For creatures who lack the ability to speak, our cats have developed a large number of ways to communicate to us EXACTLY what they are feeling in any given moment.
One of their more effective communication methods is that of Knocking Stuff On The Ground.
After living with these particular animals for the past nine years I have begun to decipher the different meanings behind each level of this process.
The first level is pretty casual, taking place when they are bored, or curious, or just feel like messing around. They will jump up on my desk or the kitchen table and start batting around things like pens, bottle caps, scissors, pills, or anything that is small, light, and rolls easily. Here the meaning is pretty much along the lines of,
-“Hey, I’m bored.”
-“Hey, pay attention to me.”
-“Hey, look what I found.”
-“Hey, this is so cool! I’m totally stealing it for myself!”
The next level is a little more intense since it is an expression of their frustration and irritation. It usually takes place early in the morning on my nightstand, where they precisely and deliberately knock off One. Item. At. A. Time, calculating just how many THUNKS it will take before I can’t stand it anymore and will get up and do whatever they want if they will just PLEASE, LET ME SLEEP A LITTLE LONGER!
I thought I was getting pretty good at understanding what they were wanting. But apparently sometime during the night we moved to a new level in this process, because when we woke up this morning we saw this:
We’re still trying to figure out exactly what it means.
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