@sneakypete
Thanks for sharing that great story. In my experience it seems the toughest cats are almost always female. I don't know why that is -- maybe it has something to do with a mother's instinct to protect her kittens. I have one friend who years ago shared a rented house with another friend. My friend had 2 cats, one male, one female, and the roommate had a female dog. In that house, the female cat was boss. The male cat and the dog were terrified of her.
As to your father's relationship with the cat: Cats often seem to sense when people don't like them or are afraid of them and they sometimes will cozy up to them. My mother didn't like cats, but when she came to my house, my sociable first cat would always sit by her or try to sit on her lap and purr. And all the cats I had knew when I didn't feel well. They would always park on top of me or beside me when I was lying down. My first cat would sit on me and knead my tummy. That kneading was a great remedy for a variety of ailments.
@Applewood I knew a couple of women who ran some sort of sewing shop several blocks from where I lived in Denver. Don't remember how I came to be in their shop one day,but there was a cat laying up on the counter,looking pretty pleased with herself,so I petted her and asked about her. They told me they didn't own her,but allowing her to come and go in the shop,sleep there at night,and to feed and care for her were conditions written into their lease. Seems the cat moved into the building as a kitten when the building owner had a shop there,and when she closed the shop and took the cat home,the cat ran away from home and went back to the building and moved in with the people renting it then. They had seen the cat when they went there to look at the building,and recognized it when it came in the door and called her. Ever since them,the cat went with the lease.
Anyhow,the two women told me that shortly after they rented the building for their shop,some guy came in and threatened them with a knife and tried to rob them. Which seemed to piss the cat off,because the last time they saw him he was running out the door with the cat on his head trying to scratch his eyes out. They have no idea what happened to him,but the cat came back "home" a couple of minutes later,curled up on the counter,and took a nap.
It is MY opinion that cats are a LOT smarter than most people think,but they are just uninterested in most of what they see going on,so they ignore it.
BTW,my father's last words as he lay dying was "Boy,you take good care of that damn cat!". He would have never admitted he liked her if he hadn't known he was dying. He would get mad as hell if I came home and caught him cooking something for her and insist he didn't like her. AFAIR,he never once called her by her name (Homicide). He always called her "that damn cat!"
And,of course,she didn't give a damn if he liked her or not. She liked him,and that was all she cared about.
