Raining cats

It's been raining cats and dogs here for almost two straight days and the thunderstorms have been ponderous even when we've avoided the brunt of the systems that have passed by.

Of course, this is nothing compared to Hurricane Dean, which thankfully skirted Puerto Rico but went on to batter the Dominican Republic, Jamaica and now Mexico. I sure am glad that I don't have to contend with Hurricane Season anymore!

But what's my cure for the rainy day blues? Magellan.

There's nothing like a self-important cat who thinks she's an Egyptian goddess to brighten up even the grayest day.

You may not know that I have to water Magellan. Yes, you read correctly. Water Magellan.

Ever since she was a three-week-old unweaned kitten, Magellan took a liking to the baby bottle we nursed her with. Even as a miniature embuste of a cat, Magellan loved to tear the nipple off those bottles with her tiny evil teeth. As she grew older, Magellan took a dislike to drinking water from a bowl, preferring to be given water in a bottle.

My theory, which my husband finds unconvincing, as do all the veterinarians who've heard me spout it, is that her bluest eyes don't work properly in distinguishing the edge of the water. Thus, she's afraid to drown by aspirating the water. Thus, she prefers that I give her water in her little bottle. OK, OK. I know how hokey that sounds but I think it's true.

Undoubtedly, I created a monster. Even though she's now a middle-aged female at eight years old, she still snubs the many filled-to-the-brim water bowls around the house and comes to fetch me to let me know she wants to be watered.

Her way of letting me know I'm being fetched is to come to where I am - usually either on the love seat in the TV room or at my desk in the basement office - and rub herself against me repeatedly, meowing in that almost-inaudible, pathetic meow she's always had. Then she moves away and sits.

When I'm upstairs in the TV room, she does this a few times and then saunters into the bathroom and sits in front of the sink, looking at me impassibly with her large, pool-blue eyes, waiting.

She will repeat this behavior as many times as it takes before I get the message (which I usually do immediately but I wait because I really enjoy her performance and have to laugh at her sense of utter command over me).

I must confess that Magellan gets watered as many times as she wants, no matter if I'm running late or I have other things I have to do right that minute. Magellan's watering needs come first.

Today, after her watering session and while the rain pit-pattered against the windows outside, Magellan got angry at the area rug in the basement office and attacked it a few times. Each time, I'd get up and smooth it back down and chastise her.

"Pick on someone your own size!", I'd say.

But she doesn't listen and attacks the rug again. Does she think she's a lioness or, better yet, a tigress, bringing down prey? Cats, I'm sure, have the greatest imagination and it often involves seeing themselves as much more than they really are.

Sharing, even for a moment, in that vision that they have of themselves as larger-than-life is quite the antidote for even the grayest and wettest of days.