midnight the magnificent

ever since i discovered that there's a webcam in our new 'puter, i've been trying to take pics of our cats. here are some early attempts with midnight, our elder statesman/nurse cat.

middie's going to be 11 this year. i got him when i had the house in benbrook, ostensibly so my youngest dtr would have a pet when she came over to visit. unfortunately, she didn't come over very often, so midnight bonded with me pretty much to the exclusion of all other humans. we got him from one of kelli's schoolmates, and supposedly his mother and all his siblings died not long afterward from some strange illness. my middle dtr always thought he was so hostile to outsiders because he was haunted by his family's spirits. i thought it was because one of her friends put him in a shoebox once and wouldn't let him out.

the first day i had him, he leaped into the toilet bowl, but he had shaken himself dry by the time he caught up with him. he was so sleek and handsome we used to call him "ailurophile magazine coverboy midnight." he used to bully sir shadow, our older black cat, chasing him around and cornering him. he got a little nicer after we gave him an "over the hill" party for his second birthday, but his behavior really changed after i left him in my sweetie's care while i went on the road with nathan brown when midnight was six. when i came back, he behaved like a different animal. when i asked her what she'd done, she said, "i just stopped rewarding him for bad behavior." with pablo, middie seemed to be the dominant one, but he seems to defer a little bit to auggie, our mini-"leader of the pack" (whom you can see in the background of the first shot).