The tale of an insane cat, an orange spray bottle, and a giant cockroach

Kitty when we first got her - she was tiny!

 When we first moved to Uganda, we got a kitten for Natalie to help ease the transition into a new place.  The cat’s name has evolved with time because Natalie keeps changing her name.  At first, she was “Skittles Sweat Pea Muigai” which changed to “Daisy” and is now “Whiskers.”  So we all usually just call her “kitty.” 

As she grew older, we came to discover that she is certifiably insane.  Seriously.  I realize most kittens are very playful but kitty’s behavior was extreme. 

Walking through our sitting room became a highly dangerous endeavor because kitty would leap out of nowhere and attack legs - trying to get her off or running away was futile, she would just keep jumping on us until we closed her in one of the bedrooms for a while to calm down.  She would pounce on my arms again and again every morning when I was trying to change Nathan’s diaper (and changing a squirmy baby’s diaper is hard enough without a crazy cat attacking me!)  Several times when I was sitting nursing Nathan she would sneak up behind me and pounce onto my head.  And if anyone made the mistake of scratching a mosquito bite in her presence, she would attack their hands! We had many unsuspecting guests surprised by a kitty attack.

It got to the point where her nails and teeth were really hurting and we were seriously considering giving her away.  Then my parents came to visit in Dec and gave us the idea for a secret weapon:

Our orange spray bottle.  This thing has worked miracles with kitty.  Whenever she attacks, we just spray her with water and she runs away.  It only took a day or two until just the sight of the bright orange spray bottle would prevent her attacks.  She has now become a very sweet cat (still very playful, but no longer crazy), and will actually sit purring in our laps at times, which she never used to do.  I would highly recommend the spray bottle trick – but only for cats, not for babies.  I actually knew a mother who used to spray her 6 month old baby with water to teach her no.  I think that is a terrible idea.  But for cats it works well.

Natalie is pretending to be a cat and sitting like Kitty

Kitty is also quite a good hunter.  She has caught mice, lizards, giant cockroaches, and even a small frog.  She mostly likes to play with them – she will catch them in her mouth, let them run away, pounce on them again, and this cycle repeats over and over again.  In case you didn’t know, lizards can voluntarily detach their tails when they are being chased and the tail keeps wiggling.  We had a wiggling lizard tail on our sitting room carpet the other day.  It was a good science lesson for Natalie.

Yesterday when my sister Kelly was here kitty had caught a giant coackroach in her mouth and was chasing it.  So Kelly decided to take a video and here is what happened:  (the funny sounding scream on the video is Kelly!)