THE SENATOR'S POSITIONS

The headline does NOT indicate a political report. It's a cat tale. So don't be afraid to read on.
People who do not have feline roommates may think housecats are the same every day. They purr, they meow, they remind their staff of what we are to do.
But, they are not the same every day, as we will demonstrate in this edition of Let Sleeping Dogs Lie & Napping Cats Nap.
This cat, The Senator, volunteered to move into our home in 2008 — he was already a “senior” cat. He'd been dining with the ferals on the front porch when he decided he preferred a homebody existence. I have been studying him ever since he stepped through our front door as if he’d been invited to a special family gathering.
And, I guess he was. (His name came from his hairline, similar to that of members of the U.S. Senate who'd undergone "plug" procedures. That working photo is from the cover of his latest book, My Days With Those Dogs On The Hill.)
The Senator is our only cat who will visit visitors -- works both sides of the aisle at the dinner table. The other cats tend to vanish under couches, into other rooms and, quite possibly, into another dimension. I’m not quite sure about that “other dimension,” but I do have my suspicions.

What you see here are photos of The Senator and his bedmate, Porche Noel, the former Oak Cliff street dog. These were all snapped on the second night of Autumn 2020 as the temp dropped and rain fell. Great sleeping weather, I am told. Yeah, I was awake to snap the pictures. Why? Lifelong insomniac.
That opening photo of the Senator shows him in a traditional “Cat Curl Position” — he scored a 10 in the Cat Curl Competition from all three judges in the last Olympic Games. In this Curl photo, he’s on my slumberspouse Martha’s side of the bed at about 2 in the morning.
It is the other pose that made me wonder, “What’s up with that cat now?”
Yes, a few minutes before he moved, The Senator had been on my side of the bed. I’d been reading and suddenly realized he was in the room. Why? Because there was no place for my feet to go. He beat me to the spot.
And there he is, gloriously upside-down on the warm comforter.
He was reluctant to move, so I let him pretend that he was completely asleep. And, minutes later, he stood, stretched, jumped off the bed and padded down the hall toward the kitchen. When he returned a few minutes later, he jumped back onto the bed, walked across me, then past Porche Noel and to the other side of Martha where he took up that traditional Cat Curl Position. [LARRY NOTE: The second upside-down photo may look the same, but you can see from his tail that he has slightly changed positions in anticipation of a "Deep Night Treat Time.]

I think he might have been toying with me when he was flopped down, head upside-down and one eye open.
Cats will toy with their humans, you know. It’s as if we are giant, catnip-stuffed cloth mice existing only as distractions to the planet’s only pure thinkers — The Housecats.
Yes, Porche Noel sleeps in the big middle of the bed every night. She snores. It doesn’t seem to bother the cat. I, on the other hand, see a lot of movies after midnight and before 5 a.m. when I get up to feed the cats, in accordance with their sternly announced routine. The dogs and Martha like to sleep in.
I'm not going to suggest that The Senator was a natural fit for Washington, but in this photo you can see that he has the outline of a second face on the back of his head. He is a great companion, however, and I adore the rascal. When you hear of people campaigning for the office of Senator, just remember that this cat honors the title. (That's him working out below in the Senate Gym & Catroom. His last election campaign slogan was "RE-ELECT THE SENATOR: STAYING LIMBER FOR AMERICA!" Worked in his landslide.)
[SEND PHOTOS OF YOUR SLEEPING DOGS AND NAPPING CATS AND SLUMBERING “OTHER” to [email protected] and we’ll spotlight them in our long-running feature, Let Sleeping Dogs Lie & Napping Cats Nap. You’ll be inspiring people to open their homes to lovable animals. And you’ll be encouraging insomniacs to believe that they, too, can get some sleep — oh, who am I kidding? We insomniacs can stay awake watching cats sleep, listening to dogs snoring and all the while we'll be changing cable channels until the battery wears down on the remote.]
—- Offer sleeping tips or dreams you’ve had by clicking on ‘comments’ below or by emailing [email protected]. —-