This past month, we have bought, and returned, four
battery-operated toys from the pet shop.
In each case, we bought a toy, took it
home, only to find something wrong. In one case, the toy stopped working after
15 minutes and wouldn't start up again.
In another case, we didn't find out
until we peeled open one of those blister packs (peel is an understatement with
those packages!) only to find instructions in 4-point print that said it would
not run on carpet. The only rooms without carpet in our mobile home are the
kitchen and bathrooms.
Another wouldn't work at all.
Anyhow, they cost,
individually, between $15 and $25 each.
The only thing so far that she plays with from the pet shop
is a purple egg-shaped thing that I fill with treats (Temptations, Savory
Seafood flavor no less) and they fall out as the ball is rolled. Even then, she
tries to look pathetic when she pats it and gets me to roll it for her. Is she
good at human-training or what? Once, she did get disgusted and took a hearty
WHACK! to it and got a treat or two on her own.
Last night, I tried to toss a freshly-empty bathroom tissue cardboard
roll onto my vanity top, to throw out a few moments later. I missed. It flew
onto the floor. She pounced on it. She flipped it. She rolled it. Then she left
it alone. On a hunch, I left it there overnight.
This morning, before 5 a.m., I heard this rustling and
bustling. She was tossing it. She was batting at it. She grabbed it in her
teeth and carried it off to who-knows-where. She kept it up for at least fifteen minutes. I'm not sure where it's at right
now. And I'm not sure if that last rush of feverish roll-chasing activity was
because she was pretending it was a kitten to be carried, or a gecko to be,
well, you know.
I've had many cats over my 74 years. And, like kids, I've learned that they often play with the simplest of things best. Some cats like big paper bags; others like to curl up in boxes. Some roll TP off the spindle. Others are yarn-nappers. Who would have guessed I'd get one with a TP-roll fetish??? Go figure...
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