Book of Mirrors

Well, it would seem Romero is going the same way that Murke did when I first got him. When I first got Murke, Neg was alpha, and once he got settled enough, he started challenging him. OFTEN.

Now, I'm all for letting animals work out their own differences, and not interfering, since I'm sure my human sensibilities about such things wouldn't make much sense to the cats. Back then, though, I was unaware of how barbarous de-clawing was, and all my other cats had already been declawed, which left Murke with an advantage. I had read, somewhere, that de-clawing was illegal in many other countries, which had given me a hint about how horrible it was, although I hadn't done any other research. At any rate, it hadn't been my intention to de-claw Murke. However, I love all my cats, but Neg was my BABY. My absolute favorite - I still think about him often. I couldn't allow the possibility that he might be hurt, or be able to defend himself in kind. As a result, Murke got de-clawed.

More research under my belt now, I would never de-claw a cat. When we got Ashira, she was so gentle that it was never an issue. Hell, half the time I think she forgets she has claws. So we never had to agonize about the safety of the other cats. Ditto for when I watched Fuzz for a week - he just didn't fight with my cats.

Romero, on the other hand, is 9 months old, and full of play. As he should be. My youngest cat, however, is almost 6 years old, and never (sadly) learned how to play to begin with. I think his desire to play with his new housemates (who aren't cooperating), having met with little to no success has gotten twisted into a dominance play instead. Certainly the postures I've seen him in with Murke have been attempts at dominance.

Being tired and not being able to sleep with the caterwauling landed Romero in the closet during bedtime a couple of nights ago (something he accepted with grace, thankfully), and while we were out yesterday. I had been told that he hated water bottles, so I went out and bought one last night, since I certainly don't want him to spend the rest of his time here in the closet. The result was that I got MAYBE an hour of sleep last night, before 7am this morning. Not all of this was because the cats were fighting. Part of it was that I was really cold, and couldn't relax enough to sleep. Part of it was because a great deal of the night, Romero did actually leave the other cats alone, and curled up around our heads. Of course, I wanted to encourage this behavior, so I made sure to make a fuss of him while he was there, which meant I wasn't sleeping. Plus, accommodating his head-sitting put me in a position I can't fall asleep in, anyway. Later, he discovered that a cat toy in the bathtub provides endless amounts of fun, in a boomerang-like way. All good things, and things I'm happy for, but noisy and sleep-stealing nonetheless. The cat-fights didn't start until about 4am, so every time I was dozing off, I would have to leap out of bed, find the source of the problem, and apply water liberally. Definitely couldn't sleep during that. The Beastie fared somewhat better, although various things woke him up during the night, too, including the fact that I had cranked the heat up in desperation. About 10 minutes after I finally started feeling comfortable (say, around 5am) is when he felt so hot it woke him up, and he went and turned the air-conditioning on. Bleh.

Anyway, I ended up getting a couple hours of sleep, was woken up by Murke and Romero fighting again, and since I'm going to the Dreaming Planning potluck, figured I'd better stay up. The lasagna's in the oven, and I appeased myself somewhat with leftover hash browns from the Original Pancake House, and I'll have to clean myself up soon so I can go.

For the time being, I'll be using the water bottle when I'm home, and when no humans are home, Romero will have to stay in the closet. I'm gonna have the Beastie pick up some of those SoftPaws, and once those are on, I won't be afraid he can hurt the other cats, and then they can go ahead and fight it out. In the meantime, though, I feel like shit, my eyes are all puffy and tired, and I've been a right royal bitch to my husband, and hope not to be to my friends.

Anyway, this was partially to vent, and partially to let Romero's owner know how things are going. Other than this particular crisis, he's doing very well post-surgically/etc., he's very sweet, and otherwise a joy to be around.

My opinion is that he needs a kitten, when you get your own place. Seriously, I'd plan for it. He needs another cat to play with, and one that's young enough that they're willing to play, and so that he'll be established as alpha from day one. It would be good for him.