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That whole nine-lives thing is just hasn't panned out as being accurate and/or provable.

But I like the word picture conjured up by "wild-roaming packs of poodles".

I'm thinking Totes poodle is the bad-*** poodle gang-leader.

Oh trust me, I understand cramped quarters. Bummer. Together mine weigh ~30lbs so it's not so bad.

Well, dogs have the advantage that you can leash them and take them out. Or have them learn to return to you when you call to them at the park. Cats just run behind the rose bushes.

Edited, Jan 12th 2009 11:13am by Jophiel

Cats are natural anarchists, so there is a certain affinity there already.

DO NOT DECLAW YOUR CAT, INDOOR OR OUTDOOR.

How would you like it if your mother decided to cut off your fingers from the last joint down when you were a child just so you wouldn't pick your nose?

Indoor cats lead healthier lives than their indoor/outdoor counterparts. I've lost too many cats over the years to cars, dogs, and disease. My cats only go outside if they're being held tightly in arms. They have a bird feeder in prominent view on the sliding glass door for entertainment purposes.

For indoor cats, a nail trimming every two weeks combined with a scratching post liberally covered in catnip is more than enough to deter the worst of the scratching, and a handy spray bottle plus some wonderful enzyme stuff called Boundary combined will act as immediate and lasting deterrants against scratching on furniture.

As long as the kitty knows that the scratching post is his place to do his thing, they're just fine with it.

For the record, our cats are named in the T.S. Eliot tradition:

Real Name: Secret ~ Full Name: His Magnificent Fuzziness Weaver D II ~ Everday Name: Weaverkitty

Real Name: Secret ~ Full Name: Digital Monochromatic Vortex Peep ~ Everyday Name: Digit or "the Peep"

Edited, Jan 12th 2009 12:28pm by catwho

Funny, really, seeing as you're suggesting they're so highly domesticated that the outdoors is no part of what they experience naturally.

To be fair, I think most people declaw their cats for a combination of reasons: to protect furniture, and to protect themselves from painful scratches. I had an indoor cat that we adopted from a shelter, and he was declawed when we got him. It worked out well. He couldn't slash the hell out of me, I fed him, let him sleep on my pillow next to my head, and cleaned his poopibox.

Erm... what?

Just thought I'd juxtapose these two quotes for you. See anything amusing? I know I do.

I'm going to concur that cats are more interested in watching the outdoors than actually being in it.

So long as they have their room with a view, so to speak, they are content.

It's like school children that stare longingly at the playground during math class. But the second school gets out, they run home and play video games instead.

What, really? The first is swimming with implications that keeping an outdoor is more work, because you have to clean up parasites and little bird corpses.

Edited, Jan 12th 2009 12:59pm by Kavekk

I suppose it depends on how you define "work". An outdoor cat is less trouble day-to-day, with no litter box and no, or at least far fewer, concerns about clawed furniture and territorial spraying and what not.

When things go wrong, though, they go really wrong for the outdoor kitty.