[pf] whistling at the phone brought the cat to comfort me.

· About a half-hour ago, my daughter cell-phoned me asking if I could see
the note she'd forgotten to take, with the address on it.

· No luck, in the places she suggested, so she said she'd work it out
herself, and hung up.

· A couple of minutes later I found it by thinking where she would have
gone (within the house) as she was getting ready. I can generally find
things the others can't, by that plus consciously "tuning" my looking for
whatever I'm looking for. 

· I called her cell-phone, which is little and has no cover, and after
about 8 rings it was "picked up", but all I could hear were the rubbing of
cloth and her shoes hitting the sidewalk (she's in Auckland). I guessed the
phone was in her shoulder-bag, so I started to whistle as loudly as I
could, hoping she would hear. Something like whistling your dog to come to
you, but as intense as possible (I've been whistling all my life). I went
on for nearly 2 minutes, during which she started talking to the guy she
was walking with.

· Near the end of that time, our cat came from the other, warm, end of the
house, and rubbed against my legs, smiling up at me. After hanging up
(about to send her a text message via MTN-SMS from this computer), I
stroked the cat's head and neck and talked to him. Usually he will walk off
in the direction he wants (any of) us to go, if he's been trying to get us
to do something - we've trained him not to miaou unless on the far side of
a door - but this time he just stayed. I don't believe _he_ wanted soothing
(as he sometimes does when trying to calm down after a cat fight), so I
assume he was trying to soothe _me_; interpreting the long series of loud
whistles as a cry for help or company, maybe.

· I'm guessing this, since in the past he has done the same thing when my
daughter has been singing - she could become a very good singer according
to her singing teacher some years ago - and he does work quite hard at
trying various ways to communicate with us. Even fairly abstract (for a
cat) things like: "this is a good place to be; why are you leaving?". Or
sometimes trying to herd the leaving person back into the house.
  Note: "leaving", for us, can be to Wellington, Luzern Switzerland,
Beijing China, or London England, for months. The cat certainly doesn't
want it to keep happening.

(· At 11:55 14/4/2001 +1200, I wrote to PF, with title: [pf] intelligence -
more-needed now than in the past {at:
http://csf.colorado.edu/mail/pfvs/2001II/msg00283.html }, about the same
cat becoming more intelligent as it explored its varied, interesting and
even challenging environment. The above is some of our evidence.)

David.
(David MacClement) davd@ihug.co.nz 
http://www.geocities.com/davd.geo/index.html#top
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