Ember, my tortoiseshell tabby, has become a self-taught meteorologist.

[wnylib]

Ember used to enjoy occasional water as a kitten, e.g. swishing her paws in the toilet bowl, or chasing down suds in the kitchen sink after I drained it. As long as I didn't try to put her into water, she was ok.

But then storms brought out her sheltering instinct. It probably didn't help that she was on the sill of an open window, checking out the pretty light flashes in the sky when a heavy downpour splashed through the screen onto her. Poof, faster than lightning itself, she was on the floor far away from the window, peeking out to see what or who had attacked her.

Gradually, Ember learned to associate cloudy skies with threatening weather. On cloudy days, she glances out the window as she walks across the room. If she hears thunder in the distance, she looks at me and then at the window. She knows now that the booming noise is the voice of the water monster and lightning is its eyes flashing arrogant threats. She paces the floor, checking out the window as skies get dark, thunder booms, and lightning flashes. Then, when the downpour hits, she scoots behind the couch and will not come out until the storm stops.

There are times when even I am a bit nervous about storms if there have been tornado watches for the area. At those times, I go to the window to scan the sky and always leave a radio and my phone on to catch weather warnings. When I search the skies from the window, Ember knows that I am a kindred spirit and joins me at the windowsill.

But now she has ratcheted up her weather warning skills. She has observed that, when the radio makes a loud buzzing sound and a robotic voice speaks our of it, I stop what I'm doing to listen. Storms have followed the radio warnings often enough so that Ember associates the radio warnings and perks up to look at me, look out the window, and get closer to the couch in case she needs to make a quick dive behind it.

If the radio buzzing is just a US Weather Service test, Ember relaxes when I tell her it's ok.

She's my own personal, in house weather watcher.