still a hunter

You may recall, that our cat Claude is rather old. 86, in human years.

While he has lived the majority of his life indoors (he just gets into trouble outside), he has not lost his hunting instinct. Luckily, we have few mice in the house for him to chase, but he used to be quite good at it. In the fall, as temps got colder, a random mouse would sneak in, and he would chase it down, play with it a bit, and be proud that he had taken care of it.

Now, he hunts socks.

Whenever I am putting away laundry, he becomes very alert, and picks a sock from the pile. He proudly hauls it around the house, meowing with it in his mouth, just to make sure we are paying attention to his amazing hunting prowess. He occasionally drops it, to bat it around, and show it who's boss. He has a few socks that are his favorites, and if I forget that he has had them, I spend a lot of time trying to hunt them down. They are usually under a piece of furniture, forgotten.

I talked to our vet, at his last visit, and he said that he may be getting a bit senile, but that it was wonderful that he was still hunting at his age.

Even if it is a sock.

Our dear Claude provides us unconditional love, and occasional comic relief.