I feed the stray cats outside my apartment each morning. I call it “Breakfast Club,” a reference to the 80s movie of the same name.
I’ve been doing this every morning for a couple years, so the cats learned long ago that when the hall light comes on at 5:05, “Salam Guy” is on the move and it’s time to gather around the window and scream like there’s no tomorrow, because the food is coming.
Most of the yard’s kittens stay away, because they are afraid of the bigger cats.
But there’s this one kitten I call Jeffrey who learned that when a bigger cat hisses and swats at him, the bigger cat steps away from the food a bit.
So Jeffrey actively seeks out, and in fact, incites, the swat. When the bigger cat backs away from the food, Jeffrey sweeps in and grabs it.
The whole operation, from swat to steal, only takes about half a second. Then the bigger cat, realizing that that round has been lost, just shrugs his shoulders and looks at me for the next round of salam.
In this short from the podcast, Rick Pizzoli reminds us that if we see an opportunity, jump on it, don’t wait for everything to line up perfectly.
In other words, be more like Jeffrey:
