I am Kitty Boy Floyd, a large, long-haired grey feral cat with large green eyes.
I was born in 1997 at the home of
cat
yronwode.
She named me after Pretty Boy Floyd,
an Oklahoma bank robber of the 1930s who was immortalized in a song by Woody Guthrie:
If you gather 'round me, childrenMy mother was a very small but incredibly hostile short-haired grey feral cat and my father was a pedigreed smokey-grey Persian stud-cat named The General who lived next door. I had one sibling, Clyde Barrow, who was identical to me in colour except for having copper-yellow eyes. We took after our father in terms of body size and coat length, but with the colouring and pointy Domestic breed faces of our mother.
A story i will tell
Of Pretty Boy Floyd the outlaw,
Oklahoma knew him well
Catherine yronwode trapped my mother (and had to pay a visit to the emergency room of the hospital in nearby Sebastopol to have the bites in her hand sutured). Thanks to the kindly help of Forgotten Felines of Sonoma County, my mother was spayed and both Clyde and i were neutered.
Because my mother was so wild and aggressive and was fighting with Ptera Yronwode, the cat who already lived here, she was relocated to a feral cat colony in Ukiah, California. Clyde and i were adopted by catherine, but, sadly, Clyde had inherited my father's foolhardiness: In 1998, within a month of each other, both The General and young Clyde were killed by cars.
I am a shy and gentle animal, and very quiet. I am exceedlingly fastidious and cleanly and spend a lot of time every day grooming my long, flowing coat. I stay far away from the road. My territory includes the garden, orchard, and chicken coop. I used to be submissive to Ptera, and so we co-existed peaceably, eating side-by-side out of our matching vintage 1930s-era McCoy Pottery pie plates. When Eris, the Doggess of Discord first moved here, i used to tease her by playing with her tail, and she sometimes snapped back at me, but in time we learned to get along and even eat out of the same bowl. I was saddened by her death and attended her funeral, sniffing her fur just before she was laid away.
The new Portuguese Water Dog Sophie is a little bouncier than Eris was, but i have gotten used to her as well. I don't know what it is about these black curly dogs, but i have noticed that they are always sneaking away from the people in order to eat my dry cat food. Then i have to go up to the Lucky Mojo shop and beg for the dish to be refilled.
I don't often go into the house except when i can hear the sound of cat food cans are being opened, but i am always glad to meet and greet people who venture out to my garden and chicken coop. Strangers frighten me, so i am rarely seen around the Lucky Mojo Curio Co. occult shop during the day, but i like to be petted in the middle of the night and so i occasionally venture up there after dark to ask for attention. I am very fond of catnip, and have at times ripped apart 1 lb. packages of this delectable treat and spread them all over the floor of the Lucky Mojo shop.
Cat sometimes calls me "Dirt Kitty" -- not because i am in the least bit dirty, but because i blend in almost perfectly with the colour of the soil here. In absent-minded moments, she sometimes calls me "The Grey Kitty," a throwback to the name of one of her favourite cats, Grey Kitty, also known as Greykie, who used to live at The Garden of Joy Blues.
One would think that nagasiva yronwode would call me Floyd, because he has a great interest in the lyrics of Syd Barrett, the founder and namer of The Pink Floyd Sound -- but he calls me "The Little Meepers" because i have a soft, high, mewling voice.
I hope that if you know of any feral cats in your neighborhood, you will help them out by adopting a cat or making a monetary donation to their trap-neuter-and-release program. If you contact my friends at Forgotten Felines of Sonoma County, they will be able to put you in touch with a feral cat rescue organization that is local to your own home town.
