Rascal is the main character in the series of books titled Why Some Cats Are Rascals but he is also a contributing author and most importantly, a real cat who lives with the author. His friends are also real, and we have the photos and videos to prove it!
As is the case with most cats, Rascal is full of character and has many talents and traits, and his friends have some unique qualities as well, some of which we will tell you about here. Over time, we will fill up this page with photos, videos, and animations and fun facts about Rascal and his pals. There are even more photos of Rascal in the gallery pages because you can never have too many pictures of a rascally cat. Rascal’s real story
Where did Rascal come from? – Frankly, no one really knows.
As a widower, Pawell was living alone with 8 old cats. It was late November and it was his day off from work. From time to time he would go on the porch and enjoy the view of Grouse Mountain and the two sister peaks. On this day around noon he spotted two kittens in his garden. Both had flea collars on so most likely they had just wondered here. Later on, Pawell could not spot them but they were hiding close to the house. As it was starting to get dark the kittens were again in the garden. “Hey, fellas, you better go home, it is getting late and it will be freezing tonight. If I come out again and see you I will take you home.” The kittens listened and came on to the porch. When he turned around and opened the door to the house, both kittens ran inside before him. Since the old cats were all very friendly, they quickly accepted the new cats.
The first day the kittens were still getting familiar with the household. Pawell was expecting somebody to come looking for them, but no one ever did. He noticed the orange one was the leader and the gray one always followed and would mimic his brother. After two days he figured out that one of two things most likely happened; either the cats destroyed their previous home and they were looking for a new one to demolish or their previous owner kicked them out before they destroyed the house completely.
So that’s how the orange cat earned the name Rascal; running around the house with the speed of lightning getting on the top of the cupboards, refrigerator and going everywhere except the ceiling lights. His brother on the other hand, with his bigger build, was much slower and could never catch up with the leader. While Rascal had already done a round around the house, the gray one had barely made it through half of the kitchen. He also noticed that the gray one liked to sit and think and was quite good at figuring things out.
For example, Pawell had kept the dry cat food in a plastic garbage can which had a “wild animal proof” lock on it. One day when the can was open Rascal got in and refused to get out. So he closed the lid and secured it to keep him in for a moment so he can sweep the floor. His brother was watching all this and when Pawell went out of the room for a moment, he returned to find Rascal running around free! His brother had figured out how to release the “animal proof” secure closure and let Rascal out. After that incident, he earned the name Philosopher.
One of Rascal’s favorite games was opening the drawers in the kitchen and throwing its contents out on the floor, then looking for something to play with. Pawell was constantly picking up the stuff and putting it back into the drawers until he realized that Rascal was apparently cleaning his house, so next time, whatever the cat threw out of a drawer, he put in the garbage. However, the one drawer holding cutlery was very hard to open and Rascal couldn’t figure out how to open this one. One day Pawell came into the kitchen to find Rascal sitting on the counter top and from the open drawer was fishing out and throwing cutlery onto the floor. When Pawell closed the drawer, to his surprise, the drawer slid out again by itself! It happened two more times, so he opened the door under and found Philosopher sitting on the shelf pushing the drawer out.
The door between the kitchen and dining room had a door handle instead of just a knob. This door was kept closed to prevent cats from entering there. At least it was until Rascal had figured out a method to open the door. Because he was still small, he could not reach the handle, so he would climb on the basket standing near the door and would jump onto the handle. At the same time, his brother would stand on his hind legs and push on the door with his front paws.
When Rascal grew up his hobby became opening every closed door in the house. He especially likes the door to the basement. Since Pawell was spending lot of time on his computer in the basement, he always closed the door behind him and was safe from cats because the door had a lock. Not for long! Rascal learned how to open this door, but any time cats got into the basement Pawell would start yelling and chasing them back out to the kitchen. So Rascal changed his tactic; after opening the door he would not go in, he let the other cats in first. When there was yelling and cats running away, Rascal would be sitting on the kitchen table looking innocent, despite the fact that he was the only one able to open the door. But if there was no yelling, he would go down to the basement. As Pawell was curious how he was doing this, he tricked Rascal and was able to observe his actions – he was jumping on the door holding the knob in his front paws and turning it around, while with one hind leg he pushed the frame opening the door. Over the knob was a simple lock, he learned that when the lock is in the horizontal position the door cannot be opened, so he always checks the position before attempting to open this door.
These are just a few of Rascal’s antics. With time, we will add more about him and his real life adventures and will also add some videos or photos documenting some of this.
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