triticale - the wheat / rye guy

Friskies Fatted Calf Dinner

Sebastian, our "who me?" cat, entered our household as an adult, accustomed to spending part of his time outdoors. Altho it wasn't our usual policy, we allowed him to continue this practice. He would stand by the back door crying "Miaout" until someone would open it for him. Sometimes he would whine to be let back in, sometimes he would bang the screen door, and sometimes he would wait till one of us arrived home from somewhere and then run up on the porch.

He would occasionally stay out overnight, but never past eight AM, when the canned food is usually served. Until a week and a half ago. He didn't come to the door, even when called. We tried everything we could think of to try to track him down, short of me luring young girls into my car to help look for him, but to no avail. We kept telling ourselves he had probably fallen in with evil companions and would soon wise up and come home, but after a few days we had to admit we were worried about him.

Late Sunday night I went downstairs in my bathrobe for a final check of the lights and and to see if the tops on the green tomato pickles I'd canned had popped down, and Peteymonster, one of the Kitty cats, was by the back door where I'd never seen him before. I walked over there to see why, and heard a cry from outside which sounded like Sebastian. I opened the door and called him. He answered, but didn't come running. I ran upstairs and grabbed a flashlight, came back down and tried to find him. When the beam crossed the window of the garage, I saw his eyes reflecting back at me. I had to run upstairs again to put on pants and sandals and get my keys to let him out.

There must have been some opening he crawled in thru, since the last time I had the garage door open was a week ago, and plump as he was he still needed a source of water. When he came into the house, he took a quick drink, ate maybe a quarter of the little can of wet food the wee wifey opened for him, and then was more concerned with catching up on petties than on eating. He has yet to go by the back door since he got back, so he must not have had that great a time out there.