Saturday, June 1, 2024

Learning Comes Easy to Some

It didn’t take long on my holidays before I found something the cats do that needs writing about.

Imogen learned the rules swiftly. More than that, she learned them well. The rules about the kitchen bar cats from the counters and the stove. They are, however, allowed on top of the refrigerator and the kitchen cabinets. Imo quickly saw the problem inherent in this. How to get to the top of the cabinets if one cannot set paw on the counters, especially if one is on the refrigerator, to the left, and wants to lie on the preferred cabinets, to the right?

The answer is speed. If Miss Silky drops from the top of the fridge to the counter between that appliance and the stove, then runs as quickly as she can across the ledge under the window, she can leap to the top of the cabinets in the same amount of time it takes for me to demand that she get down from where she shouldn’t be. Once having attained the top of the cabinets, she is on safe territory, and immune from chastisement.

She has also learned not to go near the stove while I am cooking. There has been the devil to pay for such a stunt, and she knows better.

And there is an exception to being on the ledge: if there is something to be seen through the window, she can pause and look out. She’s learned that, too.


13 comments:

  1. What a smart girl! I'm sure she'll have the other cats trained in no time!

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  2. That's what is called a "smart cookie" and she certainly is.

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  3. Ah, she's a clever girl, has learned how to outwit her human caretaker. 😁

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  4. They do like to prove they're smarter than we are. (Although the stove incident sounds alarming...)

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  5. My gosh did she jump up on the stove and narrowly miss the worst happening to her? But here, at least Katoe is too old to make that leap to the counters. She never did try the stove thank heavens.

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    1. One day, Imogen ran across the stove after I was finished cooking. A burner was still warm but in running, she would have felt the heat and avoided it; jumping up, she wouldn't have known. Now, after I've cooked something, I take the advice given by someone on here and put a pot of cool water on the warm burner, until it cools, too.

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    2. I do the same. Can't take a terrible chance like that.

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  6. What a smart kitty, yeah learning does come easier for some than other be them human, feline or canine just my opinion

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  7. She's a pretty smart kitty, and quick to boot.

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