great, great, great grandfather painted all of Dali’s pictures, Dali couldn’t paint at all. He didn’t have an artistic idea in his head or an ounce of artistic skill in his fingers. It was all Granddad, Old Moses - Dali’s cat – and I get it from him, it runs in the blood. Now where does he keep them?

Ah! Here they are; Hisfault’s brushes. Now, if I can just find some paint in these cupboards I can get going on that burning giraffe I’ve been thinking about, that wall over there should do nicely…”