stanley

This page is dedicated to Stanley, my beloved.

Here, I will post images and fun things about him :)

Remember to pet him, okay?

This is the story of how Stanley appeared in my life and changed the course of time.

Once upon a time, in May of 2012, my sister and my father went to the local pet store to pick up dog food or something.

There, they saw him.

Stanley was laying on a cat tree in the kitty room, with three or four kittens using him as a jungle gym. He looked bored and a little sad, and my family knew we had to have him.

He was apparently left at the store because his old owner couldn't take care of him anymore, and he was only a year or so old. Poor baby. So we adopted him, but the story doesn't end there. Oh, no, the story is only beginning.

My dad brings Stanley home, and I meet him for the first time. He's a bit wide-eyed and skittish, being young and in a new and unfamiliar place, but we all fall in love with him immediately. Then, my parents go out for the night, leaving me, my sister, and my sister's friend, and Stanley.

It's getting a bit late. The sun is just beginning to set, so it's probably around 8 pm, and we have the windows in the kitchen and living room open, because it's warm out. And Stanley is laying on the windowsill, enjoying his new home. And our windows have screens, of course, which are secured by metal clips.

Well, they are MEANT to be secured by metal clips.

As it turns out, my mother had forgotten to push in the clips after taking down Christmas lights however long prior.

And as I am sitting in my room, and my sister and her friend are chatting in hers, I hear a loud metal CRASH.

I jump from whatever I was doing, run out into the kitchen, and watch as Stanley's tail flicks out through the opening of the window, into the night.

My sister and I FLIP OUT. She starts calling our parents to come home immediately, and I run outside to look for him. I see him on top of the neighbor's shed, but he darts away before I can get to him. I later see him on the wood fence separating our yard from our other neighbor's, and he leaps down onto the other side, disappearing. We're calling for him, crying, as our parents get home to help. The neighbors are out, too, but there's no further sign of him by dark.

At this point, we have mostly given up on ever seeing him again. It was his first day home, and not even 12 hours had passed before he was gone. Heartbroken, I crawl into bed.

And then my mom bursts into my room, shouting, We Found Him, We Found Him!

I, having already gone through the five stages of grief, appropriately replied, wait, What?

Our neighbor across the street had discovered Stanley's singular weakness: yummy meal. She left out a bowl of cat food in her driveway, and he was chowing down within an hour.

And so, that is the story of how we lost Stanley the very first day we got him, but he came back because he loves us :)

(food. he loves Food.)

Stanley, being the pinnacle of intelligence and grace, has gotten himself into a lot of shenanigans in his life here with us.

Ever since Stanley got his first taste of the outdoors, he would try to escape out of any door left open too long. He succeeded on many occasions, but now he's gotten older and he knows that whatever is out there won't love him (or feed him) like we do in here.

Recently, we got Stanley a harness and leash to try to get him to exercise a bit. We can't take him outside, because he has no flea or tick protection, but we thought he might walk around the house. Instead, he layed on the ground like a slug while I drug him around like a mop.

Our house has a glass sliding door. Once, a young Stanley saw a critter through the glass from across the room. He got so excited that he ran, full-speed, face-first into the door.

Another thing about Stanley is that he LOVES to sit in cardboard boxes. He will try to fit in any sized box, and WILL bust it open with his fat ass if he must. However, on one specific occasion, he tried to get into an empty box of Coca-Cola. He stuck his head into the open end, got to his shoulders, and got stuck. He then panicked and backed up, but the box stuck, causing him to jump onto his back legs, standing, then lose his balance and fall backwards onto his back. On the way down, he twisted himself upright, knocking the box off his head, leaving him looking around in confusion as to what had assailed him.

As we know, Stanley loves meal. Stanley hasn't ever taken human food (although he is sometimes given a little teeny bit of chicken as a treat), but he does like to sniff it just to see what we're having. Once, while I was taking a class on Zoom, Stanley sniffed my ham sandwich so aggressively that I thought he WAS going to steal it. I let him have the littlest piece I could tear from it, just to calm him down.

Stanley also gets canned food sometimes. Even after months without it, he still comes running when he hears the sound of the lid cracking open. He likes to lick the spoon, too.

Once I was sitting at the kitchen table with my dad when Stanley jumped out of his litter box, barreled down the stairs, and scooted his butt across the floor, leaving a big smear. I had to chase him around the house and then wipe his poopy butt like he was a baby. He was not having fun and he was definitely scared something was trying to hurt him, but it was very funny.

Stanley has taken to sleeping in the puppy's kennel, much to her frustration. I don't know why he likes it so much, but he just goes in there and naps for hours whenever he wants. One time my mom put the puppy away for bed and couldn't figure out why she kept whining. She went in the check on her only to find the puppy pressed up against the door staring sadly at Stanley's sleeping form, which was taking up her entire bed. Luckily, this means we finally found a travel kennel option that he doesn't mind much, because there's lots of space for him to lounge and he can see all over around him :)

Stanley is not an animal who normally likes to play. The only toys he has ever shown interest in are ones which involve a human wiggling something near him (such as a feather on a stick, a hand under a blanket, or a piece of tissue paper). However, he has discovered the pencil. The pencil is an unsharpened Staples HB #2 that I've probably had for over a decade. For whatever reason, after clipping Stanley's nails, I decided to try to use the pencil to play with him. He tried to grab it out of my hand, chased it when I threw it down the stairs, and even played with it by himself to the point that he put two big bite marks in it and threw it at the dog.

Stanley's latest favorite place to be is on my pillows. He goes there to nap whether it's occupied or not, and he likes if I use him as a pillow too. This also gives him the perfect vantage point to put his claws in my hair or kick me in the shoulder so he can bug me for breakfast at 5:00 am. He's soooo cute when he's curled up on the pillows and he purrs so sweetly :) He even stays there when I go to sleep.

Stanley is certainly a male orange cat.

by Smiley

by Nick

by Octo

by Jasper

by Jay

"he's like if a loaf of bread was an animal or if like a cat was a grandpa or if my best friend was a baby."
- Orion

"Stanley has the most soulful eyes I've ever seen on a cat. He looks like a businessman who is happy at his job but doesn't actually know what it is."
- Jay

"i love when stanley sit like a person"
"what an incredible animal."
- Smiley

"he chills in a sloppy style and ima big fan of that."
- Mikey

"i love stanley so much he's everything to me"
- Jasper

"stanley [...] he is a beautiful cat"
- Zagreo

"stanley is my favorite and the only celebrity"
- Rain

"Stanley looks like a man who was so so deeply sad and pitiful got cursed to be a cat forever approximately 200 years ago and he never got less sad"
- Hollis

"Stanley is so cute it’s distracted me from commenting on the [REDACTED]"
- Octo

"Fantastic cat. Certainly one of the cats of all time"
- Enrique

"I love Stanley <3"
- sadgrl

"I love your Stanley page so much, he has such a sweet round face"
"Every time his page is updated it's like laying in the grass under the sun. Orange Stanley-shaped furry sun... baby boy"
"Neocities wheezes scrolling past the wall of Stanley photos at the top and it's beautiful. Crumbling under the weight of his majesty"
- solradguy

"the Stanley page is currently my favourite page on the internet"
- capstasher

"Stanley!!!!"
- satyrwoud

"stanley my beloved <- said in a tone that indicates that your cat is a local celebrity now"
- spiders

"I eagerly look forward to his inevitable ascension."
- thel3tterm

"I heard about Stanley. Came to see for myself. There was so much Stanley my browser froze trying to load it all. Bravo and thanks, to both you and Stanley."
- patentghost

"weird little face <- said with nothing but love"
- mios-axe