I like cats. Really.
Jun. 22nd, 2002 10:23 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rushthatspeaksI do like cats. Said mini-cats are presently in a ball of sparring black-and-white fluff in the middle of the living room floor, which works nicely and is very cute. They are very cute all the time, really. Raphael is the one with the all black nose with a thin streak of white along one side, and Lucien is the one with the diamond of black on his nose inside a thin symmetrical border of white. They both have black backs and legs, white spats, white tummies, and green eyes, and ears ten sizes too big. They purr very loudly whenever they are petted, and they are very sociable and come to us to be petted often. Ruth calls them our devil-angel kitties.
Sadly, this is entirely accurate.
It is not their fault that they are five weeks old and composed entirely of rubber bands, and that, since last night was their first night in the house, Ruth and I are each running on less than three hours of sleep apiece. I keep telling myself that it is not at all their fault. It sort of helps. I'd start to drop off, and they'd hurtle over and under and around the bed, kitteny lightning, thumping all the way, and attack each other on my feet, or they'd find something to knock over I had thought was perfectly stable and I'd have to rescue it and put it on the counter out of their reach (our counter is starting to look like a refugee camp for breakables, and how I'll ever cook anything again I don't know), or one of them would find a way to get the bathroom door open somehow and get stuck in the bathtub and start yowling. And just when Ruth and I would start talking longingly of violin factories, they'd do something unbelievably cute and endearing. I am proud of the fact that it took me until five-thirty in the morning to become hysterical from lack of sleep.
By that time Ruth was pretty hysterical, too, so we took their litterbox and their food and water and blanket and a bouncy ball and put them in the book closet and put the kittens in and closed the door and put a chair against it and made sure the closet door had enough of a crack under it for air circulation and then the two of us passed the heck out.
I have been vaguely concerned ever since that this might be cruelty to animals, but have comforted myself with the fact that not doing so would have been intolerable cruelty to me. They seemed to do okay, and we let them out when we got up and they seem to still like us. Tonight we are going to remove everything even remotely breakable, movable, rustleable, or shakeable from the floor, and see if that helps; if not, I think we start training them to sleep in the closet. (I informed them that cats sleep twice as much as any other mammal and up to eighteen hours a day, according to the handout from the shelter, but they weren't listening.)
Anybody who has had kittens, is this in fact cruelty to animals? Any advice at all about how to live with two five-week-old kitties in a studio apartment without somebody going crazy would be much appreciated. How old will they have to be before they stop tearing madly around the apartment all night? Or will they ever stop?
I love them dearly, they're adorable, and they're taking years off my life. So it rests.
Oh, and I got a rejection slip for Crying Queen yesterday evening.
Angst-O-Meter: Not that high; about three. I'm just exhausted.
Sadly, this is entirely accurate.
It is not their fault that they are five weeks old and composed entirely of rubber bands, and that, since last night was their first night in the house, Ruth and I are each running on less than three hours of sleep apiece. I keep telling myself that it is not at all their fault. It sort of helps. I'd start to drop off, and they'd hurtle over and under and around the bed, kitteny lightning, thumping all the way, and attack each other on my feet, or they'd find something to knock over I had thought was perfectly stable and I'd have to rescue it and put it on the counter out of their reach (our counter is starting to look like a refugee camp for breakables, and how I'll ever cook anything again I don't know), or one of them would find a way to get the bathroom door open somehow and get stuck in the bathtub and start yowling. And just when Ruth and I would start talking longingly of violin factories, they'd do something unbelievably cute and endearing. I am proud of the fact that it took me until five-thirty in the morning to become hysterical from lack of sleep.
By that time Ruth was pretty hysterical, too, so we took their litterbox and their food and water and blanket and a bouncy ball and put them in the book closet and put the kittens in and closed the door and put a chair against it and made sure the closet door had enough of a crack under it for air circulation and then the two of us passed the heck out.
I have been vaguely concerned ever since that this might be cruelty to animals, but have comforted myself with the fact that not doing so would have been intolerable cruelty to me. They seemed to do okay, and we let them out when we got up and they seem to still like us. Tonight we are going to remove everything even remotely breakable, movable, rustleable, or shakeable from the floor, and see if that helps; if not, I think we start training them to sleep in the closet. (I informed them that cats sleep twice as much as any other mammal and up to eighteen hours a day, according to the handout from the shelter, but they weren't listening.)
Anybody who has had kittens, is this in fact cruelty to animals? Any advice at all about how to live with two five-week-old kitties in a studio apartment without somebody going crazy would be much appreciated. How old will they have to be before they stop tearing madly around the apartment all night? Or will they ever stop?
I love them dearly, they're adorable, and they're taking years off my life. So it rests.
Oh, and I got a rejection slip for Crying Queen yesterday evening.
Angst-O-Meter: Not that high; about three. I'm just exhausted.
