Catastrophe
Most people are either cat or dog oriented. I have always been a cat person. I’m just too moody, elitist, and fickle to be anything but a cat person. That being said I have always had a cat in my life, not always in my house, but in my life. Dear old ma is allergic to all animal hair, or so she says, and so my childhood pets had to be snuck into the house. When I moved out on my own I lived with roommates who had a cat and I quickly made them my own. For the last several years I’ve been living on my own and after the last roommate left he took his cats with him. At first I didn’t really notice the cat void, then I started enjoying the clean air and lack of shedded fur on my clothing, then it was a financial issue, then I ran out of excuses.
I am lonely and I wanted a cat. I began buying cat equipment, litter box, small furry mice toys, food bowls, scratching post, etc. Then I began interviewing cats at a local animal shelter that kindly let me come in and wander about testing them for various qualities such as their reactions to being brushed, being held, lap sitting potential, temperament, etc. All was going well. I was looking for a fully-grown cat that was affectionate to let me cuddle it yet not so affectionate that it wouldn’t leave me alone. I was hoping for a companion pet that would fit nicely with my personality and routine driven lifestyle while giving me something to care for.
I have a friend who just recently moved to a place where she can’t have pets and she has a cat, a cat that I’m familiar with since we game at her house each week. It’s a nice cat and so I agreed to take the cat until she could get her living situation in order. Seemed like a perfect opportunity for me to help out a friend and take in a cat in need. Something tells me that you have already figured out that this isn’t a perfect story.
The move was very sudden and cats are just as negatively affected by upsets in routine that I am. This particular cat not only lost her home but her owner and she is not happy about it. She also came from a household where someone was always awake due to nightshifts and multiple residents so when I went to bed the first night she took her abandonment issues to a new level. She meowed loudly until about 4:30 at which time I threw her in the car and took her back to her previous owner, rules be damned. If I didn’t at least a few hours of sleep before work I was going to be very dangerous at work. It was promptly returned to me the next morning at 7:30.
It’s been about a week and a half now and I haven’t made it through the night yet without her waking me up. The meowing has mostly stopped, now it’s just the jumping up on the bed and litter box trips that wake me up. I’m a very light sleeper unless you haven’t guessed yet. When I am awake she won’t let me out of her sight. She follows me around and gets underfoot quite a bit. I understand she is upset by the drastic change in her environment and I’m really trying to be patient but I regularly imagine ways of killing this cat. I'm stressed out by the whole affair and I'm sure the cat is picking up on that. My only hope is that she will calm down soon as all attempts to return her to her owner have met with resistance.
I was even offered a five-week-old kitten recently, but I just don’t think I could handle a tiny ball of kinetic energy that gets into everything would be any better than a neurotic adult cat. Maybe I’m just made to be an uncle to other people’s cats. That way I can pet them for a while and then go home and sleep through the night. I do like taking care of something and it’s nice to have someone waiting for me when I get home from a bad day at work. Normal people would get a girlfriend but I hear they take it personal when you kick them out of bed.
I am lonely and I wanted a cat. I began buying cat equipment, litter box, small furry mice toys, food bowls, scratching post, etc. Then I began interviewing cats at a local animal shelter that kindly let me come in and wander about testing them for various qualities such as their reactions to being brushed, being held, lap sitting potential, temperament, etc. All was going well. I was looking for a fully-grown cat that was affectionate to let me cuddle it yet not so affectionate that it wouldn’t leave me alone. I was hoping for a companion pet that would fit nicely with my personality and routine driven lifestyle while giving me something to care for.
I have a friend who just recently moved to a place where she can’t have pets and she has a cat, a cat that I’m familiar with since we game at her house each week. It’s a nice cat and so I agreed to take the cat until she could get her living situation in order. Seemed like a perfect opportunity for me to help out a friend and take in a cat in need. Something tells me that you have already figured out that this isn’t a perfect story.
The move was very sudden and cats are just as negatively affected by upsets in routine that I am. This particular cat not only lost her home but her owner and she is not happy about it. She also came from a household where someone was always awake due to nightshifts and multiple residents so when I went to bed the first night she took her abandonment issues to a new level. She meowed loudly until about 4:30 at which time I threw her in the car and took her back to her previous owner, rules be damned. If I didn’t at least a few hours of sleep before work I was going to be very dangerous at work. It was promptly returned to me the next morning at 7:30.
It’s been about a week and a half now and I haven’t made it through the night yet without her waking me up. The meowing has mostly stopped, now it’s just the jumping up on the bed and litter box trips that wake me up. I’m a very light sleeper unless you haven’t guessed yet. When I am awake she won’t let me out of her sight. She follows me around and gets underfoot quite a bit. I understand she is upset by the drastic change in her environment and I’m really trying to be patient but I regularly imagine ways of killing this cat. I'm stressed out by the whole affair and I'm sure the cat is picking up on that. My only hope is that she will calm down soon as all attempts to return her to her owner have met with resistance.
I was even offered a five-week-old kitten recently, but I just don’t think I could handle a tiny ball of kinetic energy that gets into everything would be any better than a neurotic adult cat. Maybe I’m just made to be an uncle to other people’s cats. That way I can pet them for a while and then go home and sleep through the night. I do like taking care of something and it’s nice to have someone waiting for me when I get home from a bad day at work. Normal people would get a girlfriend but I hear they take it personal when you kick them out of bed.