Danny at Oblomovka bought a Roomba, and finds it extra useful for scaring cats.
Still, we did our final moving cash splurge today, and bought a Roomba. And, what do you know, it’s actually pretty good: both at cleaning and removing the bejesus out of nearby cats. It backed Dyson into the corner of our living room within minutes – she kept tottering backwards for about ten yards, like she was facing the Feline Terminator.
In a similar vein: I can vouch that, if Lego Mindstorms is good for anything, it’s scaring cats with its Otherworldly Silicon Intelligence. I think most cats eventually figure out that if there’s a string or stick linking a menacing object and a human, odds are that the human is controlling the object somehow. As a result, a robot really freaks them out.
But with Lego Mindstorms, they do get their revenge eventually, by eating the smaller bricks next time you build a ‘bot.