The story begins like this: ” ”Mother & father ” was at a cat show and fell in love with some large cats called Maine Coons. We contacted Benthe Prytz ( Arctic Coon`s) and asked her about the cats. In september she called us and said that she had one nice little red bloched tabby boy for us. The period of waiting for him was awful, but in january he was ready to leave home. (N) Artic Coon`s Quebeck was sent by air from Tromsø to Stavanger via Oslo. In Stavanger my friend Reidun was going to pick him up at the airport and send him by ship to Sauda where we live. We were very anxious about how the little guy would react on such a long trip. Benthe told us that the Maine Coons normally are very relaxed, so everything would be ok with the little one. The flight from Tromsø to Oslo went ok, the flight from Oslo to Stavanger went ok , but then we got a telephone call from Reidun. She told us that the crew on the ship would place the kitten on deck, together with the luggage for nearly three hours, in January. She had told them that they could not do that and ordered them to let him stay in the salon. She also told them that if they put him out on deck, I (LivBente) would probably kill one of them or at least make so much trouble that they would never forget it. The kitten was in the salon when he arrived Sauda. When we arrived at our house, we placed the cage on the floor, opened the cage door and thought he needed to sit and look around for a while. It took about 3 seconds before the whipster came out . He marched around the living room like a soldier with his tail straight up. The persians stared at him with big round eyes and wondered who this guy was and why he acted like he was the owner of the house. When he had checked the place, he turned to the persians, he spat a little to every one of them to be sure that they understood they had got a new boss and that there would be some changes.
The following day we introduced the soldier from North to our King Poodle, Elvis. Elvis loves cats and he knows how to meet them. He sat down and turn his head away to avoid eye contact. He always let the cats decide how and when they want to have contact. The soldier looked at the dog for a few seconds, sniffed and then he scratched him on the nose, turned his ass to Elvis and went away with a satisfied expression on his face. His attitude said: Just p…. off , I`m not afraid of you. Elvis sat there with a strange expression on his face, it was like he was asking:” why is he angry at me”? The days went with damaged flowers, clothes on the floor and other trivialities. We took comfort in that everything would be better when he was growing older. The Persians were sceptical and they turned out to be right. One afternnon I came home from work. The eldest Persian babe (Trine) met me on the doorstep. She was complaining awfully. She had been the boss before the soldier came and took over. Now she felt responsible for telling me when everything went over the edge. She followed me into the living-room while she all the time meowed. She jumped upon the table and she told me:”is it possible, look mother, look what he has done. We have nothing to do with all this, it is him…..” The soldier was lying on the floor, in the middle of a lot of plants, soil, roots and potsherd, He had a wonderful time. He killed plants, meowed, purred and was so dirty that it was difficult to know his coat colour. Trine was so indignent that she nearly fainted. The other Persians were just gazing like they did not believe their own eyes. When I started to clean up the mess, the soldier started to swear. He did not like that I took away his toys.
After some time, we decided that he had to have a (daily) name. The soldier and the dog had become good friends, so it was easy – since the dog`s name was Elvis, we named the cat Presley.
Still we thought that Presley would calm down when he grew older, but the opposite happened. He has developed his skills. Now he work as a hairdresser and he is also permanently employed in the waterwork. If he doesn`t have the opportunity to fix our hair, he catch the other cats in ambush in best guerilla style. He is tugging their coat. The Persians seem to enjoy it. He loves water and he is playing a lot with the water cup. Sometimes he is wading – yes he has all four feet in the water cup. The Persians don`t like all this water mess. If it is too much they use to give us a hint that it is time to clean up so that normal “people” can have a drink.
In spite of all his crazy ideas, he is enormously charming. Sometimes he takes a break, and then he cuddle up with the other cats, Elvis and us. He has occupied our hearts and our home and we all love him very much.
