The one where I compare my cats to children
I recognize that people with children do not like it when people without children compare their pets to children. My sister never likes my "That reminds me of the one time that Simba..." tangents after she explains something about one of her boys. That being said, having two cats makes me realize even more how much cats are like children.
Jiblets, being eight months old, is going through a teething phase and we are having to teach him that the coffee table is not for biting.
Jiblets wants to be like his big brother Simba and follows him around a lot, often trying to get Simba to play with him. Simba is annoyed by Jiblets when he is around, but when Jiblets leaves the room, Simba often meows and then goes to look for him.
The recent addition of Jiblets to our family has created a blended family not unlike a stepparent situation. While Prince E loves Simba and enjoys playing with him, Simba is really my cat. We were together for three years before we even met Prince E, so we will always have a different relationship. Jiblets, however, we adopted together, so he is our cat.
Jiblets requires constant stimulation, when he is not fast asleep. He follows Prince E around from the moment he gets home from work. Jiblets will play and play and play, until we stop interacting with him and then he collapses onto the floor out of breath. He needs us to remind him that he doesn't need to play ALL the time and that there is always tomorrow to play more.
Prince E and I talk about the cats all the time. When Prince E calls home from work, the second question (after asking how I am), is "how are kitties?" Even when we decide to have a whole conversation not about the cats, it always comes back to the cats.
Simba drinks water out of the toilet and Jiblets drinks water out of Prince E's freezie cup. Wait, that doesn't make them like children, that just makes them strange.
Comments
Amanda: glad we're not the only ones! :)
I remember telling my aunt once that her 2-year-old daughter reminded me of a dog, and it was meant as a compliment! She didn't see it that way...
My first cat, Maggie, came to me when she was between 3 and 5. When my wife and I married, she was bonded to me. However, she was always my roommate.
Two years ago, we got a kitten, Eddy, and a baby daughter (my wife let me bring home a kitten when she was six months pregnant!). Eddy is our child and daughter's brother. Watch them, and it is clear they have a sibling rivalry. "Mommy! Eddy pawed me!" ("He's touching me") or "Daddy! Eddy sniffed my toy!" ("He's playing with my toy that I wasn't interested until he started playing with it!"). Don't get me wrong--they very much love each other ("Eddy needs a treat, too!"). In my daughter's eyes, he's another kid; Maggie is the old aunt.
One of the cats will actually stand next to you rear up on his hind feet and bat at you, basically asking to be picked 'up' like a two year old. "up mommy, up"
We have teenagers, rrr the trouble they can get into, LOL.
We have toddlers, we have pre-teens, and so on. Their actual age does not necessarily correlate with the age they act either.