mmm, cat treats.

Every morning and every evening, the pets in the G household get treats.

Some people think we spoil our pets.  Really, we just want to ake sure none of them have done anything incredibly stupid--giving treats is how we eliminate reduce the odds that one of the critters spends the night/day on a shelf locked in the linen closet, in the dryer, locked outside, trapped in the garage, etc.

For those who don't know, Buffy recently became mobile.  She doesn't crawl but she does a scooting that moves her faster than her parents realise.
This makes feeding the pets in the morning extra challenging.  Remember the old 'items and a boat' (The Simpsons do it best, but I suppose the traditional 'fox, goose, bag o' beans' is more classic)?  It's like that.  Buffy wants to steal the treats/hug/otherwise bother all the pets.  Dawg wants to steal the treats of all the cats.  The cats won't EAT Dawg's treats, but wll bother the bejeebes out of her.  La Doof Kitton tries to steal El Gato's treats and El Gato is the world's slowest eater.  You have 1 high chair and 3 pets in the living room...

Normally, I put Buff in her high chair while arranging all of this--because of the above mentioned issues.  This particular day, I forgot.  I put Buffy down on the kitchen floor, went in the living room where I gave El Gato her treats and, on the other end of the living room (closer to the kitchen) gave La Doof Kitton his treats.  Then I gave Dawg HER treats in the hallway, after dragging her away from stealing El Gato's treats.

At that moment, I see Buffy scooting her wee butt across the living room with a look on her face that resembles a cat that ate the canary.  It looks closer to 'the baby who ate the cat treat' though and I realise that La Doof Kitton looks PIIIIISSSSSED.

I pick up Buffy, take her to the kitchen were I have better lighting, and pry her mouth open.  I stick a finger in (which promptly gets bitten) and 'finger sweep' until the Pounce treat, now resembling chicken-flavored-play dough, falls on the floor.  El Gato appears, sniffs it...and eats it.  La Doof Kitton glowers from the corner and Buffy screams that I took away 'her' treat.
I consider telling El Gato that it belongs to La Doof Kitton, but I figure that he has stolen a gazillion of El Gato's treats in the past few years, he deserves to loose this one.

I think La Doof Kitton is having to learn hard lessons about the new pecking order--and so am I.  Buffy must be in the high chair when treating pets.

Halloween wine foil anyone?

La Doof Kitton perched in the window and investigated the trick-or-treaters...he actually tried to slither out the front door to get to them so I locked him in the office, where he watched vigilantly for the ghouls and goblins (this window looks right out onto the front door):



I heard noises in the kitchen and went to investigate...
La Doof Kitton was sitting in the middle of the floor with the cork from my bottle of Halloween wine.

I decided the possibility of staining was to great and took it away from him and came back to my computer.

I heard noises and returned to the kitchen...
La Doof Kitton was sitting in the middle of the floor with the foil top from my bottle of Halloween wine.

I decided this was more-or-less safe. So I got the camera and watched him play with this for the next several minutes--and eventually El Gato, in typical pushy older sister fashion, came and nosed in. She fiddled with it for a minute and then decided that such things were beneath her (more like she didn't want to fight her brother for it--seeing as he tends to win).

The night's favorite toy:

(wandering away with it held firmly in his teeth)

Oooh, maybe it will go down the stairs

El Gato inspecting this 'toy'

I'm not quite sure where the wine foil is now, but I gave them that as a 'treat' so I get no tricks, right?
(ETA--Initially, I had given them some plastic kid's fangs as their Halloween treat...but apparently, La Doof Kitton fed them to Dawg earlier today. So I can expect glowing green flecks in the back yard this week.)

Of yogurt lids and things

(I actually started to post this tale a week ago...but our DSL modem fried itself mid-post. Literally. And it took a while to get a new one. But AT&T was pretty gracious about the entire thing and didn't charge me for this new piece of plastic attached here, so I have no room to complain)

If you didn't know, Yoplait runs a thingy where sending in lids provides donations to Breast Cancer research. Given how much yogurt this house goes through on a weekly basis (the critters eat it. I eat it. Mr. G eats it), we are saving up a pile o' lids to send in soon. Since all lids must be clean, the pets do their duty every time I open a yogurt at home by volunteering to clean the lid off for me. It works well--they clean the lid off, I run it under water to get anything they miss (HA, like that happens!) and then I stick the lid into a baggie that is attached to the very top of the fridge by a strong magnetic clip.

Well, recently, the Mr. and I left to go about our days...and came home to find yogurt lids strewn about.

APPARENTLY *someone* in the house had managed to climb to the top of the fridge, reach down inside the baggie (the baggie was still firmly magnet-ed to the fridge), and fish out lids. There was a breadcrumb trail of lids that lead from the kitchen to the office and then from the office to the living room. And the next day we found several tucked inside the blanket that's on top of the couch. And a few days later we found several inside the towel that sits on the exercise bike.

He seemed to thoroughly enjoy creating a scavenger hunt--although I believe he was disappointed that the lids lacked yogurt for him to eat (not that he eats it--he only eats it if it irritates the other pets. He likes to play with the lids and steal them from the other pets; he's indifferent to yogurt as a food--he prefers it as a plaything).

So, since it was apparent that the kitton could sit on top of the fridge and dig out yogurt lids, we moved them. We stuck the magnet smack in the middle of the fridge--it wouldn't be reachable from the top OR the floor. or at least we didn't think it would.

We came home to find 1-the baggie o' lids, with teethmarks in it, on the kitchen floor and 2-magnets and a few of the bits of magnetic poetry spread about the kitchen floor. The magnetic poetry was well chewed--I'm not sure who did that, although there was a dog-centric set as a part of the poetry that said 'treat' which is gone altogether--I can only assume Dawg ate it.
Best guess is that La Doof Kitton positioned himself on a counter/the back of a chair/the microwave cart and launched himself at the fridge--grabbing the bag and dragging it downward and scattering magnets as he slid down.

With that sort of determination at play, we gave up and the baggie o' lids is IN the fridge, on a shelf.

Just to remind us that he's boss, however, La Doof Kitton DID apparently climb up and steal the dry erase marker off the magnetic dry-erase board earlier this week. We're still not sure where that went.
(I believe the score for THIS debacle is Pets 3, humans 0)

Eavesdropping

I was sitting in the living room, watching Mr. G make himself lunch today, that this is how the conversation went:

*opens microwave to zap lunch*

Huh, lookit, a cupcake. Why would a cupcake have to live in the microwave?

*gray and white paw appears as La Doof Kitton stands on his hind feet and tries to get a claw into the cupcake.*

Oh no you don't little man. Chocolate is bad for kittehs.

*Mr. G sets his lunch down on the table and gets the cupcake...in that moment, La Doof Kitton goes from the floor to the kitchen table, trying to Bogart lunch...*

HEY! Not allowed on the table!

*La Doof Kitton moves to the floor before he can be moved. Mr. G sets the cupcake on the table and puts his lunch in the microwave*

two minutes...start....

*a gray and white paw appers above the edge of the table and one claw manages to hook into the cupcake paper and start dragging it toward the edge of the table...*

HEY!
*paw disappears*

You know it is all your fault we can't have nice things. And that the cupcakes live in the microwave. and that the cookies live in the oven. And that the dog treats are locked in cupboards.

*La Doof Kitton looks up at Mr. G expectantly, sees no treats are forthcoming and walks to the cupboard below the microwave. He nudges it open and climbs inside, to nest on top of the pudding cups*

Yeah, I give up too.

(and I ate the cupcake directly afterwards to remove temptation from the microwave.)

I'm not sure when he developed opposable thumbs...

but apparently he did.
How ELSE can one explain how he (repeatedly) got the lid off the container of Dawg's treats?

He would, however, like to attest to his innocence. He says he is much to mellow to bother with things like doggie cookies.

things La Doof Kitton has messed with since I got home 3 hours ago

(It has been a long night. And this list is hardly conclusive--it just lists the things I caught him doing.)

1-A good pen (which I still haven't found) that I left on the desk.

2-A cheap ballpoint (which I HAVE found--he only hides well the expensive ones) that I left on the desk.

3-A hershey's kiss (at least one) from my v-day stash which he stole and dragged around the house and made me chase him for. I've got an inkling there may be more hidden throughout the house.

4- a rubber spatula (which I set to close to the edge of the counter while baking...he reached up, batted it off, and spread cheesecake batter across my floor as it fell)

5-a piece of venetian glass to go with a desk set (pen-rest) that my MIL brought me back from Italy. He stole it three times tonight and I had to dive for the door to keep from having to chase him everywhere to get it. He didn't drop it but did carry it around the office very primly. (he is now locked out of the office)

6-A melon baller. I was looking for a spring form pan in the laundry-room pantry and moved a box of seldom-used utensils...he took this opportunity to steal a melon baller from the box of utensils and put it (where else) under the drying rack in the laundry room

7-A dryer-lint bison. I cleaned the dryer lint thingy and dropped the ball of blue fuzz into the trash...It's now somewhere in the basement. (And think, this means poor Linty [the lint demon who lives in my dryer vent] is going hungry tonight. I should throw him a few extra mismatched socks just so he doesn't starve. )

8-the cord to my phone charger. Although this was funny--Because I yelled at him while he was chewing on it so he tried to run away with it. But it was still plugged in.
So he got to the end of the cord and there was a *sproing* sound and he's lucky he still has all his teeth.

9-A pad of post it notes. (he didn't get far with them because he rather doesn't like the feel of sticky notes on his teeth or fur)

10-An oven mitt (which I left on the counter but somehow found under the table...)

I think I'm going to bed. That won't make him behave but it means I have 8 hours before I have to deal with his shenanigans again. (although we're averaging 3.3333 debacles per hour that I'm aware of--a lot could happen in the next 8 hours)

Ooooh, jewelry!

I came home from work today and wondered why La Doof Kitton kept attacking the bedspread; that's not his normal style.

And then I saw it...my sapphire bracelet was on the bed.
I gaped, I swore, I threatened to beat knots on his wee gray skull and I took it away and went to put it back in the bracelet drawer of my jewelry box, which is when I noticed that he has figured out those drawers.
(Initially, I figured I had left things out where they were accessible, not that he was this much smarter than me. I should know by now that he's smarter than me.)

The bracelet drawer was pulled out and I have steadily been hunting down my shiny bits; the sapphires from the bed, the blue glass beads from inside the hamper (I have no idea how either--like I said, he's smarter than me), the garnets from the edge of a closet, etc.

SOMEWHERE in the house a small plain gold chain bracelet is hiding, I have no idea where. I think La Doof Kitton is hoping to keep his spoils of war as a necklace and I"m still at a loss for how better to store my baubles.