Nothing Untoward

Someone reminded me that it has been a week now since I’ve written anything about the beasts in the Cosy Apartment. That’s because nothing untoward has occurred to them. Nor have they done anything of the sort to me. In other words, there has been nothing about which to write.

However, the absence of events can itself be news. As with many pet-owners, the smallest of changes in one of the cats will start me worrying about what might be going on. Renn went through a period when even his minimal appetite was lessened, and I thought that his loss of hunger meant something sinister. He has started eating again, as much as he ever eats, and I am feeding him at less regular hours, or, rather, making food available to him at irregular hours. As well, I am catering to the innate laziness that exists in all my cats. One of his favourite resorts is my bed, so I will place a dish of soft-food on the bedspread. He will sleep or rest for an hour or more, then rouse himself, walk the half-foot to the food and eat it. My big boy will still participate half the time during the normal service of meals, but if, as he ages, his appetite finds the clock inconvenient, I will accommodate its opinion.

Tucker, too, gave me some cause for concern. He had been regurgitating his food early in the mornings, soon after I gave him his kidney-powder (mixed in a syringe of Recovery.) I worried that because it was a new bottle of powder that it might be tainted. But the roly poly has always been a spare eater at breakfast, probably because he has a history of throwing up then, and didn’t want to do that. I switched the times when I gave him his powder, and he no longer pukes it back up. He will still return his breakfast now and then, but the kidney-powder is not the cause of such resurgence.

As for the other two, I actually saw Portia and Neville chasing each other one evening. Usually, Round Po pursues the Nevsky. (Indeed, she will chase anyone she thinks will make a good victim; she seems to see that quality in poor Renn.) But at one point, Nev stopped; Portia too halted and, when Neville made a sudden movement, rushed away. Technically, Nev didn’t chase Portia, but the latter thought he was, or would. Though Neville will think he must sneak by Po, my girl doesn’t follow him all the time, and there is clearly no animosity when she does. She will sometimes reach out and whap him, or someone else who is near (including me), but I suspect she is just showing her superiority in the household by doing so. That, we can live with.

Life goes on, then, and remains interesting in its own way, but the news from the Cosy Apartment is neither startling nor alarming. My cats and I are preparing for the chillier months, and hope that any reports that we need to pass on will be as gentle as the autumn.