Three days in the wilderness.
Okay, the suburbs, but still...
My little friend here decided to have an adventure over the weekend, disappearing from the ranch long enough that we’d given her up for good. I kept telling myself that cats do this, but I’d just got to the point of accepting that cats also get run over and taken by dogs and even pythons in our neck of the woods, when who should return but the wanderer.
As you can from the photo, she seems pleased to be back.
When I switched jobs and went from working from home a couple of days a week to working from home full time, I had a day of mild alarm the first Tuesday I was at home because my then 1 year old kitten vanished for the day, and didn't come home until 8pm. This was out of the ordinary for what I understood of her normal routine when I was home. I didn't realise until later that Tuesday was the day my squad was in the office in my previous office based job, which meant I was gone all day on Tuesdays, and the kitten had clearly decided that was her day to go do secret cat business all day. When I would get home from work at 6pm and she'd stroll in for dinner at 8pm it just seemed normal, but of course I didn't realise she'd bail for the WHOLE DAY after I'd left for work.
Interestingly when she realised I was at home full time she never disappeared all day ever again; she just supervises my work day from different places around the house and garden, and then wanders into my study to shout for food when she decides I've not been paying her sufficient attention (usually in the middle of a meeting).
we had a family cat when i was growing up that did this - turns out she got locked in a garage next door accidentally and shot out when our neighbours got home from a weekend away. Now our family cats are strictly full time indoors (i have an indoor policy due to my interest in nature) and everyone freaks out when a cat slips out the door. We've had other parents comment about how amazing it was that our children always closed doors behind them. Of course that trick was the one we used to fill the one habit slot that kids have and they were hopeless on everything else. Good to see she is back safe and sound.