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Alternate title – Who taught my cat how to tell time???

My gorgeous black cat Trouble whom I have mentioned before, the President and CEO of joeware, at some point has learned how to tell time. I don’t know how she did it, I don’t even let her look at books because I don’t need a cat revolution on my hands as she realizes she gets the short end of the stick on the decision making process in the household. Last thing I need is her reading the Art of War or something… Regardless, she has figured out how to determine when it is 4PM every day.

I say this because everyday “around” 4PM I try to get my act together and walk away from work for a short break to give her a little snack. The little snack is one spoonful of Friskies canned cat food[1]. As a general food item, she has hard cat food, I can’t recall the kind at the moment, but it is a really good kind in a white bag that I only can remember when I see the bag and sometimes not even then because I only have to buy it every few months and I put it in a plastic bin as soon as I get it home… Anyway, she gets a little spoonful of the wet stuff once a day around 4PM.

Some days I get involved with work and forget for a little while that I need to do that. I am not doing it on purpose to piss her off or anything, I just get tied up; you techies out there understand… there are times when you get in a groove and if you disturb it you know you will have to spend 3 hours trying to get back to where you are right now.

Well if it gets to being about 15-30 minutes too late… she comes looking for me and she isn’t generally happy about having to go out of her way to do that… Initially she may lightly feign niceness but I know she is feigning because I will hear her stomp down the stairs first and I know how hard it is for a cat to actually stomp… then I will hear her jump against the door to my office and the door will pop all the way open, and she will sashay (left right shake) up to me purring and uttering one or two little demure meows.

If I jump up immediately and run to get her snack all is good. She sees me get up, she runs to the door and then stays about 4 feet in front of me stopping and looking back at regularly spaced intervals the whole way to make sure I don’t get lost on the way until we reach the kitchen where she walks up to her little paper plate that I put her snack on, pops a squat, and then looks over her shoulder expectantly at me… Woe is me if I try to make a quick detour to the bathroom before getting her snack…

If not… well then she starts head bumping my legs or standing up on her two back legs and extends her claws into my thighs with a little bark like meow of “Listen Mr… do I have to get rough with you??? I don’t want to do it, but if you make me do it, its on your own head…“. That is almost always enough to get me going but if I am exceptionally tied up then she jumps into my lap, whaps me in the face with her tail repeatedly and starts putting her paws on the keyboard because she seems to know that that will absolutely get my attention… And let’s face the facts… she is right.

I don’t know who trained who in this situation but I really do want to know who taught my cat how to tell time and where in the world does she hide her watch at?

[1] She is particularly fond of the Salmon and Mixed Grill flavors.