Millie the Border Terrier 360 Review Part 2: The Cats Share Their Views

In the previous post, The Cardi Boys shared their views on Millie.  This is all part of Millie's personal (or is it pupsonal) development.  This time, the cats have weighed in with their opinions of Millie.


BLOSSOM'S Feedback for Millie:

Strength = Snuggling

There is no question that snuggling is Millie's strongest point.

Here we are snuggling on Mom's lap.

And here in a back to back snuggle on the bed.

We snuggle many different ways.  

Millie is a great snuggler.

Weakness = Destruction!

(photographic proof of my claim)

I love to play with toy mice.  I carry them around and bat them under things.  

Before Millie came along, the mice were a CATS ONLY toy.

Now Millie destroys them.  

Mom says it's because she was meant to kill vermin.

She must not be very smart, though, because these aren't REAL vermin.

SUMMER's Feedback for Millie:

Strength = She does not chase me

(this is the disdainful look the dogs deserve)

I had a very hard time thinking of a strength for Millie.  

Mom said I had to come up with one, so I guess I like that Millie doesn't chase me or bug me.  Sometimes the boy dogs get "in my whiskers" but Millie keeps her distance.  

She must be the smartest dog.

Weakness = She is a Dog

This is where I like to stay to keep away from the dogs.

If they get near me I must hiss at them.

Dogs are nothing but trouble.  

Except when they are sleeping.  Then they are ok.  I guess.

The Cardi Boys Product Review: Iams Digestive Care Cat Food

The Cardi Boys (aka Ziggy and Rip) have asked if they can do a product review.  I, of course, said yes.   

Here it is:

We would like to take this time to review Iams Digestive Care Cat Food.

Our Humans brought this food home for the cats 2 weeks ago.  

We DO NOT APPROVE of this cat food.

Before they brought this cat food home, the Stripey Cat used to puke a lot.  And many times, she puked in our area.

Since this cat food, that puking has stopped.  Meaning we do not get our usual between-meal snacks.  

Of course, The Humans have not increased our food and we may soon starve.

GRRR to Iams.  We do not recommend your cat food to homes with Cardigans.

Sincerely,

Ziggy and Rip

When The Cat Ruins Months of Training

Question of the Day:

What does THIS

Sweet, sweet Blossom in a dog crate

And THIS

Sweet, sweet Rip eating his dinner in a tunnel

Have in common?

Let me explain using badly drawn pictures, and a photo or two.

For Christmas, I was lucky enough to get something that had been on my wish list for a long time:

A heavy-duty chute!  From my favorite dog training store J and J Dog.

What more could a girl want?

Rip has already worked on the chute during agility class, but I wanted one at home so I could get a more solid, quick performance on this obstacle.  

I had the chute upstairs to practice in the living room on a daily basis.  The first days went really well - Rip liked the chute and I was able to send him to the obstacle from many different angles and distances.  He seemed happy.

Then, one day, Blossom saw us practicing.  

Rip was happy.

Tail up and wagging.

Ears and head up.

Looking forward to the obstacle.

Blossom watched.

Rip entered the chute, thinking happy thoughts.

Then, like a cat on a mission, Blossom ran to the chute, too.

And then…

Just when Rip was pushing his way through the closed part of the chute…

Blossom pounced on him from behind.

He ran through the rest of the chute,

but would go near it no more.

Head down, ears back, and tail tucked,

 Rip wanted nothing to do with the chute.

Blossom seemed pleased.

I was not pleased.  I now have a dog who, after months of training, REFUSES to go near the chute.  Not just go INTO the chute.  He won't enter the room if the chute is set up.  

I tried clicker training him to get close.  This worked to get him in the room, but didn't work to get him near the chute.  And he still looked unhappy.

So I removed the closed/fabric part of the chute, and started feeding Rip in the open tunnel portion of the obstacle. At first he was even wary of that, but his comfort level is growing. Once he's comfortable with this, I'll add the fabric back and continue to feed him until he's comfortable again.  Then we'll try re-training the obstacle from scratch the very beginning.

Meanwhile, whenever I train Rip now, I put Blossom in the dog crate.  Why?  Not just because of the chute, but because she started to ambush Rip on dumbbell retrieves, and taunt him while we were working on stays.  Don't feel bad for Blossom, though, I only train for 10-15 minutes at a time, and she can watch most of our work from the crate.

So that's what this...

…and this have in common.

Cat Update - Meet Blossom

Occasionally the felines, known to the dogs as The C*ts, make an appearance on the blog.  I don't post specifically about them very often, but as furry residents, I feel they need a little time now and again.

I want to take this time to introduce our newest feline, Blossom.

Blossom joined our home over Labor Day weekend, 2013.  Her arrival wasn't planned, but it also wasn't unexpected.  You see, The Small Human is a cat person.  The dogs are finally growing on him a bit, but he strongly prefers the cats.  And the cats know it, snuggling with him and generally sucking up.

The cats started their indoctrination of The Small Human very early.

Earlier than this even, they snuggled with him, allowed him to carry them around, etc.

We've had 2 cats since before The Small Human was born.  One of these cats was Duncan, whom I'd had since 1995 - when he was a year old.  Duncan was a lovely, snuggly cat - deaf since birth, and very laid back.  Unfortunately we had to say goodbye to Duncan in August.  He was 19 years old, and had been geriatric for a long time.  We were sad when we lost Duncan.

Our dignified Old Man Cat, Duncan.  We miss you.

The Small Human was sad too, but he very soon started talking about getting another cat.

Fast forward to Labor Day weekend, when I (foolishly) decided to take The Small Human with me to drop off some towels, leashes, food, etc. at the local animal shelter.  Of course he asked to visit the cats, and promptly fell in love in with nearly all of them.

After (not) much discussion on the way home, and a brief call to The Husband who was out of town, we decided to go back the next day and select a cat.

We were lucky enough to meet a volunteer at the shelter who came over after work every day and snuggled with the cats.  He was a true cat lover and shared with us which cats were the most snuggly.  Our #1 criterion for a new cat was snugg-ability, so we were VERY happy to have met him.

And this is how we ended up with Blossom.  She and The Small Human hit it off right away.

She looks so sweet.  How could we resist?

And she wasted no time sucking up to The Small Human. 

I think she knows exactly what she's doing here - wrapping him around her little paw.

Unfortunately she didn't hit it off with the dogs right away.  We let her out when the dogs were in their crates, and after she saw them she REFUSED to enter the part of the house where the dog crates are located.  I thought we were in for a very long road.

Within around two weeks, though, Blossom decided she LOVED the dogs, and interacts with them more than any other cat I've known.  This is both good and bad, as you'll see in future posts.

Rip is worried.  Why does this c*t not run away?

And why does it take over our beds?

Ziggy soon called her bluff and decided to just start sleeping with Blossom.  

She soon won Rip over, too.  Amazing.

Oh, and I've created a page on the blog dedicated to The C*ts - which they demanded as part of their 2014 contract renewal.  I'll update it periodically as per said contract.

A Day in the Life of the Old Man Cat

Today is the 19th Birthday of our old man cat, Duncan.

Duncan is an indoor cat, 

but always enjoys a supervised wander around the yard.

It's wonderful to wish Duncan a Happy Birthday - especially since he's lived 4 years since the vet gave him one year to live (bad kidneys).

Wonder what life is like for a 19 year old cat?  
Here's a day in the life of Duncan (in descending order of time spent on each activity):

15 hours => lay on heated cat bed next to heater vent

7 hours => sleep on bed at night with humans

1 hour => wait in bathroom for someone to turn on the bath tap to get a drink

40 minutes =>  look for a place to puke.  do this multiple times per day - deciding whether to make it easy on the humans and puke where the dogs will clean it up OR puke where the dogs can't get it so the humans must clean it up.

10 minutes => eat cat food to puke up later

8 minutes => pee just outside of litter box

2 minutes => run wildly around around the house - preferably where the humans can't see you

We love our snuggly old man cat.  Here are some of my favorite pictures:

Snuggled up with Maggie on one of our 

cross-country trips.

Duncan is a good car cat.  

He loved to sit in the back window of my Honda.

Always the helper cat.

...in his younger days.

Always the helper cat.

...today.

Happy 19th Birthday, Duncan!

White cat + black clothes = sigh

As you may recall from his previous appearances on this blog, we have an old white cat named Duncan.  He is 17 years old now, and his time is mainly spent sweetly sleeping.

When not sleeping, one of his favorite activities seems to be seeking out my black clothes and coating them in his lovely white fur.

I wear quite a lot of black for work (not all at the same time), so I've become militant about hanging up or putting away my black items of clothing when I get home from work.

Spring has recently inspired me to add some items to my work wardrobe, and I decided that I needed a lightweight black blazer.  I ordered two of them, and yesterday I finally got around to trying on the blazers.  There wasn't a clear winner (I'm only keeping one) - so I set them out on the bed in the guest room to until I could get The Husband's opinion on which looked best.

The cat likes to sleep in the spare room, so I decided to close the door just in case he wandered in, spotted the blazers, and decided they were the best place in the house to sleep.  I looked around the room before I closed the door - just in case Duncan was already there.

Then I forgot about getting The Husband's opinion on the blazers (after all American Idol was on!).

This morning The Husband opened the guest room door to find one very upset white kitty.  Yes, I'd accidently shut him in the room.  The poor old cat had been in there since around dinner time the night before.  Needless to say he was hungry, thirsty, and had peed on the carpet (can't blame him).

AND he had thoroughly cat-haired one of the black blazers.

I guess Duncan got to choose this blazer for me.  Fair enough.