When my friend Angie was visiting several weeks ago, we stopped in at Union Square’s DSW, where Angie bought a pair of boots. The boots came in box (naturally) and that box came home with us. The moment it was emptied of its contents, it was seized for other purposes. By Sir Hal.
It became immediately clear that were I to get rid of the box, I’d be a horrible person and a failure of a cat mother. So I moved it out of the middle of the floor… to the middle of the club chair. You know, where it’s out of the way. Ish.
That box has become Hal’s sanctuary. He sleeps in it (after dragging my winter accessories into for padding), hides in it, plays in it. And when the downstairs buzzer rings, he flees to it for safety.
Oh, clever beast! They’ll never think to look for you there!
While hardly the SNL Classic “Dick in a Box,” I’m still very amused. I know you will be, too. To get your own Cat in a Box, follow these simple instructions.
1: Take your shoes out the box
2: Put your cat in that box
3. Take lots of pictures of your cat in that box
(Can you imagine if I had kids? Lordy!)
You’d keep them in a box, too?
YES. And don’t go acting like that’s a bad thing, missy. Have you ever seen a child around a refirgerator box? Or even a large office supply box? It’s their natural habitat!
At the last baby birthday I was at, there were 100 guests (there were 200 guests at my wedding, so spoiled kid). Anyway, this baby received a mountain of toys, and what did she want the most? The box that the cake came in. Until the kid is old enough to ask for what they want, like to be let out of the box, for instance, just give them a bedsheet, a stick, and a sauce pan.
I love it! One of mine loves bags and suitcases. She will crawl in and look out, no matter the size or prior contents. I just love when they do cute things like that!
Ah, the club chair. Just thinking about it is dreamy.
My cousin’s daughter recently had a birthday and one of her presents didn’t have an obvious name but it did have prominent sales copy on it. “What is it?” we asked. “Special offer!” she cried.
It’s what we like to call a win win situation. I get an awesome pair of boots and Sir Hal gets a fun new place he can call his own. I can just hear him, “it’s mine, ALL MINE!”
In my vast experience as a crazy catlady-in-training, it’s usually girl cats who like the box/bag way of life. Boy cats, not so much. Perhaps Sir Hal needs a male role model. . .or just a kitty companion or 2 (part of my training is urging others to become crazy catladies-in-training).
Gotta love the fur hanging over the edge. I have an empty box that the cat *let* me hide under a chair so we’re both happy now. Dogs have owners, cats have staff.
Hahaha! My kitty, who looks strikingly similar to yours, loves boxes and plastic bags. He is non discrimintaory and will take any box of any size, shape, or colour! He will even try to fit himself into boxes which are not at all big enough (for example, little girl toddler shoe boxes!). Aren’t kitties just the best? I think I have GIGS of pictures on my computer. Hehe.
Sir Hal should feel lucky! There are hardly any boxes in my apartment. So few that when the box of Alhambra water bottles was finally empty and left near the trash can, my poor cat climbed in, through the PLASTIC and sat staring at me, reminding me how much a cat needs a box and how I had failed him in so many ways.
It is my opinion that Catholics learned their guilt trips from cats…
He’s adorable!
Awwwww – he’s a cutie pie!!!
It definitely doesn’t take much to entertain cats. That’s for sure!
Great minds.
I think your cat just has a foot fetish.
My cat, Gertie, loves boxes. She even drags shoe boxes out from under my bed, flips open the top and settles in (if it’s shoe-free. If not she moves on to the next box.) I don’t understand, she has a nice, soft bed. She’s not hiding from anything, the top is open. It’s one of those adorable personality quirks.
My list looks like:
1. Get cat.
2. Buy boots. (Think of the kitty!)
3. Take the boots out of the box.
4. Put the box on the floor and pretend not to notice that the cat has found it.
5. Take too many photos.
I need a cat!!! If only to expand my shoe collection.
Did Barbara just put Hal “under suspicion”? My boy cat, Stedman, loves the boxes and the suitcases too. Maybe they can be partners and have a commitment ceremony. Then I can tell my ultra-conservative father that his grand-kitty is in a same-sex marriage with a cat from NYC. That will blow his hillbilly doors off!
Consider sending the pictures of Sir Hal along to Stuff on My Cat. Besides a website they update all the time they have shirts, calendars and a book! Hal could be famous!
Mookie is still sleeping on the pizza box from when you came over last Thursday.
that’s so funny–especially since my cat does similar things if I happen to leave a box out. The best, though, from my cat and boxes stories, is this amazon box that I got with a few big textbooks in it. Since I plan to move in a few months, I placed the open box on it’s side. Now my cat goes and sits in the box, which provides a perfect frame for her cute self.
In truth, Mike, once they’ve made that fateful trip to the vet, there’s no reason to point fingers or paws. Or to make assumptions based on a certain rakish angle of the ear tips.
Cat in a Box, cute.
Dick in a Box, funny.
Box in a Box . . . taking it too far?
Both of my cats do that too. One prefers the double gallon milk boxes from Costco, the other prefers empty cat food bags.
My cat loves shoe boxes, even though he’s so fat he doesn’t technically fit. His fat and fur just flow over the edges.
I LOVE CATS IN BOXES. I have a special voice for it. “Cat in a box!” Which…doesn’t relay well in a comment. But the “box” gets all squished up and high-voiced. People working with me at the sanctuary will go out of their way to put cats in boxes just to get me going.
Considering that I’m that person who snatched a Cheetos chip out of my friend’s 10 month old daughter’s hand after her EVIL aunt gave it to her for snack, you can safely assume that I’m a worry wort. So I just had to ask you this… Have you thought about what might happen to Sir Hal with all that plentiful industrial strength glue used in those shoe boxes? I’m sure it might be all harmless in the end, and the scent of which might attract him to it, but I’m just curious… That’s all.
Be thankful that its just a shoe box, I currently have a rather large box in the middle of my kitchen, that Gus has taken up residence in! If I try to move it he gets rathers annoyed and would prefer that he doesnt destroy anything this week, so the box stays!
Priceless.
I bought a $3 mat from Target to put in front of my sink. My cat will take a running start, land on the mat and ride it across the kitchen. THIS explains why if I leave for a few days, when I come back all of my bath mats are in the hall way.
Entertainment & love– that is reason enough for a cat.
My cat loves boxes and drawers. He opens drawers, particularly my underwear drawer, pulls out whayever is in there, and climbs in. A pervert could be rifling through my panties on a regular basis and I’d never suspect a thing because the cat normally does it!
Sir Hal is quite handsome.
We have a folding clothes hamper that can no longer be used for its intended purpose as some of the cats have appropriated it.
John: our cats like boxes, too – even the non-evil recycled cardboard boxes with no industrial strength anything, but its cute that you worry
One of my 2 cats is totally obsessed with boxes. My personal favorite is when he insists that he can lay down comfortably in one that cleary is far too small for him. And he’ll sit there for a solid 15 minutes just to prove the point.
God, they crack me up.
My little cat loves plastic bags and also gets tangled up in them. When you try to “rescue” her, she gets all playful and defensive and even more tangled up in the darned thing.
Oh, my kitty has squished himself into every single shoe/boot box I’ve brought home, whether he actually fits or not. I keep them around until he gnaws the corners to death or the cat hair pile-up gets scary.
That reminds me of my cat. She’ll find the most boring things amusing, shoe boxes, a piece of string, a crumpled piece of paper….but they’re so darn cute!
My Cat (who also looks like Sir Hal) will climb into the bottom mesh wire drawer thats under the microwave stand and then turn facing out to eat out of his bowl, which is on the floor in front of it. He also likes to climb inside boxes, drawers, baskets, the sink, open cabinets and closets. Pretty much anywhere he can hide and spy from. I think he really thinks he is invisible- like little kids who hide their eyes and think that you can’t see them!
Sir Hal looks just like my Oliver, who loves to climb into drawers and get his fur all over my clothes. Gotta love them.
Oh boy! An excuse to share kittypix!
excpet a cat is not human, no resmblance to a baby.maybe you should leave the baby making to people who can tell the difference. You are a woman in your 30′s aren’t you?
From This Fish: HA! No. I’m a woman in my twenties. And the only difference between babies and cats is that my cat doesn’t need me to wipe his arse. Now, go be a douchebag somewhere else.
I think Hal looks like a big furry baby in a box. Only better.
My critters have claimed that doughnut shaped neck pillow – so I had to make a flannel cover for it. When one gets up, the other immediately moves into the hole. Also, I have a reed basket that I’ve had to make a pillow for so that whoever isn’t in the hole can sleep in. But, at least they aren’t sleeping on my head anymore.
C! U! T! E!
Fish – your reply to disgusted made me snort coffee out of my nose at the office. I’d take a cat over a kid any day!
It amazes me that cats can manage to look so cute when they really look smug and self-satisfied. On a human, it would just be annoying, but on cats it’s totally adorable. And it is funny to watch them squabble over the best napping spot. I had a cat that slept up on top of the refrigerator, and good luck finding her when she got up there. She also managed to squeeze into kitchen drawers when given the opportunity–we still haven’t figured out how. Kitties are the best!
My old boss bought his 2 year old son a rather expensive toy car (the kind that the kid can sit in). You know how this ends- junior preferred the box the car came in. Might as well have saved $300.
Awww, cute kitty. So funny, the things they do. Don’t know why some people hate them. They must have encountered only the psychotic ones or the boring ones.