Tuesday, November 1, 2022

A Late-night Excavation

Last night, while the rest of us were getting ready for bed, Horace started playing. That’s what he does. At this time of the evening, he will find a fuzzy mouse and knock it about amid the dining table and chair legs for a quarter-hour or so. I don’t mind that, as I can fall asleep despite his activity, and the sound of a cat enjoying himself is soothing to me.


But before I actually retired to bed, Ivory had propelled his prey under the oven. He tried to retrieve it himself, but obviously couldn’t reach it, so I thought I would get it for him. I took my handy yardstick and a flashlight, and crouched to have a look.


It was like a cat-toy graveyard under there. Amid all the overgrown dust-bunnies and various debris, I saw a dozen playthings looking back at me. In total, I found seven fuzzy mice, two furry balls, a hard blinky ball, a longish plastic tube that resembles a bouncy wormhole, and a petrified raisin. I have never eaten raisins in the Cosy Apartment…



I was going to buy more toys for the cats; Zofia and Horace in particular like them. Now I won’t have to. However, since the toys were scattered by the morning, and at least one was missing, I suspect I will have to find more, even if I don’t have to buy more…

14 comments:

  1. Cat archaeology! (I won't even speculate about the raisin...)

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  2. Temporarily you hit the toy jack pot. Good thing Horace lost only one,lol, so you could find all the others. Must have been a Halloween thing where some goblin hid them. And maybe the rock hard raisin used to be a fresh grape? I find one under the stove occasionally as one drops and rolls out of sight.

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  3. I got a trove of Robin's very old treasures (she passed in the late 90's) when I got a new washing machine. The old one was pulled out and there were at least 5 of her tiny fur mice that were under the washer... BUT hardened to concrete-like staus from being drenched in the bad washing machines over flow at the stand pipe so many times. I used to rake out hers and Admiral's toys from under the sofa but no one bats them under there any longer. Robin's toy's are kept safe in a silver bowl along with a few other treasures.

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  4. I'm sure there are plenty of cat toys under my refrigerator. It seems it's the cats' the favorite place to hide things.

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  5. Yep, I have to agree with the other comments: are you sure that's a raisin?
    Hahahaha!

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  6. Ha! The raisin comment made me laugh!

    Chumley and Annie "hid" a lot of fuzzy mice, most of which I actually never have found. Presumably they disappeared somewhere in the unfinished basement (used as a laundry room and storage), so perhaps I'll find a few when I eventually move. (And my fridge, stove and couch all have been replaced in the intervening years, so I know they're not hiding under there!)

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  7. I used Ivor's snooker cue to retrieve long forgotten toys from under the fridge and oven. One day we had to take the small fridge out to replace it, and as well as the toys underneath as we tipped it up we found the dried remains of a mouse. It had flicked up under the metalwork so was well hidden. At least I discovered where the elusive horrible smell had come from a few months earlier.

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  8. The toy hunt is always a fun time here too and we're amazed at our finds too!

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  9. Wow, that was quite the re-discovery. We wonder where that raisin came from, though.

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  10. Hopefully that wizened raisin was a grape that the cats batted under the stove.
    It's funny, I found a similar trove under my bed a week or two ago. Many of them have disappeared since then but I can assure you they are not under the stove or fridge. Today was my scheduled semi-annual clean up of those areas. Beyond bits of cat food and cat hair, the only other item was a dead French fry.: :)

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  11. Now all those toys are like new finds!!
    Once I went on a toy hunt here when. our kitties were still active and vigorous, and I got 15 b9r 16 toys, from under the furniture. I had already placed a barrier to prevent toys from going under the appliances.

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  12. At my house we push everything we can find under the bed and under the couches. Why? It's so much fun to watch our momma get down on her sore knees and retrieve our toys. But what she does is, she puts everything away in a box and gives us only a couple of the toys. We don't see the other things for weeks or months... or ever! She says we will forget about the toys so when they reappear, they will be brand new to us.

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