eight things no one really cares about concerning the first week with my new cat

1. He does not have a name. We were thinking of keeping to the Lonesome Dove theme and naming him Pea Eye, but he is no Pea. He has Woodrow potential, and he sometimes exhibits Blue Duck like behavior.

2. He was hit by a car about a month ago, resulting in a fractured pelvis. The person who brought him to the shelter found him injured. His fracture is healing, but he can't really jump up onto anything over 18 inches high. I don't know if that will improve or not.

3. He is hyper-alert. He notices noises outside and reacts as if they were inside. It took a while for us to figure out why he was spazzing out for seemingly no reason- it was because the car door closing outside scared him, and we didn't even hear it. I think he will chill in a few days.

4. He growls like some kind of pit bull. You know how cats make a low, growly sound right before they hiss or scream? My cat doesn't do that. He just growls like a dog, or a cougar. He does it when he hears the big dogs bark, or when Tina moves. It's getting better, though.

5. He's got weird little pseudo-claws on his front paws, called horned paws. They are callouses, I guess. His actual claws are trimmed very very short- in fact I had to check to see if he wasn't declawed.

6. He is aggressive toward Tina. (Although this behavior, too, is quickly improving.) I've never seen a cat move toward a dog, hissing and growling. That's what my cat does. Tina just shakes and waits to be rescued.

7. He lies on his back and looks at the TV upside-down.

8. He makes a real mess out of his water dish, as if he cant' drink right. I know that Scottsih Folds have a reputation for liking to drink from a drippy faucet, so I offered that to him, but he didn't seem interested. I'll give the bowl of water a few more days.

So, yeah. He's a quirky cat. But he is nice to people, and his unpleasant behavior really is decreasing rapidly as he gets comfortable. I try to imagine what he's been through, to fit the pieces of his life together like a puzzle to figure out his past. Maybe I can make up a really great story about him. But first, he'll need a name.