I woke up a couple times during the
night, and each time I did I noticed that Tommy was asleep by my head. Either she’s really good at anticipating when
I’m going to wake up and she quickly gets in place, or she’s staying in that
spot for most of the night. I’m glad that even after I had been gone for
several hours during the day, she still was sleeping on the bed at night.
When we got up in the morning I put
out Tommy’s grass and then took the bag that had the rest of her canned food
into the study with me. I hoped that it would warm up enough so that the
princess would eat it. The last two days have been a struggle to get her to
eat. It appears that she doesn’t care
for the Blue Buffalo Brand. During the night she did eat some of the dry food.
It’s rather crunchy and I usually wake up if she “picks the right time” to eat.
After I completed printing the
puzzles and checking my email, I went back in and got her food ready. I put it down for her and you would have
thought I had done something really mean to her. She started yelling/complaining all the time
looking at either me or the dish of food.
This was the same food that she had (reluctantly?) eaten yesterday.
After she finished her tirade
(which lasted for several minutes), she went into the bedroom and sulked (my
words, not hers!) under the bed. I couldn’t imagine having this reaction when
she was given food and I knew that it couldn’t continue. It was time to settle
on the kind of food I knew that she had liked during this little experiment.
Off I went to Petco to get her the
Purina Pro Plan classic meals that she had eaten during the first few days of
the “canned food experiment.” Fortunately when I got to the store I learned
that the food was on sale and if I bought 15 cans or more there was a 25%
discount. I quickly picked up 20 cans and also got her some more hairball
control treats. As I left I checked in
with Stephanie to see what her schedule was like since Tommy’s nails needed clipping
again. (Tommy & I need to get tot eh point where she trusts me enough and
I’m confident enough to clip her nails.)
When I returned with the food,
tommy came out and acted like she was ready to eat. I put the food in the dish
and gave it to her. She immediately started eating it and finished half of the
contents before taking a break. She was definitely in a better mood, so I
decided that maybe now would be a good time to try to brush her teeth.
I followed the directions and put a
little bit of paste on my finger and offered it to her. She didn’t lick it off like the directions
said that she would. I put a small bit
on the brush and tried to start brushing her teeth. After a short “struggle”
Tommy “escaped” and went under the bed. Day one of the brushing experience had
been a failure, so I’ll try again tomorrow.
It took a while to coax Tommy out
from under the bed. She saw that there
was nothing in my hands, but peeked out and looked up to make sure that I
didn’t have the brush near. When she finally felt that I was telling the truth
and had given up for the day, she came out and joined me in the living room.
Later I figured since she was
already upset with me for trying to brush her teeth I might as well vacuum. I
got the living room vacuumed while Tommy was under the bed. It took some coaxing
to get her out from under there so I could vacuum the bedroom. Once I finished
all the rooms, it again took a while for Tommy to venture out.
When it was time for dinner, I put
her dish with the food, that I’d taken out of the refrigerator a while before
so it would come up to room temperature, on the floor. She was ready to eat and
so I left her in peace while I worked.
When she was finished she joined me
up on the desk. I put my arm on the desk
and Tommy curled up against it. We spent quite some time with her purring and
me petting her and enjoying the closeness and trust. When she heard a strange noise, it was time
to investigate and she was gone.
Later I ate my dinner which Tommy
thought was a second helping for her. Since it was a salad she quickly left me
to eat alone. While I cleaned up and did dishes, Tommy took a nap. Later she let me know that she was hungry and
I brought her dry food to her. She ate a little of it, but it was clear that
this was not the kind of food that she wanted.
Once she was back eating her
preferred canned food, she no longer felt a need to try to bite me. All
hostility was gone and she was back to being the affectionate cat that I’d been
used to seeing. We’re still working on meshing
our schedules, but I’m sure that sooner or later we’ll get the play times, nap
times, and bed times in synch.
We were able to play and enjoy the
evening. When it was time for bed, Tommy decided that she wasn’t quite ready. I
had to corral her, semi-blocking her movements until she finally gave up and
ran into the bedroom. Once there everything was fine, so we settled in and I
went to sleep.
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