A "SMART" CAT (?)
(My human wants to add a few words)

Granted, this is my first cat. Thus I cannot compare him to other members of the feline race. Maybe other cats are even more intelligent than my little bundle of joy. Still, from time to time he has displayed outstanding facilities.

A few examples:

ARE CATS CAPABLE OF UNDERSTANDING QUESTIONS?
Sometimes my cat runs around the house, sitting down in one place for a couple of minutes at a time, then goes somewhere else, sits down for a while again, only to relocate once more a few minutes later - obviously unable to make up his mind about where he wants to sit down and make himself comfortable. When one of us approaches the cat and asks him: "Where would you like to sit? Show me!" he gets up immediately, goes to the bedroom, sits down in front of the closed door and utteres a little "meow". When one opens the bedroom door for him, he runs inside right away, jumps onto the bed and makes himself comfortable.

ARE CATS ABLE TO TELL THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN YELLOW, RED AND BLUE? THEY CANNOT READ, CAN THEY?
Our little friend prefers a special brand of catfood, three flavors in particular. The cans are yellow, red and blue. We keep those cans in one specific drawer. When our darling is hungry, he jumps onto the cupboard (right above the drawer) and says "meow". Once somebody opens the drawer for him, he puts his right-hand paw onto one of the cans - sometimes onto a yellow one, sometimes onto a red or a blue one. I cannot help asking myself whether he does that to let us know which flavor he wants today.
 

ARE CATS ABLE TO RECOGNIZE HUMAN VOICES?
Our cat divides his time between my mother's, my aunt's and my place. January 2000 my mother moved to the city. Prior to that she lived in the countryside for a couple of years. There our cat strolled around the garden and the neighborhood. My mother's nextdoor neighbor really fell in love with the little fellow. He always was a welcome guest in her garden. He dropped in almost every day, bathing his paws in her garden pond and looking into the house through the back door. However, he never let the neighbor touch him! As far as touching is concerned, he is very shy towards non-family-members. The neighbor even purchased his favorite cat treats, but he would not accept any. Once my mother had moved back to the city the cat never again met that particular neighbor again. A little while later the woman wrote a book and two and a half years after she had said farewell to our cat, she presented her book on a talkshow on local television. My mother watched the show when the cat came in from outside and walked passed the television without even looking at it. The talkshow host was speaking at that moment. The cat had just passed the television set when the former neighbor began  speaking. The cat jerked his head around and stared at the TV screen. He backed up and sat down right in front ot the TV. Then he watched his old friend and admirer for some twenty minutes - all the way to the next commercial break. Of course he couldn't know that the show would continue after that. He got up and left the room as soon as the first commercial started. He usually only watches TV shows about birds.