Cats get away with a lot. They stare at you while you eat, tear through the apartment at 3 a.m. for reasons they will never explain, and leave things on your pillow you didn't ask for, and somehow we call it cute. So we started wondering what would happen if a person followed the same rules for one week, in an office, surrounded by coworkers who have no idea what's going on.
Meet Doug. Doug is fictional, which is good news for Doug, because his manager Denise would have every right to file a report. Everything he does below is something real cats actually do, and we've linked the research so you can check our work.
Monday: The Slow Blink
The Monday budget meeting runs forty minutes, and Doug spends all forty of them slow-blinking at Denise. He isn't winking, which would at least be a known HR issue. He narrows his eyes, lets them close, and opens them again like a lizard on a warm rock. Denise loses her place twice on slide six. Halfway through the Q3 projections she stops and asks if the lights are too bright for him. He blinks.
By the end of the meeting the new intern, who has never spoken to Doug, is slow-blinking back at him, and the rest of the room decides it's better not to ask.
Why do cats slow blink at people?
A slow blink is one of the ways cats show they're relaxed around someone. In a 2020 study published in Scientific Reports, cats were more likely to narrow their eyes after their owners slow-blinked at them. They were also more likely to approach an unfamiliar researcher who slow-blinked than one who kept a neutral face. The researchers suggest the blink may partly work as a way to break up a stare, which cats tend to read as a threat.
Tuesday: The Zoomies
At 10:14 a.m., Doug comes out of the restroom and runs. He covers the full length of the office and takes the corner by the printer fast enough to rattle the paper tray. Then he loops back past accounting and sits down at his desk, opening a spreadsheet as if he's been there all morning.
Gary from facilities pokes his head out to ask if there's a fire drill, and a voice from the copy room yells, "Ask Doug." Denise, who saw the whole thing from her doorway, writes something on a sticky note and closes her door very slowly.
Why do cats get the zoomies?
Vets have a formal name for it: frenetic random activity periods, or FRAPs. According to PetMD, the bursts often come after a cat has been inactive for a while, and the sprints and sharp turns may trace back to hunting instincts. Plenty of cats get them right after using the litter box, possibly just because they feel good. We'd rather not dwell on that one.
Wednesday: The Belly Roll
Denise is on a call with a vendor when Doug walks into her office, lies down on the carpet in front of her desk, and rolls onto his back. He doesn't say a word, just lies there with his hands tucked loosely up by his chin.
Denise mutes the call. They look at each other for what feels like a full fiscal quarter. Slowly, against her better judgment, she reaches down to pat his stomach, and Doug clamps onto her forearm with both hands and won't let go. Denise unmutes herself and, with her arm still in Doug's grip, says, "Can you hold for just a second? There's a matter I need to attend to."
Do cats like belly rubs?
It depends on the cat. A cat that rolls onto its back is usually showing it feels comfortable around you, which isn't the same as an invitation to touch. Some cats happily take belly rubs from people they trust. Ours, for the record, will flop over and wait for one like it's on the schedule. Others have extra-sensitive bellies and get defensive the second a hand comes near. Doug, clearly, is the second kind.
Thursday: The High Ground
The quarterly all-hands is in the big conference room, and Doug shows up early so he can climb on top of the filing cabinet in the corner. He sits up there with his legs tucked under him and a legal pad balanced on his knees. Every so often he writes something down, and nobody can see what. Denise presents the Q4 roadmap without once acknowledging him, though her eyes keep drifting up to the corner. Bill from marketing asks a question, and Doug watches him ask it.
When the meeting ends, Doug watches everyone file out one at a time. His head turns slowly to follow each person to the door, and he thinks this is easily the best seat he's had all year.
Why do cats like high places?
Cats sit in the middle of the food chain, hunting small animals while being small enough to end up as prey for bigger ones. According to Vetstreet, height gave cats a better view of both and a way to stay out of reach of ground predators like coyotes. Indoor cats still carry the instinct, which is why the top of the fridge is never available.
From our Cat Instinct series on Instagram.
Friday: The Gift
There's a box of donuts in the break room and one everything bagel. Doug skips the donuts without a second look. He picks up the bagel in his mouth, carries it down the hall into Denise's office, and sets it gently on her chair. Then he sits down on the floor a few feet away and waits.
Denise comes back from lunch, looks at the bagel, then at Doug, and moves it to the corner of her desk without taking a bite. Doug stares at the bagel, then at her, completely confused.
Why do cats bring their owners dead animals?
Nobody knows for sure, and there are a few theories. Home is a cat's safe territory, so bringing prey back may just mean bringing it somewhere safe to eat or stash. An urban ecologist told Live Science that cats might also see us as not-so-efficient kittens, since mother cats bring prey home to their young. Either way, the gift may have less to do with you than it seems.
Doug skipping the donuts is accurate too, since cats can't taste sweetness.
Saturday: The Sniff Test
A neighbor knocks on Doug's door holding a package that was delivered to her by mistake. When Doug opens the door, he leans in and sniffs the air around her, first near her shoulder and then by her elbow, while she holds the box out at arm's length. Eventually he takes it, gives his own mail on the side table a one-second sniff, and loses interest. She says, "Okay, well, have a good one," and leaves noticeably faster than she arrived.
Can cats recognize people by smell?
In a 2025 study published in PLOS One, researchers at Tokyo University of Agriculture presented 30 cats with three odor samples: their owner's scent, a stranger's scent, and a blank. The cats spent significantly longer sniffing the stranger's. That suggests cats can tell familiar people from unfamiliar ones by smell, though the researchers say it's still unclear whether a cat can pick out one specific person by scent alone.
Sunday: The Results
Doug spends Sunday asleep on the one patch of carpet that gets afternoon sun. On Monday morning there's a fifteen-minute meeting from Denise on his calendar titled "Quick Chat." He accepts it and slow-blinks at the screen.
Taken as a whole, Doug's week is a pretty thorough HR file, and every behavior in it happens in cat households daily, usually before breakfast. Cats have been living alongside us for over 10,000 years, and we're still the ones apologizing for being in the way.
If your cat has already made it clear who owns the place, the My Cat Allows Me To Live Here tee puts it in writing.
So which cat rule would you actually adopt? We're going with the high ground. Nobody can assign you anything if they can't reach you.
Sources
Humphrey, T., Proops, L., Forman, J., Spooner, R., & McComb, K. (2020). “The role of cat eye narrowing movements in cat–human communication.” Scientific Reports, 10, 16503. nature.com
PetMD. “Why Do Cats Get the Zoomies?” petmd.com
Agria Pet Insurance. “Why Does My Cat Show Their Belly When They See Me?” agriapet.co.uk
Rover. “Do Cats Like Their Belly Rubbed?” rover.com
Vetstreet. “Why Does My Cat… Like to Sit in High Places?” vetstreet.com
Live Science. “Why do cats bring home dead animals?” livescience.com
Li, X., et al. (2005). “Pseudogenization of a sweet-receptor gene accounts for cats’ indifference toward sugar.” PLOS Genetics, 1(1), e3. plos.org
Miyairi, Y., Kimura, Y., Masuda, K., & Uchiyama, H. (2025). “Behavioral responses of domestic cats to human odor.” PLOS One, 20(5), e0324016. plos.org
Published by Smart Cat Gifts | smartcatgifts.com | 2026