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| Oscar |
It was really funny today reading Linda's blog and seeing Smokey, the cat. It could have been a photo of our Oscar, the cat who adopted us for a number of years when we lived in Victoria. You see Oscar making himself very comfortable on our front window ledge. My long time blog readers will be very familiar with Oscar. He was the most amazingly affectionate cat to everyone.
He was great with people but other cat owners weren't so pleased. As you can see he is a big cat and injured a couple of neighbourhood cats (Siamese) called Tom and Jerry who thought they could get the best of him. He also liked to torment the female cats on the block. He kept one poor thing under a car until the owner intervened. We think Oscar got a bad rap with Tom and Jerry as they used to slink up to him when he was sitting on our front porch. We never saw him going after them. He just sat there and looked at them and they went scurrying away.
We learned from the owners that he is quite a famous breed called the Chartreux . This breed also had some famous owners like Charles de Gaulle. Read more about the breed below.
From Wikipedia:
The Chartreux is a rare breed of domestic cat from France and is recognised by a number of registries around the world. The Chartreux is large and muscular (called cobby) with relatively short, fine-boned limbs, and very fast reflexes. They are known for their blue (grey) water-resistant short hair double coats which are often slightly nappy in texture (often showing "breaks" like a sheepskin) and orange- or copper-colored eyes. Chartreux cats are also known for their "smile": due to the structure of their heads and their tapered muzzles, they often appear to be smiling. Chartreux are exceptional hunters and are highly prized by farmers.
As for every French cat with a pedigree, the first letter of the official name of a Chartreux cat encodes the year of its birth.[1] All Chartreux born in the same year have official names beginning with the same letter. The code letters rotate through the alphabet each year, omitting the letters K, Q, W, X, Y, and Z. For example, a Chartreux born in 2011 would have an official name starting with the letter G.
