Ruboil the Hutt
I’d already met Ruboil the cat before I went to Christchurch for the first time this year. I’d seen her on a webcam: a geriatric kitty, enjoying the twilight years of her life with all the dignity that comes with being waited on hand and foot by a doting human slave. Andrew told me she was annoying, and I laughed it off; he was exaggerating to amuse me. I love animals of all kinds. There was no way I would find this cat annoying.
When I first arrived, and as Andrew had predicted, Ruboil was skittish and ran the hell away whenever I came near her. Especially given how much I was hanging near her human plaything, I must have seemed a threat. By the second or third day, however, she realised that I was a human plaything just like Andrew, and slowly relented. This caution disappeared exponentially as she discovered that when Andrew brushed her away as he tried to work, I would welcome her into my arms and give her all the attention she craved.
The first night I heard her slip into bed with me, my face lit up; finally, I had become her friend! She tread gingerly across the bed towards me. She then proceeded to sit on my hair as I lay on my side and started to breathe cold air down into my face, rumbling like a broken chainsaw. So this was Ruboil’s famous annoyingness.
The rest of my stay in Christchurch was much like this. As it turns out, she also apparently has a love of resting her chin on things, regardless of how likely they are to move. This means that when she sits on your lap as you work at your desk or laptop, she will immediately put her chin on the back of your arm or wrist such that it would cause her great inconvenience if you moved it. This generally tends to be your mouse hand. And the look she gives you when you move! For pet push-overs like me, this is an awful paradox.
Even without being in her presence Ruboil works her annoying magic. When having a tender webcam moment, she will make her way to Andrew’s laptop and stand on the keyboard, obscuring all view. She’ll stand there for some time as she decides whether or not she wants to plod this way or that next:
Ruboil displays her signature annoying behaviour.
If she happens to brush past his headset on the slow, deliberating journey across, she’ll soon turn around and start chewing obsessively on the mouthpiece. When pushed away from that, she’ll absently play with the flouro green headphone cable until made to stop. If you put her outside your room and close the door, she’ll meow pitifully at your door until locked in the laundry with her cat bed. She is, in short, an annoying little ball of fluff who doesn’t take “no” for an answer.
And yet I can’t wait to see her again.
