RAPS is short for Regional Animal Protection Society, a registered charity and operator of a sanctuary which houses and cares for nearly 500 homeless or abandoned cats in Richmond, BC, Canada. The Neko Files is a celebration of the sanctuary and all those who live and work there.

Friday, March 30, 2012

Cleopatra

I like hanging out in the "gericatrics" trailer. It's quiet, the cats are older, mellow and pretty much have their own thing going on.

These days however, if you go to the geriatrics trailer you will likely encounter what seems to be a regular problem happening in the the kitchen sink - it's full all the time. With dishes? Dirty water? Half rinsed cans of cat food?

None of the above.  Try the last queen of Egypt.

Huh?

Yup, queen Cleopatra sits on her thrown on top of a plate, in the sink. By now you've figured out that. Cleopatra is a cat. She is a beautiful black cat with white markings surrendered along with her former housemate Cesar to the no. 5 road shelter sometime last year. Her medical history reveals a problem with her thyroid but otherwise no other issues.

She is quite a congenial cat, while in the sink she purrs and accepts pets and scratches behind the ear, a contradiction to her initial RAPS arrival assessment of being deathly afraid of people. I even felt comfortable picking her up and taking her to a chair to see if she would interested in a cuddle.

It seems however that Cleopatra is not so fond of being out of her sink and once in my lap she fussed and squirmed, clearly not happy at being dethroned. When I let her go she scooted right back to the sink, indignant at the interruption from her happy place. It was then that I noticed a sign by the sink that read as follows:

So I spent some time observing Cleopatra curious to know if the sign was justified - what would she do if she ever left the sink? Sure enough just as the sign had said, the accused soon hopped out of the sink and headed over to the litter dish to take care of business.

So there you have it, clearly the evidence speaks for itself. I've since noticed in my last couple visits to the gericatrics trailer that a large white overturned basin sits in the sink banning the admission of water filled dished or any queenly cats with sink fetishes.

It's tough to be a queen these days. Soggy paws and all.

2 comments:

  1. You put a little plate on top of the overturned dish basin and run the water slowly into it and Cleopatra laps it up at her leisure without getting soaked. ;)

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  2. Cleopatra went to The Rainbows Bridge a couple of weeks ago. We will miss her terribly. RIP Cleopatra.

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