This was back in the day of analog rotary dial phones like this:
I used to have my answering machine on my desk next to the phone. When Zeus was a young kitten, I would call him during the day and talk to him via the answering machine. One day, while we were having a one-way conversation, he stepped on the phone's receiver and knocked it off the phone. We meowed back and forth to each other for several minutes.
Ever since then, anytime the phone rang, he'd jump up on the desk and intentionally knock the receiver off the phone and meow to the caller.
BBB and Zeus had many a conversation that way. If someone else beat her to it, I'd get a call at work from her to tell me my phone line had been busy for several hours and Zeus was probably answering the phone again.
I posted some photos of him and talked about some of his antics over in another thread. Here's a copy of it:
Butrflynet wrote:
You are going to have your hands full trying to keep him entertained. Don't spend a lot of money on store-bought toys. Cats will play with almost anything. Some of the favorite toys my cats have loved over the years were just things that might have gone into the trash. A fan-folded piece of paper tied in the middle with a 3 ft piece of yarn is a good one. To get him interested, I'd dangle it in his face just out of reach and let him catch it occasionally. Or, we'd run up and down the hall trailing the paper lure for him to chase. After awhile, I could tie it to something so the paper was just above his head and he'd still play with it for hours like a tether ball.
Another favorite toy is the little plastic ring you remove when you first open a gallon jug of milk. I'd toss that into the bathtub for my cat and he'd play soccer with it for hours. The slick surface and high walls of the tub were great fun for him.
Yet another favorite was tightly wadded up pieces of paper that he'd bat around the house. He eventually learned to fetch and we'd entertain each other with it for hours.
Here's a picture of one of my old cats from many years ago, caught in the act with the plastic ring in the bathtub game.
You can't see it, but this is him about to make a goal in a game of soccer played with a wadded up piece of paper filled with a little catnip. He got so good at it he could easily land a goal into the brown paper grocery bag on the other side of the room. Then he'd go flying into the bag to tackle the paper ball and make the paper bag rattle.
This cat figurine was his buddy. No matter where I placed the figurine, he'd find it and cuddle with it, using it as a pillow.
For awhile, I had it on top of the TV and Zeus would spend cold winter nights there with his pal while I watched TV. Can't tell you how many times I had fits of side-splitting laughter as Zeus rolled off the TV in his sleep.
He was a great cat.
Here's another photo of him a few years later. When he wasn't talking, he was walking around with his little pink tongue hanging out.
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