If you’re not a cat person, you may as well just skip this one and go about your daily business, you filthy cat-hating ninny.
My new kitty Frank has finally come out of his shell 3 weeks after my adopting him at the used pet outlet center, a.k.a. Tha Animal Humane Society. It’s always a little scary with a new pet as I was telling Berkman the other night, as you’re always a little worried they’re gonna be duds – cats in particular. Either you get a hider, which are the cats that give cats a bad rap, or you get one that wants to be friendly and hang out with you all the time. Thankfully Frank finally came to last week and is indeed a hanger-outer.
Yesterday I went to live at my parents for a little while and decided I warn’t gonna do it without my new little buddy, so with the okay from Moms and Pops (bless their souls), I plopped Frank in the Death Star and we were off to Rancho Relaxo. The air was thick with danky heat and he was a-panting like a dog for the most part, but he hung in there like a trooper and made it to the Ranch A-OK. During the ride, he proved himself to be quite the entertaining and reliable passenger, which I was very relieved to discover. Not too many cats are travel-savy and I always like mine to be so’s I can take them up to the cabin, so that was very cool. Perhaps it was the soothing comfort of the Death Star that helped him remain composed.
Upon arrival at Rancho Relaxo, he hid for a while, but eventually ended up coming out and saying hi to everyone… still need to work on peaceful co-inhabitance with the dog, but I’m sure that will resolve itself in a few days.
When Frank takes a dump or goes pee, I’ve noticed it’s never covered up (when cats go, they usually cover up their dootie with surrounding cat litter). I discovered why this is: He does indeed go to cover it up, but scratches the top of the litterbox rather than the litter itself. He continually goes back realizing he didn’t fulfill his mission of dootie coverage and takes another stab at scratching the top of the litterbox to try to cover it up. It’s sort of the human equivalent to taking a dump next to the toilet and then flushing it. Very bright! I’m thinking maybe I need to dip the litterbox lid first in a mixture of eggs and milk and then cat litter to “bread” it so he’s at least getting some coverage by scratching the breading off of the lid.
Another strange behavior I’ve noticed is he scratches the ground as he drinks water.
You know, I think I might have a fix for this litterbox thing. I’m putting his water bowl in the litterbox.. that way when he does the drink scratch, he’ll potentially cover up his poo and maybe make a connection.