Here's Carrie
20 minutes with my crazy cats:
So I’ve mentioned our morning and evening cat treat ritual, which is really quite an ordeal.
Going upstairs anytime after I get home from work (or anytime past 3 or so on non-work days) results in me instantaneously amassing a fan club of at least three (Baxter, Jasper, Oliver), but usually more, cats. They run to catch up and follow so closely that they are usually ramming into the backs of and between my legs as I try to climb the stairs. They will do this as many times a night as I go up the stairs. At the top of the
stairs, they race to the bedroom, frequently tripping me in the process. On this particular day, I notice strange bits of things on the floor of the upstairs hallway and bathroom, and a quick peek at the bathroom as I walk by reveals that the soap/shampoo/conditioner etc. on the edge of the tub has all been knocked off onto the floor. I’ll have to address that later, though, so I can get rid of the little gang surrounding me first.
I notice as I enter the bedroom, that Baxter has yet again attempted to help himself to the treats. The basket which contains their various treats and medications sits on top of a jewelry box on my dresser. He knocks this basket down and when all the contents go flying across my bedroom, he mauls his treat containers. He has never been able to break into these containers (and only these containers), yet he persistently tries—frequently in the middle of the night. That’s my favorite. He now has taught Carrie to behave this way. As I try to pick up all the containers and restore the basket, I have several fat, furry heads that keep trying to get between my hands and the treat jar. They apparently don’t understand that this slows, rather than speeds up the process. Once I get the right treat container, Baxter, Jasper, Carrie, Tica, and sometimes Lila, start trilling, grunting, and making a cacophony of desperate noises, as if they haven’t eaten in days.
The distribution process is where the fun really begins. Of the 9 cats, 8 of them come for treats. Ivan is too good for such twaddle, so that’s one less problem child to struggle with. The order of the distribution is of utmost importance, and I haven’t found an order that works smoothly yet. Baxter usually gets first treat, mostly because he stands right up on the dresser so he can more easily headbutt the treat out of my hand. Additionally, he screams “mow mow” from the bottom step to the time the treat hits his greedy little lips, and I just want him to stop with the noise. It’s easiest to hit him first. Also, if I don’t, he tries to head butt and steal treats from each cat until he gets his. The ill-mannered noise makers do tend to get theirs first. You wouldn’t believe what a racket they make! Oliver is a dream. He doesn’t like the crazy cluster around the dresser either, so he politely waits in the hallway for his. He is perfect and easy, although I have to stand guard over him, because Baxter, Jasper, and Lila are vicious little thieves who will steal it from under his nose. Carrie is starting to become a little treat snatcher too. Petey is generally pretty good, although he will steal from others on occasion—especially Hallie. I have to individually guard Carrie, Tica, and Lila, too, as they cannot hoark the treat in one bite like the boys do, and they boys will steal the partially eaten portion from under the girls’ noses, too. Guarding involves me literally using my body as a shield and pushing the fat, furry heads away from the object of their desire. Lila is not innocent, though, as she joins all the others in trying to steal from her mommy. Hallie is the real difficulty. She is cross eyed and doesn’t see well. Like Lila, she also has permanent respiratory damage (not as bad as Lila’s though) and doesn’t smell well either. It makes it an epic chore for her to actually find the treat, despite me continually tapping and scratching the floor near it. Once she does actually find it, she is extremely timid and will back off if one of the pushy ones approaches too near. It takes on average about three minutes of guarding and trying to coral the pushy bastards back, so she can eat her treat in peace.
Once that ordeal is finished, we can move on to the next “treat”. Lila and Hallie each get lysine paste for their respiratory problems/herpes. This is licked off my finger. It is very yummy to them and very expensive. I have to hold one hand out for them to take their lysine, while using my one remaining hand to keep the others back. They are fast and they are ruthless. I’m quite tired at this point.
Then we move on to the hairball paste, which everyone gets. This too is licked from my finger, and hopefully keeps them from noticing that they didn’t all get the expensive, yummy lysine paste. Same process continues, though, with the Petromalt, as I use my free hand to keep the others away from the one who is licking up their paste. Carrie, however, does not like Petromalt. She is long-haired and vomits a lot, so she really needs it. I have to grab her, hold her with one arm, use my other hand to rub the Petromalt into her front paws, while fending off the greedy bastards with whatever body parts I have free. During this whole process, she squeaks indignantly as if I'm torturing here. If I don’t get it rubbed in, in a thin enough layer on her paws, she is really good at flicking her paws and flinging the sticky paste off, leaving me to find it on the wall, bed, curtain--whatever it landed on and clean it up.
At this point, I am finally able to venture back into the bathroom to assess the damage. The lace curtains and rods have NOT been ripped down today (yay!). This is one of their frequent redecorating schemes and I hate having to fix that mess. Oh great, Lila has found the caulk again. She has stripped the caulk bead from all the way around the top of the bath tub, and has strewn debris in the tub, on the bathroom floor, and out into the hallway. Caulk strips are great fun for her. I thought the shower curtains (two—one for each side of the tub) and the product arranged around the ends would hide and protect it. But no. We will add recaulking the bathtub to our huge “to do” list. How do I know who did it, you may ask. I usually have a good guess who the culprit(s) in any situation is/are, because they each have their own interests. They have divvied up the various types of house damage fairly well—allowing every single thing we own to be destroyed without forcing any one cat to cover too much territory. Specialization makes them much more efficient in their destruction. If there was any doubt whatsoever, as to the caulk bandit’s identity, it was dispelled when she ran back into the tub and pulled off the last few inches of caulk that was dangling over the side and proceeded to frolic around the tub with it, while I was cleaning up the bits she left on the floor.
One treat session is done. This will start over again at 5:45 am tomorrow. The morning session is a little easier, as we’re already upstairs, so I get to skip the part where I risk life and limb climbing the stairs with the kamikaze treat bandits. Why are my well-fed and spoiled cats such ill-mannered little thugs?!!
Going upstairs anytime after I get home from work (or anytime past 3 or so on non-work days) results in me instantaneously amassing a fan club of at least three (Baxter, Jasper, Oliver), but usually more, cats. They run to catch up and follow so closely that they are usually ramming into the backs of and between my legs as I try to climb the stairs. They will do this as many times a night as I go up the stairs. At the top of the
stairs, they race to the bedroom, frequently tripping me in the process. On this particular day, I notice strange bits of things on the floor of the upstairs hallway and bathroom, and a quick peek at the bathroom as I walk by reveals that the soap/shampoo/conditioner etc. on the edge of the tub has all been knocked off onto the floor. I’ll have to address that later, though, so I can get rid of the little gang surrounding me first.I notice as I enter the bedroom, that Baxter has yet again attempted to help himself to the treats. The basket which contains their various treats and medications sits on top of a jewelry box on my dresser. He knocks this basket down and when all the contents go flying across my bedroom, he mauls his treat containers. He has never been able to break into these containers (and only these containers), yet he persistently tries—frequently in the middle of the night. That’s my favorite. He now has taught Carrie to behave this way. As I try to pick up all the containers and restore the basket, I have several fat, furry heads that keep trying to get between my hands and the treat jar. They apparently don’t understand that this slows, rather than speeds up the process. Once I get the right treat container, Baxter, Jasper, Carrie, Tica, and sometimes Lila, start trilling, grunting, and making a cacophony of desperate noises, as if they haven’t eaten in days.
The distribution process is where the fun really begins. Of the 9 cats, 8 of them come for treats. Ivan is too good for such twaddle, so that’s one less problem child to struggle with. The order of the distribution is of utmost importance, and I haven’t found an order that works smoothly yet. Baxter usually gets first treat, mostly because he stands right up on the dresser so he can more easily headbutt the treat out of my hand. Additionally, he screams “mow mow” from the bottom step to the time the treat hits his greedy little lips, and I just want him to stop with the noise. It’s easiest to hit him first. Also, if I don’t, he tries to head butt and steal treats from each cat until he gets his. The ill-mannered noise makers do tend to get theirs first. You wouldn’t believe what a racket they make! Oliver is a dream. He doesn’t like the crazy cluster around the dresser either, so he politely waits in the hallway for his. He is perfect and easy, although I have to stand guard over him, because Baxter, Jasper, and Lila are vicious little thieves who will steal it from under his nose. Carrie is starting to become a little treat snatcher too. Petey is generally pretty good, although he will steal from others on occasion—especially Hallie. I have to individually guard Carrie, Tica, and Lila, too, as they cannot hoark the treat in one bite like the boys do, and they boys will steal the partially eaten portion from under the girls’ noses, too. Guarding involves me literally using my body as a shield and pushing the fat, furry heads away from the object of their desire. Lila is not innocent, though, as she joins all the others in trying to steal from her mommy. Hallie is the real difficulty. She is cross eyed and doesn’t see well. Like Lila, she also has permanent respiratory damage (not as bad as Lila’s though) and doesn’t smell well either. It makes it an epic chore for her to actually find the treat, despite me continually tapping and scratching the floor near it. Once she does actually find it, she is extremely timid and will back off if one of the pushy ones approaches too near. It takes on average about three minutes of guarding and trying to coral the pushy bastards back, so she can eat her treat in peace.
Once that ordeal is finished, we can move on to the next “treat”. Lila and Hallie each get lysine paste for their respiratory problems/herpes. This is licked off my finger. It is very yummy to them and very expensive. I have to hold one hand out for them to take their lysine, while using my one remaining hand to keep the others back. They are fast and they are ruthless. I’m quite tired at this point.
Then we move on to the hairball paste, which everyone gets. This too is licked from my finger, and hopefully keeps them from noticing that they didn’t all get the expensive, yummy lysine paste. Same process continues, though, with the Petromalt, as I use my free hand to keep the others away from the one who is licking up their paste. Carrie, however, does not like Petromalt. She is long-haired and vomits a lot, so she really needs it. I have to grab her, hold her with one arm, use my other hand to rub the Petromalt into her front paws, while fending off the greedy bastards with whatever body parts I have free. During this whole process, she squeaks indignantly as if I'm torturing here. If I don’t get it rubbed in, in a thin enough layer on her paws, she is really good at flicking her paws and flinging the sticky paste off, leaving me to find it on the wall, bed, curtain--whatever it landed on and clean it up.
At this point, I am finally able to venture back into the bathroom to assess the damage. The lace curtains and rods have NOT been ripped down today (yay!). This is one of their frequent redecorating schemes and I hate having to fix that mess. Oh great, Lila has found the caulk again. She has stripped the caulk bead from all the way around the top of the bath tub, and has strewn debris in the tub, on the bathroom floor, and out into the hallway. Caulk strips are great fun for her. I thought the shower curtains (two—one for each side of the tub) and the product arranged around the ends would hide and protect it. But no. We will add recaulking the bathtub to our huge “to do” list. How do I know who did it, you may ask. I usually have a good guess who the culprit(s) in any situation is/are, because they each have their own interests. They have divvied up the various types of house damage fairly well—allowing every single thing we own to be destroyed without forcing any one cat to cover too much territory. Specialization makes them much more efficient in their destruction. If there was any doubt whatsoever, as to the caulk bandit’s identity, it was dispelled when she ran back into the tub and pulled off the last few inches of caulk that was dangling over the side and proceeded to frolic around the tub with it, while I was cleaning up the bits she left on the floor.
One treat session is done. This will start over again at 5:45 am tomorrow. The morning session is a little easier, as we’re already upstairs, so I get to skip the part where I risk life and limb climbing the stairs with the kamikaze treat bandits. Why are my well-fed and spoiled cats such ill-mannered little thugs?!!
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