Jungle Gym! Mine!

[Someone got to my tree and baubles first.]

Ruru the Cat here.  I came out of my super-secret private room (yeah, the adult humans call it their bedroom, but I know the truth.)  And there, almost up to the ceiling, was a brand new, fresh jungle gym.  To you, it looks like a tree.  Pine, maybe. But it smells like plastic.  And by the time I got into it, it already smelled like cat.  Dude AND Chonk, which means they beat me to it, dangit. I could tell SOMEONE had beat me to it because there were bits and baubles from it thrown EVERYWHERE. 

 

[Me in MY jungle gym] 

But when I came out of my room, it was empty. Well, except the shiny, dangly baubles that are clearly meant to be cat toys.  Anything that exciting and shiny and dangly can ONLY be a cat toy.  So I climbed up inside, and it felt like home.  There was no evil Silvy or Cass, the cats that claimed it a couple of years ago.  Especially that mean, old Silvy who wouldn't let any of us touch it.  I climbed straight up those branches and happily batted at EVERYTHING. It was AMAZING. 

[The competition chases me out, in spite of my best growling.

For about five minutes.  Then, the dorsal tails of my competition moved in.  I didn't even see them before I smelled them because I was so happy with my beautiful jungle gym.  Those two new kittens came closer and closer.  I growled to try to keep them away, but they wouldn't be stopped.  And they're a little scary, especially in pairs. And they're almost always in pairs.  

[Back to my tree.  Grr.]

I finally had to flee to my cat tree, the one that already smells like me.  I feel safe there, protected because Maya and Dude, the two scariest cats in the house, leave it alone.  They don't even try to get up there.  The kittens will hop up there whenever they feel like it and even sometimes chase me down.  But mostly, I can protect my turf.  Because it's safely mine.  

[Don't they know it's mine?]

And, of course, they sniffed my beautiful jungle gym, and the bigger, stripy brat, Wren, even explored it a bit.  Now, I have to wait 'til none of the other seven lurk there.  And even then, I will hesitate to go there because all cats in the house have already marked it as their own.  It's just not fair.  'Cuz it's MY jungle gym.  The people clearly set it up just for me.  'Cuz it's mine.  No touchie.