This morning I gave the cats their treats. Jake ripped through his so fast that I saw him starting to try and get in on Jenny's treats. I lifted him out of the way, said "No," and waited for him to start pouting like he does. Instead he went back to his bowl and started licking it. I found this sad enough that I said "Aww, buddy! You just had breakfast!" I also found it amusing enough that I was laughing while I said it.
Poor deprived kitties.
There are times that I think back to the fact that I was only going to the shelter to pick up Jake. I had no idea he had a sister there until I showed up. It took me no time at all to say "Yeah, I'll take them both" once I found out.
And when I try to imagine what I almost missed out on...
Don't get me wrong. If I only ended up with Jake, I'd still be one of the luckiest pet owners on the planet. But the true joy from these two knuckleheads is the fact that they're so much better together.
In five days I will have had them for seven years.
I can't imagine my life without them.
Last Caturday I waxed poetic about the "Broths" that I've been feeding my cats. This week I'm diving into cat treats.
For the longest time I resisted giving my cats treats. Jake was heavy enough, and I didn't know that it was very good for them. But then I started factoring treats into their feeding quantities and schedule because I needed some way of luring them into the kitty carriers when it's time for a checkup at the vet.
Besides, I was using the Royal Canin treats, so at least it was quality.
Until COVID happened and the Royal Canin were increasingly hard to find. Then I just started buying whatever treats I could get my hands onto. Since the cats were each getting less than a tablespoon a day, I wasn't terribly concerned.
And lately I've been raising the stakes on my treat game...
I've been sticking mainly to Friskies "Party Mix" because Jenny hasn't had an issue with any of them. She mows through them regardless of the flavor I pick. Which lately includes...
I don't know if there's any real difference. They could all taste the exact same, for all I know.
And I will never know, because I am not going to be snacking on them any time soon.
Vets can't come to a consensus on whether dry food or wet food is best for cats. So I feed them both. At 6:55am they each get a spoonful of wet food. At 7:00am they each get a small amount of dry food. At 7:20 they get an even smaller amount of dry food... AKA "Second Breakfast," because they will scarf it all down at once and might get sick if I don't split it up. At noon they get a small amount of food for lunch. At 5:55pm they get a spoonful of wet food. At 6:00pm they get a small amount of dry food. At 6:20 they get "Second Dinner." Then at 9:00 they get a tiny-tiny snack to carry them through the night.
These small amounts of food given throughout the day have worked best for Jake and Jenny, and there's no scarf-and-puke sessions when I go this route.
The wet food is indeed a small amount... 1/6th of a can twice a day. Jenny refuses to chomp anything wet, she just licks it, so hers is mixed with a little tap-water.
Last year I changed things up a bit. After each can was done, I split a packed of "Broths" between them. So it's 1/6 can at dinner, 1/6 can at breakfast, 1/6 can at dinner, then 1/2 a packet of broth for breakfast. Repeat.
The stinkiest of all Broths... and Jenny's favorite!
I added the Broths for two reasons:
A) The fish oil in it does wonders for their coats... so soft!
B) The cats go bananas for the stuff.
Jenny's sense of smell is diminished, so her meal needs to stink a bit. Broths stink a lot, so it's like the best thing ever to her. The minute I tear open the packet and she gets a whiff, she meows and meows and meows until I hurry up and get it to her. Jake gets most of the fish chunks, Jenny gets the small pieces and most of the liquid so she can lick it up.
Then my house reeks of fish for hours, which is why they get it at breakfast before I leave for work. If they got it for dinner, I would be gagging while trying to eat my dinner, then trying to sleep through the stench of it all.
The things I do as a cat dad.
Jake had been carting Mufasa around all day. The only time he was been without his favorite toy was using the litter box or eating. Just now as I was heading into the kitchen, I saw him sitting on the steps taking a break... and he managed to sit Mufasa down in front of him UPRIGHT. Which doesn't happen very often. I sneaked back into the living room to grab my phone, expecting him to move, but he didn't. So I managed to get a photo of it. Wouldn't look at me though. Intentionally looked away!
And then...
I decided I wanted to see him set Mufasa down upright, so I went back through the security tapes. And that wasn't even the best part of what happened.
First he set Mufasa down on the step...
Then he leaves!
Then he comes back...
And plops down in front of Mufasa...
Which is when I saw him and got my phone to take a photo.
This morning Jenny came in crying at 2:30am, waking me up. This is a rare occurrence, as my cats usually don't interrupt me when I'm sleeping. Unless it's an emergency. So you can understand my concern. I thought maybe something was wrong with Jake or the Litter-Robot needed to be filled or some other catastrophe. But when I wandered downstairs Jake was asleep on the cat tree and everything seemed to be well. When I got back upstairs, Jenny hopped on the bed and demanded to be petted... so I can only guess she had a nightmare or just woke up and needed to be petted.
At 2:30am.
A half hour later she wandered off.
After breakfast I nodded off and awoke to this...
I couldn't resist, could you?
Sorry, buddy.
I swear I am not an overly-paranoid person... but sometimes the internet brings it out in me when something wildly coincidental happens.
Which in this case concerns kitty foot rubs!
First I posted on Facebook about Jenny loving foot rubs. So much so that from time to time she will insist on them. She'll plop down next to me and keep contorting herself until I relent and rub her fuzzy little feet. Like she did on Friday.
After she fell asleep I stopped so I could keep working. Big mistake. She started kicking me until I started again. The I stopped again. She started kicking me again. So I became stuck. Can't stop rubbing her feet or I get kicked...
I've probably written about this before. I just find it so endearing because most cats don't want their feet touched at all.
And wouldn't you know it... right after I posted the above on Facebook, I drop by Instagram and see this...
Now, it's not a stretch to think that Facebook shared my post about Jenny's foot massage with Instagram. Facebook owns Instagram! And both posts clearly talk about kitty foot massages. But to have it happen this quickly? That's pretty darn... scary... I guess is the word I'm looking for?
Although I have to say... in this case I can't be mad about it if this is indeed what's happening. Just look at that cat! This is exactly what Jenny does!
My cats are very upset about the snow that's been dumping down. Very.
Jake will go out in the catio and squawk at it. Jenny prefers to meow at it from the comfort of the indoors looking out the window. Either way, they are having a bad day.
It's different for me.
No matter how bad of a day I've had, coming home to have my fuzzy girl curl up next to me and purr like a motor boat makes it all better...
But then there's Jake, giving me a heart attack when it looked like he was going to jump downthe stairwell...
The last time he did that, I had to take him for an emergency run to the vet.
Every Caturday I tear apart my cat feeding station and steam clean everything, throw the ceramic cat fountain in the dishwasher, sanitize and clean the feeders, and wash the cat warming pad covers, cat beds, and bedding. It's a lot of work, but I want to keep my cats healthy, clean, and comfortable, so I honestly don't mind.
This morning when I gathered all the pet beds and bedding and tossed them in the washer so I could vacuum under everything, I heard meowing coming from the living room. I knew it was Jenny because Jake can't meow.
I look around the corner and she's upset because she wanted to lay in the cat bed that I keep on the coffee table. But the only thing there was the piece of cardboard that I set down to protect my table... and so that's where she was...
Look at her all prim and proper sitting there in her fluffy winter coat! Such the perfect little lady!
She moved when I hauled out the vacuum cleaning to suck up all that cat hair and dust off the table though.
The vacuum is a cat's mortal enemy, after all.
Yesterday I had a slice of pizza left over from dinner, sitting on a plate next to me on the couch. Without warning, Jake jumps up and walks towards it. I take it away and say "mine." Jake looks up at me, then starts WAILING. And he would. not. stop. And so I was like "Holy shit!" So I gave it to him. He sniffed it a few times, then left. And now I'm like WTF? What were you crying for if you weren't going to at least lick the cheese off of it?
Jake has been acting out a lot lately, and I think he gets it from his sister. He sees how she has me wrapped around her little paw, so he thinks "Why shouldn't I get everything I want too?" And so he's squawking at me just as much as Jenny meows at me... demanding that I pay attention to him or give in to his frustrations when he isn't getting his way.
I am so pussy-whipped.
Take this photo, for example. I was on a Zoom call and Jake came along and sprawled out on the bannister shelf I made so he doesn't fall down the stairwell again. I thought "How cute!" and swiveled my iMac so people on the call could see him. Little did I know that this was NOT Jake trying to be cute... it was Jake waiting to get belly rubs! And when I didn't act fast enough, he was squawking at me... while I was on my Zoom call...
Which was highly amusing to my colleagues on the other end.
Then there was this morning when I woke up and Jake was on the cat tree that looms over my bed looking down at me. I said "good morning" and grabbed my computer to check my email. All of a sudden there was bird commotion outside the window and Jake was riveted...
Then the bird commotion stopped.
And Jake was very upset about it. His entertainment was gone.
So he decided to get mad at me about it.
Squawking and squawking at me... like I was supposed to go wrangle some birds for him, I guess.
Yeah, sorry buddy, but I'm not doing that. There are limits to your demands, and it's better you find that out sooner rather than later.
This was an eventful couple week to be my cats... what with all the construction fixing my home.
For the most part, Jake and Jenny spent their days hiding in the storage closet in my bedroom. I am always sure to take their food up to them... have a litterbox available... and check in several times to make sure that they're not completely catatonic. Which is a distinct possibility given how terrified they are of strangers.
The worst part was when the electrician actually had to go into my storage closet in order to replace the light switch. Poor Jenny backed herself so far up against the wall that she ended up looking like a little puffball...
Jake held out as long as he could... then made a mad dash for it, running past me, the electrician, and one of his nine lives.
He did recover enough that he was up for watching television with me that night though...
By the next morning, they were both back to their normal, abnormal selves. Jake got a paw massage, which he liked a little too much...
Fast-forward to today, and I arrived home from my Thanksgiving adventure over the mountains. As I was unloading the car, Jake was unloading my first load of stuff, including a box of toys I bought them for the holiday. I guess he smelled the catnip?
Remind me to disinfect the countertops.
Jenny is very particular about her toys. Most she won't play with. Some she hates so much that she dumps them in the water fountain. This time she only dumped one in the water... an astro mouse or something. The rest she was indifferent towards.
Except one.
I got a jumbo-sized catnip toy that she attacked immediately. She was biting it and kicking it with a dedication usually reserved for her brother...
And now? I'm off for a warm winter's nap.
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