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| Marylisa's Cats |
B.C.: August, 1987 - March 15th, 2005
 Losing a pet is always difficult. For me, saying goodbye to B.C. was especially hard, as he was another link with Marylisa that has slipped away.
At 17 1/2 years old, he had a good run.
BC was the loudest cat I’ve ever heard. I used to joke that I could mount him on the hood of my car and he’d clear traffic. He was loud when he wanted something, he was loud when he disagreed with something, and he was loud when his needs and wants were not dealt with swiftly. He was not loud when asleep, which was often enough to allow the rest of the household some rest. I inherited BC when I married Marylisa; one of her high school friends worked at a pet store, and spun a story about him being sold to a medical testing lab if he wasn’t purchased soon. Maybe he was telling a tall tale in order to enhance his commission that month; maybe he was telling the truth. At any rate, BC came home with Lisa and a year later moved in with me.
She named him BC because one of the Batman movies was out around that time, and in profile his ears apparently resembled Batman. So he became Batcat, which soon became BC
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Taz: 1988 (?) - June 12th, 2006
 So the North Shore Animal shelter told us two things about Taz on the day we brought him home: "He's a wonderful kitty" and "he's six months old". Well, he had been returned twice to the shelter by other families because of his proclivity for shredding human skin, and he was up to 6 years old! But, he turned into a wonderful cat to have around, our 'emergency auxiliary cat'. I'll miss him.
Taz was the quietest cat I've ever had living with me; when he vocalized, something was truly wrong. He did purr a lot, though, and loved kneading humans while being petted. For hours, if necessary. The problem with this behavior was his needle-like claws; I've lost multiple pairs of pants to his claws. Constant kneading is not good for fabric.
He was called our 'emergency auxiliary cat' because he replaced two other cats we had lost in rapid succession, Emma and Jake, both to automobiles. So one Saturday Lisa said "Let's go over to the shelter and look at cats! We don't have to get one, we'll just look! Honest!". Uh huh.
So off we went, and we saw the cutest little female kitten and decided that we'd take her. But the staff said "Oh no, no, no, no. We'll have no problems placing her! Look at this cat, he's sooooo cute, and he needs 'cat people' who will understand him. Take him, you won't be sorry." Uh huh.
Well, honestly, I'm not sorry that we took him, although we had to change his name immediately. The shelter had named him "Apricot", which probably contributed to his behavioral problems. I mean, what self-respecting cat could abide a name like that? So, he became Taz. And we purchased a lot of iodine and Band-aids. My hands were war zones for the next year or so, but finally Taz realized that he liked being patted. Of course, his idea of telling you that he was done was to simply put some more holes in your skin.
BC was the alpha cat, so Taz was always second banana. But they got along alright for the most part. After BC's death, Taz was unfazed. Were he capable of speech, I believe his remark might have been "Good. More food for me".
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Created on 03/15/2005 11:30 AM by admin
Updated on 06/12/2006 01:22 PM by admin
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