My Cat Stalker

Most people adopt their cats from a shelter or buy a kitten at a pet store. Some even find their cats in the classified section of the newspaper or maybe on Craigslist. Occasionally, people have to get rid of their cats for personal reasons and they give them away to family and friends.

But some lucky people, like me, just happen to find their best friend and that's how you know that you are meant to be together.

This is my story about my cat Stalker AKA Houdini. He's the World's Greatest Cat and has turned this die hard dog person into a cat lover.

Stalker is overseeing the writing of this page. He meows when he doesn't like something I write and then I have to start all over again.

On one not so peculiar day, I was at the barn with my horse, Flash. It was early evening and we had just gotten back from a trail ride. I put him back out in the pasture, put all his stuff away, and was just about ready to leave. I got to the truck and realized that I needed to put one last thing in the tack room.

Since I was running in real quick, I didn't bother to turn the light on. It would only take me a second.

I never thought I would own a cat but Stalker my cat has really been a blessing.

What do you think is better? Dogs or cats?

I was in the small little hallway between the barn aisle and the hay room when I heard a "MEOW! MEOW! MEOW!" above my head. Usually the barn cats mind their own business. Most of them run and hide when people come in the barn. Some are friendly but they don't normally try that aggressively to get a person's attention.

I looked up and there was this cat that looked like it was about to jump on my head all the while yelling at me "MEOW! MEOW! MEOW! MEOW!"

I wasn't too keen on the idea of a strange cat jumping on my head, because i had never had a cat, so I bolted out of the hallway and called my friend asking her when she had gotten this new attack cat that I had never seen before. She was confused and told me to get it out of the barn in case it was diseased or had parasites or whatever. She didn't want the other barn cats to catch anything from it.

While I paced around on my cell phone talking with my friend about what to do with it, the cat came down and scared the heck out of me when I turned around. It started rubbing my legs and when I looked down at it, I was a little worried about what I saw. The poor cat had a bald strip from the top of it's head all the way down to the middle of it's back. It was still meowing at me like crazy and it seemed friendly enough.

I was still a little nervous because I had never had a cat and didn't really know much about cat language but being the animal lover that I am, I knew it wanted something and was looking for some help.

I took the cat over by the food and gave it a little. It scarfed it all down. That's it! It's hungry! Now I had a new friend. Just had to figure out how to get it out of the barn. Unfortunately, right as I was feeling a litlte more comfortable around this nice cat and was getting ready to pick it up, the big black lab that lives at the barn came running in and chased the poor cat all over the barn. It ended up above the horse stalls again and I had no idea how I was going to get it down.

I went to the workshop and found a big cage that I figured I could take it home in until I could find it a home. The cat was still above the stalls and every time I got close, it would walk out of my reach. Finally after about an hour, I just put the whole cage up on top and put a big pile of food inside so it had to go in to eat. It worked!! I captured the cat!!

I got the cat home but still didn't want to bring it in the house because I didn't know why it was bald or how infested with bugs it was so I got it a disposable litter box and some food dishes and left it on the front porch.

I thought it might be lonely so I sat in the rocking chair on the front porch and within about 2 minutes, the cat jumped up on my lap. I was so nervous. Was it going to bite me? What did it want? I had nothing to worry about. The cat came right up and started rubbing my face. Probably not the best thing since I'm sure it had bugs so I went to the pet store and bought some sponge bath flea killer.

The cat didn't put up any kind of fight as I gave it a sponge bath. I knew this cat must be pretty nice to let me do that because you always hear that cats hate water.

For the next few days, I would go sit on the porch and the cat would jump right up on my lap and rub my face a little and then curl up. It was obvious that this cat had been well taken care of and had just gotten lost somehow.

(In this picture, you can see how the fur was all missing in front of his ears from the bad ear mite infestation)

Over the next few days, I searched online every chance I had looking for the cat's owner. Nothing. I took the cat to a vet and had them check for a chip. None. I'm not a big fan of the humane society and just couldn't get myself to take the cat there. It was such a nice cat and I would much rather find it's original owner or find it a good home myself.

It had been about 4 days and I only had one person even remotely interested and no leads on the owner. I came home from work one day and it was really hot outside. It was in the 90's and the cat was panting. I had to let it into the house. It had been a few days and I figured the flea stuff had at least had a few days to work.

My friend from the barn had a friend who was a vet tech so she brought me some of the super strength flea and parasite killer. Nasty stuff but if this cat was going to come inside, I really needed to use it.

Cats will never get bored because there's so many toys available. It's so funny when I hear my cats throwing their toys up in the air and chasing a ball across the room.

Since I had never had a cat, I thought that once I let it in the house, I would never see it again. I honestly thought that cats were anti-social and didn't really want anything to do with people. Boy was I wrong!! This cat followed me all over the house! Everywhere I went, the cat was behind me. I had no problems catching it and picking it up and every time I sat down, it wanted to be on my lap. After a couple more days of this cat following me around the whole house, I decided that it's name should be Stalker because I always felt like I was being stalked. LOL!!

I finally gave up looking for his owners. I had grown too attached to him. I know this sounds stupid but I wasn't sure if Stalker was a boy or a girl. I suspected that he was a boy and the vet confirmed that. He got his other shots and his fur was growing back.

Every morning at the same time, he wanted breakfast. Every night at the same time, he wanted dinner. Wherever he came from, I could tell that the person had a routine and fed him at the same time every day. He was neutered so someone cared enough to do that. They must have rattled a plastic bag at him when he was naughty because he's still to this day terrified of plastic bags.

Right from the first night that I let him in the house, he has wanted to sleep in my bed. The first few nights, I locked him out of the bedroom, because I didn't know him, and in the morning, he would scratch at the door until I opened it and then he wanted to be held for awhile. I never knew that cats had so much personality!

I still see it in his eyes sometimes. He's so grateful that I saved him. I think he knew he wasn't going to make it much longer if someone didn't help him and then I showed up. I gave him food, love, and shelter and that's exactly what he needed.

He probably doesn't know it but I'm as grateful for him as he is for me. I love this cat more than I ever thought I would!

When Stalker wants attention, he climbs right up on top of my laptop and says in his own kitty way "Look at Me! Not this thing!"

Stalker is always right by me as I work on the computer. In this picture, you can see the harness that I use on him.