@sneakypete
My first cat slipped off a window sill and fell into her litterbox. Waste all over, so I had to bathe her. She squirmed and cried the whole time, but didn't bite me. But when we were done and she was towel dried, she stared licking herself all over. Before long, her "extra bath" made her fur stand up. She looked like she had a punk hairdo. Wish I had a photo, but I didn't have a camera or smartphone back then. I guess I laughed at her, which must have made a bad situation worse because my normally very sociable cat ignored me for the rest of the day. Spent most of the time in her favorite hiding place and wouldn't come out unless I left the room.
@Applewood I accidentally acquired the weirdest,and maybe the meanest female cat in the world when living in one of two houses on a horse ranch outside of Denver. The people that lived in the other house moved out one day,and a couple of days later I happened to look over and see a tortoise shell calico cat sitting in a window. House was locked,so I broke a window to let her out. She followed me home and moved in. I said to myself,"Ok,no big deal. She only weighs maybe 5 or 6 lbs so she can't eat that much.
A few weeks later I was home one afternoon and heard her scratching at the door and cying to get in,so I opened the door,and she walked in followed by a full-grown female Doberman,who walked over to a sofa chair,and laid down to take a nap. No tags,no collar. I have no idea how her and the cat got together,but they were best buds by the time they walked through the door. The cat seemed to hate other cats,and was fearless. The Dobie seemed to think anything smaller than her was a puppy,and in some cases a ugly puppy. None the less,she was ready to defend that cat to the death,as I found out later after moving back to the city,and having the neighbors German Shepherd chase her into the yard,and had her trapped in a basement window. Not as bad as you might think,because the basement windows in that neighborhood had bars on them.
It was hot weather and I had a window open,so I immediately jumped up and ran for the door when I heard the battle cries, Ran down the hall and out the door,and then had to make a 90 degree turn to get to that basement window. The Dobie was hot on my heels,and took the corner running so fast she fell over.
It was immediately obvious to me the cat didn't need any help because all the screaming with pain was coming from the dog. His head was jammed between the bars,and evidentially she was dug in with 3 sets of claws,and slicing and dicing with the other one.
The dobie either didn't know or didn't care,and she hit that Shepherd so hard and fast she flipped over his back and tore a chunk of fur and meat out to take with her when she flipped.
It seems that "jar" and pain may have made him jump "right",because suddenly he was free from the window,on his feet,and hauling ass for home with the cat and the dobie chasing him. I called the dobie back,but the cat,being a cat,didn't give a damn and chased him to the point where he ran into the crawl space under "his" house.
She may have been mean,but she was also VERY smart tactically. She knew better than to get under the house with him,so she strutted back home with her tail up in the air,jerking and sending "That's right,I'm bad!" signals.
The next time I know of them tying up,she suckered him into chasing her under my 4 wheel drive pu. Where he got jammed. That was when she came off the driveshaft and started slicing him up again. He finally managed to back out and haul ass for home. Never saw or heard of him attacking her again after that,despite the fact that my cat was going into his yard and eat the cat food the neighbors put out for their cat. She walks back to my yard,once again high-stepping with her tail up in the air, flirting about.
I know of one other time they tied up,and it was a totally unprovoked attack on the dog. I was out in the back driveway one warm spring day,working on my 35 Chevy pu,when the cat came wandering up the driveway to see what I was doing/supervise. She jumped up on the front fender and then the hood,and sat down and started to groom herself while supervising. Suddenly she stopped in mid-lick,and I turned to see what she was looking at.
The neighbor had a 60's something Dodge car under a car cover parked right next to the fence in his yard. Being a warm spring day,the dog had gone out into the yard,and was laying on the ground in front of it,taking a nap.
I looked back at the cat and she had a look in her eyes like a scientist putting a complex problem together,and it turned out she was estimating angles and distances. The instant I could see it "click" in her eyes,she jumped from the truck cowl to the fence,to the top of the Dodge,to the hood of the Dodge,and when she came off the hood of the Dodge,she had 3 paws out with claws exposed,and her right front paw back and cocked. She landed on that sleeping dogs head and commenced slicking and dicing him. Rode him all the way to the crawl space under his house,and jumped off just before he missed the opening and crashed into the cement block skirting.
Strutted back to the yard with her "victory flag" flying again, and she did this about 2 weeks before having kittens.
The Shepherd always seemed to hang close to the house after that one.
The drunken woman that lived in the rear apartment flagged me down one day and told me "I complained to management about you having that cat in the apartment when you first moved in,but now I am glad you have her. Used to be cats in the yard fighting all the time,and they kept waking me up. I haven't seen another cat in the yard since you and the cat moved in. I think they are all afraid of her."
The only time I saw her whipped was by a squirrel. Used to be a big tree at the edge of the yard,with a couple of squirrels living in it. One of them liked to tease her by jumping out of the tree and running around in circles in the leaves to get her to chase him. When she did,she would end up stranded out on a branch too light to hold her.
I came home from school one night in a snowstorm,and when I rode my bike (engine off and gliding to not wake anyone) into the back yard,two of the neighbors were up waiting for me to tell me my cat wa up about 30 feet off the ground,and stranded out on a limb. The guy that lived next door had opened a window near the tree to see if he could reach her,but she was too far out,and with the sleet and snow with the dropping air temps,it wasn't going to get any better,so I asked him to get out his water hose and blast her out of the tree while me and another neighbor held a big beach towel to catch her.
Brought her in the house and dumped her in the bathtub with slightly warm water to get her circulation going again,and then toweled her off.
She never chased that squirrel again AFAIK. I have been out in the yard with her and heard the squirrel try to sucker her into it again by jumping out of the tree and ruffling dead leafs,and I could see her START to turn,and then lock her head forward and pretend she couldn't hear anything. She was SERIOUSLY pissed,though. I could see it in her eyes and in her body stiffening and her claws coming out. She had learned her lesson about chasing squirrels up trees.
Had to move home to take care of my father a year or so later,and he was terrified of her. I think she scared him more than the doberman did. He hated cats,but for some reason she liked him,and she liked laying in his lap. It was hilarious to watch him stiffen as he made her circle to get the right position to lay down and take a nap. By the time he died she had him cooking fish for her.
She lived for maybe another 10 years,and I still miss her.
