According to Miss Kitty, when it comes to games and toys, the best things in life are free ... you can't beat paper and plastic bags from the grocery store, a crumpled cellophane bag tied with a piece of string, and the plastic wrapped wire that secures lettuce leaves to the head. And the next best thing, those super bouncy rubber balls from the candy machine at the grocery store, can be had for 25 cents. She has six. When she rolls them under the stove, they usually have enough energy to roll back out ... which saves me from getting down on the floor with a flashlight and a stick.

Life is good when there is something to chase, excuses to jump high and run fast, and great places to hide. A small rug on a slick bathroom floor becomes a magic carpet, to slide "home" on. An hourglass shaped wicker plant stand, knocked over, is such fun. She hops over it, dives under it, races around it and explores open spaces at each end. If she jumps on it, it rolls. Miss Kitty says a human shoulder is even better than climbing a tree ... because her human walks around and gives her a bird's eye view.

And there are real birds here, too ... especially the sassy magpies that scratch around in the eaves, chatter in the spruce tree and fly about the neighborhood, flashing their iridescent blue green feathers with the jaunty black and white trim. Oh, it would be heaven to catch one! She has tried that, too ... fetched up against the venetian blinds with a terrible crash and landed on the floor. She seems to have learned about blinds the first time, though it took two crashes into a solid glass sliding door to figure out that it was shut and there wasn't anything she could do about it, but avoid it.

Tables and cabinets are off limits, but oh, if nobody's watching ... watch out! It is SO tempting to launch from a dining room chair through the pass through window onto a kitchen cabinet ... and how did those place mats on top of the refrigerator find their way onto the floor? The window between the sun room and the kitchen has been closed since that very first night, when she crashed through it and delivered two potted plants from the window sill into the kitchen sink with a single, prodigious leap.

That's where sticky duct tape comes in ... aversion training. Cats hate that sticky stuff on their paws. The sticky label from a new box of dishwasher detergent looked like a good place to start, so I left it on the cabinet, sticky side up, over the dishwasher. Sure enough, Miss Kitty came rocketing into the room where I was working with the label stuck to her chin. She hit the panic button when she couldn't get that label off.

She figured out how to knock a pumice stone into the bathtub and push it around with a most annoying scratchy sound. When she saw it floating in water, she jumped in to play with it. I've seen her chase it around in up to three inches of warm water, lifting up one paw and giving it a good shake, then plopping it back into the water and repeating the motion with another paw. She hasn't volunteered to stick around for a shower ... yet ... but she would fish in the toilet in a heartbeat if the lid wasn't down.

So we are learning what each can tolerate and playing increasingly complex games. She hides her favorite mouse ... the felt covered gray mouse that clings to her claws and sports ears and a tail in bright pink. She expects me to find it. She ambushes tossed objects (and the pointer light) from hiding places under furniture and all down the stairs. She has a preferred chair with a window view in every room, to watch street traffic and stalk birds. Life is good. And she feels safe enough now to nap on the floor. Everything would be purrfect ... if I could just find that silly mouse!