I’ve noticed that we can do the simplest things only a few times, and our pets will pick up on them very quickly. Suddenly that simple thing is an indication of something that will happen or should happen.
The most obvious and common example of this would be dogs and walks. My husband cannot put on his shoes or a hat without our dogs going absolutely nuts. To them this indicates a walk. Of course, there are times when this is not what he intended. However, once the dogs are excited, he often hates to disappoint them so off they go on a walk. Somehow we’ve managed to teach our cats to beg whenever we barbeque. Whenever they smell something on the grill, especially salmon, they hang out on the patio. It started when we gave little samples to the older, skinny cat, and then had to include the other cat to be fair. Now they expect some of our dinner; they meow and put their paws on our chairs. Sigh.
Speaking of this older cat, apparently I have also taught her the joys of dinner in bed. Mandy is 17 years old and has hyperthyroidism. She is on medication and has trouble keeping the weight on. It all started when I became concerned about the amount of leftover food in her bowl. At night we lock the cats into the guest bathroom to prevent them from waking us up in the wee hours of the morning. The bathroom has a cat box, cat beds, and water bowls. I decided to place Mandy’s food bowl on the counter next to her bed. She gobbled up the remaining food that night and every other night that I did this. In fact, she thought that this was such a great idea that she began going into the bathroom earlier in the evening, meowing at me. It became quite clear that I was supposed to bring her dinner and put her in her bed. Actually, this cat has us trained quite well. Over the years she has developed a very loud and annoying meow. She uses this when she wants to go out, or come in, or go out again. I guess it’s true that dogs have owners and cats have staff.
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