Oh, look. There's no holiday for me to research today. Whatever will I talk about?
Well, I can always start with the old standby - the weather. Last weekend we had record-breaking cold, this weekend was raining. It's going to be warm for the next couple of days, then cold, then warm, then it's going to hover around the zero mark for a few days. Unless something changes in the forecast. And we all know by now that nothing is as changeable as the weather.
I guess for lack of anything else, I'm going to tell you a story. :-)
Once upon a time I had five cats - a daddy cat, a momma cat, and their three sons. I also had a dog and three rats, but that's a different story. Despite being raised together, the three boys had very distinct personalities - you'd almost think they came from three different litters.
Romi (short for Romulus) is the largest, and was clearly his mother's favorite (and he likes to throw his weight around). Next is Julius, the middle child and friendliest of the three, almost like a normal cat. And last, but not least, is Dante, my wild child. Despite the fact all three were treated the same, Dante was always like a feral cat.
I think what happened with him was this. When he was about four or five months old he developed kidney problems and had to go for an overnight stay at the vet's. When he came home we kept him separated from the others until he was fully recovered.
Now either the real Dante died under the vet's care and we came home with a feral look-a-like, or he was more traumatized than we realized. I don't know. But for whatever reason, he just wasn't the same. He really was like a feral cat that we were trying to tame. He rarely came within touching distance and then only close enough for a "drive by" patting. And he startled easily.
Fast forward to the last couple of years when Dante has suddenly become more sociable. The first time he made himself at home on my lap I hardly dared to breathe for fear of scaring him off. He's even purred for me a couple of times. These days, if I don't have my lap top on my lap I usually have Dante. He's really become quite friendly.
Now, I may have mentioned this before, but my cats differ from normal cats in one very important way. They don't like boxes. Everyone knows cats love boxes, you see pictures of cats in boxes all over the internet. Yeah, not my cats. My cats like caves. They might use a box if you turned it on the side and made a cave out of it, but that's about it.
I have a blanket covering the futon in my workroom to protect it from cat hair, which isn't working out very well because Romi likes to go in behind it, making it a cave to sleep in during the day. There's a box on its side in my office that they will sometimes sleep in. The bottom shelf of the extra wide bookcase upstairs is empty, making it a nice long, low cave for one or more cats. I think that's also why they love my book nook so much - it's very cave-like.
Dante's favourite cave is made by a blanket that's thrown over a wing chair in the living room. I think it was probably another case of the blanket originally being on the chair to protect it and he managed to get underneath it, but in any case, that's what he likes. The problem is, sometimes he gets a little ornery and pulls the blanket down, or sits on it to collapse the cave. And sometimes, not very often, he tries to use the blanket to sharpen his claws on. This is where we have a problem.
The blanket on the wing chair is one of my favourites. It's a woven throw that has a picture of a bookcase on it. I've had it for years and although a few pulls are to be expected, wanton destruction is not. So, when I caught him trying to sharpen his claws on it a couple of weeks ago, I took it away. And Dante sulked.
Man, did he sulk! After a week of him being all sad and pathetic I broke down and got a different throw for the chair. And Mr. Martyr won't make use of the cave. Twice he's pulled the blanket down, the rest of the time he just lies on top of it, waiting to steal my chair whenever I get up. Now he and Romi usually share my chair at night, after I've gone to bed, but I guess Dante figures if he can't have my blanket he'll take my chair.
Here's a picture of him showing his disdain for the new throw:
My cats aren't spoiled, no siree. ;-)
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