Category: pets

My feet were cold so I put socks on the baby

I had a friend who would wake up because her feet were cold. She would get up and put socks on, then go into her child’s room and put socks on him, figuring that if she was cold, he was cold. I did my own version of this the other night.

I woke up at 4am because I had to empty my bladder and because I was thirsty. While I didn’t make Molly go outside in the very cold weather, I did make her wake up from a deep, deep sleep to drink some water. If I was thirsty, she must have been, too. She didn’t argue, but she was very confused. She went right to sleep again after the unplanned outing.

Were the cats fed?

The last one to bed feeds the cat. Some nights, it’s difficult to know who the last one to bed will be. I am usually the first to bed, though. I sleep for a few hours and then wake up to use the bathroom. If I hadn’t heard anyone feed the cats, I will text my kids. One night, “Were the cats fed?” got a response of “Yes. Twice.” Each of the kids thought that she was the last one to bed so she fed the cats. The cats didn’t correct her. They even tried to tell me that they hadn’t been fed when I got up, so they were trying for a third dinner that night. I guess they forgot that the humans talk to each other.

Scaring the pup, by Mistake

Molly is my constant companion when I am working on schoolwork in the garage. This works out well, until I take a break. If I decide to stop to do laundry, she follows me over and helps by standing on the dirty clothes so I can’t pick them up. If I try to go to the bathroom, she either has to go out, too, or she follows me into the bathroom.

I decided to stop to take a shower. Molly decided she needed to supervise. After the shower, she decided to race me out to the garage to get back to work. Molly did not realize that my daughter was out there, doing laundry. I heard a loud yelp and my daughter laughing. Molly had run past her, then saw motion and realized that she was not alone.

Molly is a scaredy cat. I have rescued her from spiders, lint, the cats, etc. I never thought I would have to rescue her from my daughter. Thankfully, she settled down as soon as she realized that there was no real threat.

Makeshift Wrestling Ring

Two cats and a dog think they share my bed. The cats pretty much are only there when I am not, but the dog will go up any time, as long as the kitties aren’t in her spot.

Today, it was time to put the sheets back on the bed. I sent the dog to the garage. I kicked one cat off the bed. The other cat decided she was going to help with the sheet changing by sitting in exactly the same spot where she was sitting. No. No you aren’t. I called for human help, since that cat doesn’t like me at all.

I use a sheet scrunchie, which holds the fitted sheet onto the bed. It works great, but is a pain in the neck to get on the bed. The first difficult part is figuring out which end is the bottom of the sheet, so that I can attach the scrunchie to it. Then fitting the scrunchie around the mattress isn’t so easy.

I got the bottom of the sheet on the bottom of the mattress and was pulling it up to do the top part. A human helper decided that the dog wasn’t going to hurt anything, so she let her in. Molly decided it looked fun, so she jumped on the bed and all of the work I had done came undone.

I got the dog out, finally. Then the cats came back to help.

I decided to quit for a while until they whole group decided there was anything more fun to do.

I described the scene to a friend and he said it seemed like a makeshift wrestling ring. It sure felt like it. Thankfully, no one was recording it.

A third of the bed

Molly has figured out that she’s allowed in my room. The cats tell her otherwise, but she’s finally learned to ignore them sometimes.

Sometimes, she decides that she will be sleeping in my room, which is fine. She’s not that big and only takes up a third of the bed at the most.

Unfortunately, most of the time the third of the bed she chooses is the bottom third. I’m not very tall, but this does make it difficult to find a spot for my feet and legs.

It’s still a work in progress, but we’re getting there.

It’s raining kibble

The cats decide to have a midnight snack quite often. We have kibble in a kitty puzzle for them to work at. I can usually hear them going for a snack, but I don’t usually see it.

I caught Mini attempting to get food the other night. She was dipping her paw into the puzzle and throwing kibble onto the floor. Then she was eating the kibble from there.

The sound of her throwing the kibble to the floor made it sound like it was raining kibble. I think she was doing it just to disturb the quiet of the room.

Doggie laundry lessons

Because Molly and I spend so much time in the garage, I decided that it was time to teach her to help out with the laundry. She watches me each time I put clothes in the washer or dryer, so she knows what to do. I decided that she can help.

She can’t really reach the washing machine well enough to put clothes in. I don’t want her to accidentally eat a laundry soap pod, so they are out of her reach, too. She doesn’t wash her paws frequently enough to allow for me to let her try to put the clean, wet clothes into the dryer. We don’t need mud on the clean clothing. She is lousy at cleaning the lint trap in the dryer. The extra lint and dust make her sneeze, and it sticks to her wet nose. The only option left was to give her the job of folding. I decided to start with towels. She informed me that opposable thumbs were required for this task. Darn it.

I ended up giving her the most important job of all – listening for the alert. She knows that I will get up and go to the washer or dryer when I hear it chime. She leads me to the machines and watches intently as I move the clothes around.

My daughter told me that I succeeded, though. I couldn’t teach Molly how to do laundry, but she learned when to do laundry. Baby steps.