Animal house
We are on Day 7 with the Strip (of gel!) Applying to the Dog’s Eyes, and you know what? Shorty actually sees Jason grab the tube of gel, utters a small, let’s-get-this-over-with sigh and plops himself down on my lap, patiently enduring Jason prying open his eyelids to apply the strip without even flinching, and then trots expectantly to the fridge, where he sits without being asked and waits for his reward hot dog. Meanwhile, when I use a washcloth to wipe the residual goop from his eyes every morning (from the gel – his eyes are looking perfectly fine now), he thrashes and tosses his head, and basically acts like I am tossing acid in his face instead of gently wiping it with a soft green washcloth.
Abby has been an extensive hunter lately. Every night when we go to bed, she’ll hop up on the bed for a few minutes, kneading the blankets as though she’s tucking me in, and then hop back down. A few minutes later, we’ll hear her caterwauling downstairs as she grabs one of her toys out of the basket (Beanie Babies). This caterwauling continues for a few minutes, as she navigates the stairs with the stuffed animal in her mouth (which is 1/3 her size), walks around the living room, pinpoints our position as we call out to her: “We’re in here, Abs!” and finishes her muffled meowing by depositing the toy either on the bed with us or right in the doorway so one of us is sure to step on it at 4:30 a.m. By the time we get up in the morning, there’s anywhere from 3-10 toys on the floor, proudly displayed for our benefit. She is still partial to her ribbon-decorated rabbit’s foot (which I accidentally sucked into the vacuum a few months ago and Jason repaired), but usually brings us a giant stuffed baseball, a Halloween bat, a Halloween ghost, and a few rabbits. Thankfully she does not meow for every toy, and I am also thankful that these “dead” animals are not real.
Sunny has been particularly annoying in the mornings again lately and has realized that the earplugs and pillows over our ears means we can’t hear her meowing or batting at the dresser handles, so she has developed the habit of coming right up to me and repeatedly headbutting me in the arm or head – hard. She also spends a lot of time looking out the window at our driveway, so the first thing I see when I get home is her in front of the curtains, mouth open in a disapproving meow, like a parent upset over a missed curfew.
Every morning when Jason leaves for work, I’ll stand at one of our windows and wave goodbye. This morning I was in our bedroom making the bed and right when I stepped up to the window, a damn grackle flew right into it, making me shriek and flap my arms in some kind of weird sympathetic gesture. Meanwhile, the bird immediately recovered from its head bashing and stared back of me, crazy bird eyes all agog, wings flapping, probably wondering what the hell MY problem was.
What odd animal behavior have you seen lately?
Heh, heh. Animals.
A., myself, and the dogs were startled awake the other night by a fox er, barking? It was the strangest noise. The fox was rightoutside our bedroom window. It was right there.
Bedlam. The dogs went totally apeshit and were running around the house whining and woofing under their breath. A delightful event at 2:00 a.m.
Comment by Artemisia — June 10, 2010 @ 11:22 am
Oh, and Abby’s hunting escapades kills me dead.
Comment by Artemisia — June 10, 2010 @ 11:23 am
My old lady cat does the caterwauling for toys as well. I think she’s getting worse as she gets older, and she definitely does it more often. My son has this plastic octopus with removable rubbler legs (8! of! them!) and she find those all the time and then hollars and wails and moans about them until you go take it away, regardless of the time. Unfortunately, she wails exactly the same way over actual prey and we do get mice and the occasional snake in our house, so it’s always fun to go see what she caught. Usually it’s an octopus leg.
Comment by lisa — June 10, 2010 @ 11:40 am
FUCKING GRACKLES. We had to buy one of those plastic OWLS, because they keep stealing the dogs’ food and then going onto the POOL STEPS to eat it, leaving dog food residue all over the place. GROSS! DOWN WITH GRACKLES!
Comment by Tessie — June 10, 2010 @ 12:02 pm
my siamese does this weird clicking thing when there’s an Actual Animal around (like a bird on the windowsill). it’s disturbing / HILARIOUS. oh! like this! except with no meowing or being calm in between, just chatter/clicking on HIGH INTENSITY until the prey goes away. it cracks me up.
Comment by Alice — June 10, 2010 @ 12:50 pm
LOVE the hunting expeditions. My dog is a BIG fan of stalking and hunting water bottles. He refuses to drink water from his bowl…he only wants to drink water that he has hunted and killed himself (by chewing a hole in a full water bottle so it spills everywhere). He likes to lick the water up from the carpet and get hair and god knows what else with the water…rather than drinking fresh, clean water from his bowl. Sigh.
He is also a fan of head butting me in the morning until I wake up. Then, once he knows I’m awake, he goes and curls up back under the blankets next to me.
Little booger.
Comment by Sarah — June 10, 2010 @ 1:26 pm
We have foxes outside our window too. They SCREAM, I swear to god, every night. It wakes us up and if we look outside we see them running all over the street and the neighbors’ lawns. It must be mating season or something, and it is really freaking annoying. The dog also does not appreciate it, obviously. She JUMPS out of her crate and sprints down the stairs as though she has some possibility of actually getting out there with the foxes. Then when we convince her to come back upstairs she just sits in her crate with her ears on top of her head, listening and waiting.
Also yesterday we came home and she was crouched in our garden, staring intently at the leaves with her ears pricked all the way up. She didn’t move even to greet us, which is highly unusual. She stayed out there in that crouch position for a good 15 or 20 minutes and then came inside and lay down in her bed. There must have been a mouse or a snake or something in there, but it doesn’t look like she ever caught it.
Comment by Jess — June 10, 2010 @ 1:58 pm
Our newest cat likes to take a big bite of blanket as he kneads his napping spot. It’s so adorable, this big-ass cat nomming on a blanket. I read somewhere that they’re remembering nursing on their mommy when they knead, which just makes me melt.
I recently made friends with my dad’s cat, tigger. She’s a teeny, grey and white striped, crosseyed kitty. She becomes friends by meowing, waiting for you to meow back, then moving a few paces closer, meowing, waiting, repeat. When she finally reaches you on the couch she will head-butt a hole in you. Little thing has tremendous head strength, and will head-butt anything if it will pet her. It is funny to see her look up with her doofusey eyes afterwards though, makes me think she knocked them out of alignment head-butting a cement wall.
Comment by parkingathome — June 10, 2010 @ 3:18 pm
Also I had to google grackles, because I thought you made up a word. I have never heard of this bird before in my life, does not seem like a real word!
Comment by parkingathome — June 10, 2010 @ 3:19 pm
Our cats like to knead also, particularly the reeeaaaallyy soft fleece blankets. We call it “making biscuits!”
Comment by lacetwo — June 10, 2010 @ 5:48 pm
Oh, you want to hear about odd animal behaviors, do you? WELL BUCKLE UP. (I was going to post about this, but decided it was too gross. However, you ASKED.) So we’re potty training Eli right now- well basically he’s training himself, but whatever- and after the first momentous poop in the potty we all went off to celebrate with a new toy. When I returned three minutes later to clean out the potty, guess who I found LICKING IT CLEAN? Yes, he literally ate the freshly deposited fecal matter and then licked up the pee. I just… it made me want to die. More than anything else about pets or childrearing ever has before. WANTED TO JUST LAY DOWN AND DIE.
Comment by Sarah — June 10, 2010 @ 10:45 pm
Um, the DOG licked it clean. Guess I kind of failed to clarify that, but I figured it was self explanatory.
Comment by Sarah — June 10, 2010 @ 10:46 pm