Just so you know, my klepto cat stories aren’t actually as fictitious as you might think. While I may not be depicting a particular cat involved in a specific incident, my cat tales are truly and charmingly realistic. Yes, Virginia, there are cats who steal things. I have one and I’ve heard of others, but I’ve never seen as many little kleptos until a friend shared a video with me. I’m sorry that I couldn’t find a link so I could share it with you.
In that video, I watched a cat take money from a purse, pull an item of clothing under a closed door and take off with it, steal food from a dog, take a slice of pizza from a plate and run away with it, grab a skein of yarn and run through the house with it, and even pilfer a whole loaf of bread.
In this hilarious video, a cat sneaks in and takes a fax as it’s coming through. Our Sophie
used to do that, and she’d shred it before we could read it. Lily will lift a sneaky paw and swipe food from my plate when I’m not looking, and she won’t leave her stuffed toys in the basket. Oh, she doesn’t play with them, she just grasps them in her mouth and brings them to me. At night, she decorates the house with them. Oops, she just now brought me her baby otter toy.
The funniest and by far the cutest thievery I saw on this video was a cat gingerly easing a pacifier from a baby’s mouth and running away with it.
Rags, in my Klepto Cat Mysteries, has sneaked away with a lot of items, but never in my imagination did I consider having him steal a baby’s pacifier while the baby’s using it. I guess that proves that cats are even more clever than we can imagine them to be.
