cheese-eating sugar monkey & home-again redball

[kaigou]

1. Balto went in for neck injury just before Yule, and during the checkup, the vet noticed Balto's got two broken molars. One is snapped, the other is cracked (vertically, at that). Today Balto went in to have his teeth pulled, and let's just say when the vet called to give me an estimate of what it'd cost... well, that's about four mechanics' visits for my car. That's a serious amount of four digits to drop on us without warning. But since one of the molars can be saved (via root canal) and that's a dental-specialist vet, we ended up spending only three-quarters of that estimated cost. Yeah, like this is a big improvement. Bleah.

After a day spent under and then recuperating, Balto's home again, wiggly as ever, and spent the first hour wandering around the living room crying. Not because he hurts, from what I've figured out, but because he greeted Sachiko, and then greeted Kiku... and Baccano was still outside. Oh noes! His kitty isn't home! ...finally, after doing enough tapping-on-sliding-door (to mimic sound of can being tapped), Baka came running in, and now Balto's calmed down. Then CP finally got home from his evening's meeting, and Balto went from fifty-whiney to zero-sleepy just like that.

Ah, now all is well with the world, mostly, in the mind of a groggy red nutball.

Although he did do one thing that has me baffled, when it comes to boy-dogs: he refused to do anything before we left the vet's. He gave that excited crying all the way home, was out of the car instantly, dashed into the house, barely pausing long enough for me to get the leash off. Then he was out the dog-door and into the yard, where he peed for like ten minutes with a blissful (and post-surgery slightly stoned) expression. I have no idea what was up with that.

2. Baccano is a plate-licker. It was bad enough that CP discovered Baka will beg (and pretty obnoxiously) for swiss cheese, which CP will dole out, only every now and then, in teeny pieces about the size of an eraser... but such a teeny piece was enough to hook Baka instantly. (It's like the stupid movies from junior high: one drag, and you're ADDICTED!!11!! FOR LIFE!!)

Over the holidays, our neighbor made her annual Very Awesome Orange Pound Cake (to which, I admit, CP and I are addicted). I had a slice one evening and set the plate on my desk after finishing; ten minutes later I looked up from my book to see Baka on my desk, meticulously licking every inch of the plate. I yanked it away from him, then warned CP that when the sugar rush hit, the littlest demon might end up rocketing around the place for an hour. No noticeable effects, however, so I relaxed.

Until the next day, when I had a slice (sans plate) and went to get up from my desk -- when Baka leapt up on the desk, did a hand-check, hooked a claw in my palm and started licking my fingers. WTF, cat. Seriously. No sugar for you! I consoled him with some jerky.

A few nights ago, I had peanut-butter cookies for a snack, and set one on the mat by my keyboard while I typed. I look over a minute later and Baka's on my desk WITH HIS FACE PRESSED AGAINST THE COOKIE. Mouth open! Tongue descending! The little demon was freaking licking the cookie.

I have no idea what's going on with this cat, but I can say that I think sugar gives him nightmares, seeing how later that night he woke up from a sound sleep, with a bone-chilling holler. Scared himself right awake, and then carried on at me for a good few minutes, telling me all about it before he finally calmed down. I'm not certain there's a connection (he's had nightmares before, though they're pretty rare), but still. Not like I want a plate-licking cheese-eating hallway-roadblock monkey demon suffering nightmare-DTs post-sugar-rush.

Fortunately, jerky remains the great consolation prize.

Comments

[annotated_em]

*giggling helplessly*

My younger cat, Kowalski, does the paw-hook-grab thing with cups that contain ice. He adores licking the condensation off them, god only knows why. It's entertaining, if baffling. Cats are so much better than television.

[dragonhand]

Sophie thinks she's a dog. She follows me around the house, and needs to come sit on me when it's apparent I've woken up. (She sleeps quite comfortably at the foot of the bed until I wake up.) She also goes nuts for pumpkin, of all things, so I shouldn't have been surprised when she cried under my feet while I was making butternut squash soup tonight. She's also taken off with dried fruit I'll later find on the floor. Can't leave that out unguarded anymore.

[thistleburr]

Our cat eats a lot of human foods too. She's really fond of cookies.

As an interesting side note, cats can't actually taste sugar or any sweet flavors. He's probably attracted by the fats instead.

[kaigou]

Cats are better than television, and make almost as much sense sometimes. That is, it's a sense, it's just... not a sense I've ever figured out. Cat-logic, I tell ya.

[kaigou]

I had two cats that were raised by a dog, and they'd beg for rawhide chewies alongside the dogs... and then would spend the rest of the afternoon with baffled expressions, because the dogs loved the chewies, but the cats were like, "ewwww, we're supposed to like this?" I mean, that's what Big Dogs like, and the cats never did figure out they weren't Big Dogs. They were perpetually confused as to why they ate on the counters and not on the floor with the rest of the pack.

[kaigou]

Wah, I had no idea. Not that sugar is something I want him eating, anyway, but even if it's just a craving for starches, it's still not okay for a little carnivore to be eating anything other than, well, meat. Fortunately he does adore the jerky, which is really just strips of chicken or lamb that are meant to be dog-treats. We break a strip up into little pieces, and now we're finding he's eating less dry food and more jerky... which is probably more expensive overall, but he's also staying a great deal sleeker and muscled, so I guess less starch in his diet is a good thing.

[dragonhand]

I've really wanted to try a raw food diet, but it's expensive, and the cats don't recognize anything that's not crunchy as food as it is. Well, Whisper doesn't. Sophie thinks everything is food, so maybe I've got a chance with her. If I could figure out how much they need a day... hmm, this requires more research on my part.