1. She will let you brush her, but only for a few minutes and only in the correct areas.

More than once has she been likened to a tiny black panther, and although she may look foreboding, she's only 11 pounds. I wish I was kidding when I say I think half of that is just fur. I'm lucky to not have seen a hairball in quite some time, but she does have a habit of leaving behind clumps of excess hair.

Brushing off the extra is something she should enjoy, seeing as it's the cat version of a hot stone massage, but if you persist too long and brush too thoroughly, she's going to quit. In the span of thirty seconds, she'll go from rubbing her whispers through the bristles on her own to biting my fingers and yelling at me.

Side note: My cat can't be the only one that yells. I understand that it's a meow still, but sometimes I just know that if she could speak that meow would actually be an expletive. I've learned that her personality is quite abrasive.

2. She loves to be in the way.

Besides sitting in the glare on a sunny afternoon, Montie's favorite place in the world is in front of a laptop. Or a book. Or a bowl. Or anything that would require your attention, and one or both hands. If she's in the vicinity, and in an attention-seeking mood, you can kiss productivity good-bye. She'll sit on the mouse pad and jab at the keyboard should I attempt to work around her, and there've been one too many pieces of fur floating in my cereal before because she had to be right there.

She's very particular about when she wants to be touched, and how, but if you even consider paying attention to something other than her, you've got another thing coming. I can't tell you how many times I've had to erase "kjshdflaksj" from my essays while proofreading because she added her input. It's flat out disrespectful Miss, but then again, typical for her.

3. She wants me to know that she could kill me, if she wanted to.

When I came across that viral post a couple of months ago (the one about the guy thinking his cat was going to murder him), I about died of laughter because I thought I was the only one who ever felt that way. Sometimes I think my cat is unique in her grumpy queen nature. My friend's cat is an angel, a lanky poofball that's always down for belly rubs. After seeing him, I'm always back on guard when I go home to my fickle feline. I forget that some cat owners go through what I do too.

The post described things like how your cat shovels excess litter out of the litter box (you know, to bury your body), and sleeping on your electronics (to disrupt your communications with the outside world). When I tell you I have never laughed so hard at any other post on the Internet, I'm dead serious. Then after a couple of hours of consideration, I stopped laughing and started worrying.

I was one dead lizard away from messaging the creators of the post that I fear for my safety. When she started sitting on my chest like a loaf of bread and staring me down from three inches away, I was concerned. It wasn't until last week, when she sat horizontally across my neck, like an 11-lb scarf, and kneaded my esophagus with her paws, that I finally had my Last Will and Testament drawn up. She hasn't acted yet, but you never know what's going on behind those green eyes. I like to be prepared.

4. I'm her favorite person, except when I'm not.

We can debate the "politeness" of taking our phones into the bathroom later, but let me tell you I've never regretted not taking my phone into the bathroom with me until today. I had the door cracked, and Montie squeezed her face into the 1-inch crack and stuck one paw through to feel around the inside of the door for weaknesses. If I had gotten a picture, my obsessive need to prove her mood swings would finally be satisfied.

I had just gotten home from class, and I guess she was feeling positive towards human interaction. The time it took for me to exit the bathroom was too long for her, apparently, and so she sought to resolve the problem of my absence herself. I can never predict when it is she'll want my attention, and if I'm not fast enough she'll either leave or bite me. When she does want to be pet though, she'll sit as close to me as possible and purr herself into a satisfied bliss.

5. Most importantly, she will never, no matter what, under any circumstance, allow herself to be given a bath.

I wish with all my heart that I could have linked a photo of my cat after a bath, but in that fact lies the story. The last time Montie got a bath was 10 years ago, amidst a fit of rage after she peed herself in the cat carrier on the way home from the vet. She used to do it every time we put her in the carrier, and whether it was out of spite or anxiety I'll never know. After she soaked her entire undercarriage on this particular car ride and received a bath as a result, she mysteriously never peed herself again.

My mom and I had quite the errand trying to pull a reluctant ball of screaming fur from a soaking wet mesh bag. The smell of ammonia wasn't the best at setting the mood either, and once we wrangled her free, we were three unhappy campers. She screamed bloody murder the entire time the water was on her, and once we got soap through her fur and a towel around her claws, I figured we'd never see her out from under the bed ever again.

I still have two raised lines in an X on my forearm from her back claws, in one of her attempts to break free. You'd think my mom and I were the Capital organizers of the Hunger Games and she was the rebellious protagonist, Catnip Everdeen.

If I learned anything from that harrowing experience, it's that if she ever gets herself dirty like that again, she's on her own to get clean.