Jenny, as I have undoubtedly mentioned, is a fiendishly clever and intelligent cat. She's also unbelievably manipulative. Not just towards me, but her brother as well. Once or twice a week she does something which has me wondering if she's smarter than I am.*

Except... only in specific areas.

As an example: Jenny loves running up to bed with me so she can get some pets before turning in for the night. Me, not her. Because she would gladly be petted for six hours. But the minute I turn the lights off, she runs back downstairs to sleep. But anyway... She used to head up with me when I went upstairs. But sometimes I'd forget something or was just going up to get something and wasn't actually going to bed. So then she stopped going up with me until I would turn off the television. When that wasn't guaranteed, she would wait for me to call her to say I'm going to bed. When that wasn't guaranteed (I'm forgetful), she started waiting until I'm upstairs and have Siri turn off the downstairs (I tell Siri "goodnight" once I'm in bed for real, and everything outside my bedroom turns off).

On Tuesday night I got into bed and told Siri "goodnight," then Jenny came running up as usual. But I forgot to set out something I needed to remember to take to work, so I had to get out of bed to go back downstairs. Right after Jenny had jumped up to be petted.

She was furious. Started meowing her head off upstairs, because how dare I leave her there un-petted! Then, when I was taking too long, she came downstairs to get me. Meowing the entire time.

So I don't know what happens next. I guess I have to pinky-swear that I'm really going to bed and won't be leaving until morning or something.

So, yeah, she's smart.

And then...

Jenny sometimes wants to be petted while I'm on the couch... but doesn't want to sit next to me for whatever reason. So she'll sit all the way at the other end of the couch and meow in frustration at me because I'm not petting her. I reach out my hand to show her that I can't reach. But instead of realizing it, she'll lean her little head towards me like she can somehow bridge the 4-foot gap between us.

After five minutes of this nonsense, she begrudgingly got up and moved closer because she realized I wasn't moving. But she was angry about it. Wouldn't even look at me, no matter how much I talked to her...

"Just give me my damn belly rubs and shut up about it."

Now, there are other things that I honestly don't know whether she's smart about or not.

Like when she gets a drink.

Jenny refuses to drink from the cat fountain in the dining room. Maybe the moving water bothers her or something. So I ended up buying a still water dispenser for her. No big deal, right? Well, maybe. Because she will never just walk up and get a drink. There's a process. First she sits in front of the bowl and stares at it... waiting for it to move or something. Then she will dip her paw into it... making sure it's not going to move, I guess. Then she will taste it off her paw five or six times... to make sure it's not poisonous, perhaps. Then, and only then will she take a drink.

But here's the problem... she's so skittish that if I walk into the kitchen while she's drinking (or, more likely, preparing to drink) she will run off. This is bad news, because a hydrated cat is a healthy cat. And so, any time I get up to go into the kitchen and Jenny's not around, I will stand at the cat tree and look into the kitchen to see if I can proceed. If she's waiting for the water to attack her or in process of drinking, I will wait for her to finish before heading towards the kitchen!

If she's checking for poison? Smart. If she's worried that the water might be going to attack her after drinking from the same dish hundreds of times? Wellll...

   
* Yeah, I'm sure everybody reading this is thinking "Of course Jenny is smarter than you are." But I'm all... "Well, I don't see her able to earn a living or surf the internet, so how smart could she possibly be?"**

** Oh...