Wednesday, September 17, 2008

When you're a Jet...

There are two gangs in this house. One consists of two adult humans, two dogs and one white cat and the other consists of the other seven cats, including two adults, two adolescents and a couple of recent additions whose long-term loyalties are yet to be decided.

Actually Osli - the cat in our gang - is one of those flexible types that thinks he can move smoothly across social frontiers without causing major ructions.

The architecture has a lot to do with this. Like many Oxbridge colleges, Guatemalan homes are not big on corridors. Five of the cats in the other gang were born in the internal patio and have no reason to suspect that this area of the house might actually belong to us humans (and dogs) in any way.

Whenever we cross over from our indoor space into their outdoor space - to do some gardening for example - they collectively assume expressions of profound vexation. They themselves will only slink into our zone when it appears to be otherwise unoccupied...whereas you can't hold a door open for more than four seconds without Osli trying to dart through it one way or another.

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