[PLAINTIVE MEOWING INTENSIFIES]

May 10, 2016 9:08 AM

I have no idea how these cats got wedged into these doors or why.
posted by phunniemee (28 comments total)

Cats: Ruining Screen Doors Since The 1840s.
posted by TheWhiteSkull at 9:14 AM on May 10, 2016 [3 favorites]

I'M FINE

THIS IS EXACTLY WHERE I INTENDED TO BE
posted by griphus at 9:20 AM on May 10, 2016 [23 favorites]

Move along, move along, nothing to see here.
posted by lemonade at 9:23 AM on May 10, 2016

ugh, my cat keeps falling into and getting stuck in the very tight space between my bed's headboard and the wall and I don't know how to stop my cat from doing that :(
posted by and they trembled before her fury at 9:23 AM on May 10, 2016

ugh, my cat keeps falling into and getting stuck in the very tight space between my bed's headboard and the wall and I don't know how to stop my cat from doing that :(

Try putting a bunch of cat toys back there. In my experience, that should make it totally uninteresting to cats.
posted by sexyrobot at 9:27 AM on May 10, 2016 [37 favorites]

ugh, my cat keeps falling into and getting stuck in the very tight space between my bed's headboard and the wall and I don't know how to stop my cat from doing that :(

idk either but please take video and put it on youtube.
posted by phunniemee at 9:28 AM on May 10, 2016 [10 favorites]

Those first two were super adorable. The one where someone put awful piano music over it needs to never be allowed to make videos ever again. Stop ruining cat videos with your awful, awful music.

My cat has a hard time with regular doors. She doesn't seem to understand that her face is not the appropriate way to open them. So I sit in my bed and try to watch her wedge her face into the door while her two very useful paws sit on the ground. Eventually I have to get up and open the door for her which was probably her plan the entire time.
posted by Neronomius at 9:34 AM on May 10, 2016 [4 favorites]

There seems to be an epidemic of plump kitties trying to squeeze themselves through small spaces. Well, it gives me hope that if they can do it, so could Chubby Cat (youngest feline resident of our household).
posted by Kitteh at 9:38 AM on May 10, 2016

To dissuade your kitty from getting behind the headboard try stuffing the cavity with swim noodles. If nothing else, it will give kitty an alternate plaything.
posted by mightshould at 9:44 AM on May 10, 2016

The "got wedged" cat looks a little too much like my own fat grey tuxedo kitty so now I'm sad....

and I was just researching putting in a cat door between my kitchen and mudroom too. I guess I'll get a small dog door instead of a cat door.
posted by vespabelle at 10:10 AM on May 10, 2016 [1 favorite]

Charlie: "Alright, I've seen this before, you know what happened? I bet it flattened itself out, and went right through a seam in your door."
Dee: "I don't think there's anything in the laws of nature that would support that."
Charlie: "Cats do not abide to the laws of nature."

(It's always Sunny in Philadelphia, slightly adjusted.)
posted by bigendian at 10:12 AM on May 10, 2016 [3 favorites]

I've been watching this compilation of cats saying 'hello' way too many times in the past few days, so I'm putting it in this thread.
posted by Fantods at 10:28 AM on May 10, 2016 [7 favorites]

Oh, God. I accidentally shut one of our cats into the little space between the door and the screen door once. I have no idea how I actually did this without noticing. Moreover, I didn't notice until my spouse came home and found Morrigan hanging on the screen door and looking confused. I felt terrible, even though Morrie seemed to take it OK and didn't hold it against me. Confused is sort of a default for her.
posted by dlugoczaj at 10:35 AM on May 10, 2016 [5 favorites]

Waiting for the trifecta of the overfed kitty squeezing thru the cat door, only to find out the screen door is closed... followed by the plaintive "heh whoa" over and over.
posted by smidgen at 11:03 AM on May 10, 2016 [2 favorites]

dlugoczaj, just a few days ago I heard some doleful meows coming from my parents' bedroom, only to discover that someone's little burrow in the bottom dresser had become more of an enclosure than they would have liked! I know exactly that look, ha.
posted by a good beginning at 11:51 AM on May 10, 2016 [2 favorites]

As a child one time we thought our cat got outside because we couldn't find her anywhere. We spent hours asking neighbors if we could go through their yards and then searching the bushes; with someone at home with a can of open cat food. Around 10 or 11 my parents insisted that I needed to go to sleep and we'd hope she showed up in the morning. As I'm falling asleep, I keep hearing phantom mews that I assumed I was hearing because I was so sad.

Finally I realized that I actually was hearing her. I started digging through my closet, and dresser drawers but nothing. Finally, when I opened the drawers on my waterbed, the mewing got louder. I took out the drawer, and there she was.

Apparently I'd left a drawer open, she'd crawled in, crawled to the back of the drawer, and then fit between the back of the drawer and the center support of the bed. Without knowing she was there I later closed the drawer; not quite squishing her.

Since then I've become a big believer in "unless you saw your cat leave the house it's really likely hiding rather than gone" when people lose indoor cats.
posted by nobeagle at 11:59 AM on May 10, 2016 [6 favorites]

a big believer in "unless you saw your cat leave the house it's really likely hiding rather than gone" when people lose indoor cats.

Oh gods. I have this argument weekly with the other half. Just because you haven't seen Miss Kitty in X hours does not mean she's gotten out of the house. She's never gotten out of the house. She's just really good at hiding. Also, sleeping.
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 12:25 PM on May 10, 2016

Our kitten is just under five pounds at eight months old. She also sleeps like the dead, preferably in tiny spaces that no living thing should fit into. I've spent more time than I care to mention panicking because the kitten is missing, only for her to yawn and saunter, blinking, out from some odd nook or cranny. She hasn't yet broken into our sliding glass doors, but it's only a matter of time before she contemplates it as a place to lurk in. Worst of all, she switches up her hiding places routinely.

(The worst is when she escapes into the drawers under our bed and we just have to leave them open for hours until she's good and ready to leave. Worst. kitten.)
posted by sciatrix at 12:27 PM on May 10, 2016 [4 favorites]

wait, aren't we supposed to have a link to a cat behaviorist telling me how terrible I am for finding this funny?

I had roommates with cats once. One of them used to do this for fun. It would climb between the doors and hang on the screen in different positions, then look over at you as if it was looking for your approval or applause or something. That cat was a weirdo. Weird cats are the best cats.
posted by Hoopo at 1:13 PM on May 10, 2016 [2 favorites]

Great post!
posted by Going To Maine at 1:43 PM on May 10, 2016

This is funny, but I feel bad for the really fat cats.

*looks at his cat*

*looks at ad next to the video for a $250 exercise wheel for cats*

Hmmmm...
posted by destructive cactus at 1:53 PM on May 10, 2016

You know that cat's never going to go near that wheel
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 3:21 PM on May 10, 2016 [3 favorites]

It makes me so happy that each of these clips includes the successful escape by each cat from its predicament as part of the video. This is a very well curated, stress-free post!
posted by Pfardentrott at 3:24 PM on May 10, 2016 [8 favorites]

My cat really doesn't understand doors. She often goes through her catflap even when the door it's in is standing wide open. This means that she sometimes goes through the catflap and ends up smooshed between the door and the wall it is open against.
posted by lollusc at 7:08 PM on May 10, 2016 [6 favorites]

The cat is stuck between the doors, Leon, beating its legs, trying to get out. But it can't. Not without your help. But you're not helping.
posted by yesster at 8:41 PM on May 10, 2016 [4 favorites]

Also, this is the only encounter my cat ever had with a screen door. To this day I don't really understand how she got up there. I'm pretty sure she also didn't understand how she got up there. Maybe it was aliens.
posted by lollusc at 8:43 PM on May 10, 2016 [1 favorite]

I had a big ginger cat that was a stray I fed once, and then kept feeding for 22 years. Before I converted him to the joys of couches and pillows, and he was still an outside cat, he would leap on to the screen, and thwack himself against the window, to announce that he was back, and would like some kibble now, please. He would just hang there until I opened the window. I miss that cat. He was awesome.
posted by SecretAgentSockpuppet at 10:46 PM on May 10, 2016 [1 favorite]

I lived with a bunch of hipsters in a big house in my last year of university. I brought a cat with me who was very cheerful and friendly, almost doglike in the way she'd aaaaalways greet me at the door when I got home. She'd run to the door trilling and follow me to my room every single day.

Now, my housemates were lovely people, but often not the most reliable/responsible. So the day I came home and she didn't greet me, I got very nervous. Maybe she's just napping really deeply somewhere... so I looked around the house and didn't find her. I got a lot more nervous - she's an indoor kitty, but she'd been stray before me, so I wouldn't put it past her to wander out an open door if it was just left that way.

I called out for her, and I heard her meow. She almost never meowed - usually she made little chirping or grunting noises instead. My room was toward the back of the house, on the ground floor, with a door leading into the backyard. It sounded very much like the meow was coming from the yard. So I went out into the yard, calling out for her, hearing her meow back like we were playing marco polo, and not finding her.

Then I realized it was coming from above me.

I looked up, and found her in my roommate's room on the second floor, stuck between the window and the screen. I'm guessing it fell down behind her once she got into the window or she knocked it down (old house, not super sturdy windows) - I was glad she wasn't hurt, just embarrassed and inconvenienced.
posted by gloriouslyincandescent at 3:44 AM on May 11, 2016 [4 favorites]