Simon was the king of the block and a very majestic cat

Simon was a very epic majestic cat. He was a very calm and epic cat. He was a big cat, a big Norwegian forest cat. A totally white big Norwegian forest cat, making him really stand out in sight as well as in personality.

Simon had been brought up together with another big cat, my totally black cat Zorro. So Simon was used to have other cats around him. This, together with his enormous courage and personality led to a very noticeable cat with a majestic behavior. Also, he did view his garden as his turf. And he made it clear to dogs coming by that he was the king of the block, passage was to be on the other side of the street.

This majestic cat made regular inspection rounds of his surroundings

When cats walk through gardens that are not their own, many cats will sneak around it in the fringes of the garden. Hiding themselves from sight by the shadow of the fence or under the bushes, or...

But Simon would very epic and majestic walk straight into the garden, to its middle. And then sit there and look at the surroundings, inspecting them. Calm in his knowledge that this was his turf, he was the king of the block. Of course, being as big as he was, and as white as he was, hiding was not anyway as easy for him as for other cats. Yet, from his behavior, hiding was not the thing in his mind. Whatever the reason, he did not much even try hiding. In the photo from the garden he can be seen flat on his back catching some warmth from the sun. He shows no thoughts on hiding himself, still being the king of the block. But not being a very majestic cat at this time.

He did have his spying nests in our garden, places where he could monitor the garden and the sidewalks and the insides of the house without being easily seen. In the beginning when we moved into the house, Simon would use such places quite often, especially when taking a nap. But as time went by, he spent more and more time in the open also when sleeping. He enjoyed lying on the grass within the comforting shadow of a bush or similar, getting parts of his fur warmed by the sun, and other parts in the shadows. One of his favorite places where close to one of the boxwood bushes. From there, he could monitor the inside of the kitchen, as well as much of the outside garden, still catching a little warmth from the sun but not too much.

The neighbors used to tease the poor cat. On his regular inspection rounds of his turf (which he normally made three times a day, after his meals plus some times in the evening plus the nights), he passed by outside their window. When they saw him, they would knock on the window. He would react, but continue, pretending as nothing happened. And they would knock again. What they found amusing was that he might hurry his steps away a little, but not much, and he would make it very clear that he moved because he wanted to, not because they scared him off.

Besides the inspection walks Simon took around his turf every morning, every afternoon, every evening, he also used to sit and view the surroundings. Either at the gate into our garden (on the outside of the gate, in the open), or on the fence post, or simply on the sidewalk. When Simon was younger, he patrolled his area so often, that there where a "paw way" created in the grass around our house (in fact, just at the side of a pathway formed by my wife doing similar rounds for the garden but with bigger feet). In the last year, Simon did not take the inspection rounds that frequently. In fact, I doubt his turf was the same size anymore, I had the impression his turf was successfully challenged by another big young cat.

This big majestic forest cat met other cats very calmly

The white cat Simon was used to live with another cat (the black cat Zorro) in the beginning of his life. That led to him being very calm about having other cats close to him. He would calmly approach them, just as he calmly went towards dogs. Walking towards them, without ruffling up neither himself nor his tail. In this way, he did not start a fight, although the other cat would put stomach towards the ground and indicate that he would fight if Simon took another step. But Simon would in spite of that still take another step, until they were around 3 decimeters apart. Then if the cat was still there, Simon would likely just sit down in his normal sitting pose, with two straight front legs, looking at the other cat. Cats are not used to that behavior, so In this calm way, he got most cats to leave without a fight. In this way, he converted his wish to meet other cats to a bigger and bigger turf. I only once saw Simon do an attack, and it was in his last living year when he was no longer that confident on himself around other cats. I think it marked one of Simon's aging signs.

The big king of the block forest cat Simon almost never gave way to dogs

Simon was not only calm around cats, but also calm about dogs. He was a very big white forest cat, weighing in around 8.5 kilo. He considered himself much bigger than that, and kept all dogs away from the sidewalks to our house. There was the exception of Simon running for a Schaefer. But besides that, he did not run for dogs. He did not even bother to ruffle up when meeting a dog. There were many occasions were Simon met and blocked dogs from using our sidewalk. Both my neighbors has told me of them seeing other such occasions. I have gotten similar stories from the dog owners themselves. Simon actually managed to get the dog owners to have their dogs in leash, if so only around our house.