Oops... gotta be more careful with those behavioral conditioning attempts...

[cyan_blue]

So Preia loves to drink out of the bathtub faucet, and when one of us is in the bathroom she'll zoom over and wait for it to be turned on. If we take too long, she'll often meow at us or put up a paw and tap it.

This is absolutely adorable, so I started to insist that she 'ask' me before I would turn it on. Often I'll cue her: "Do you want some... Water?" And she's gotten pretty good lately about responding with a meow or some sort of gesture.

Last night emmett_the_sane and I were snuggling in bed, and suddenly from the bathroom: "Meow... meow... MEOW!!!" This went on for a bit, and finally I went to check to see if she'd gotten herself into some kind of trouble. Nope... she was simply sitting in the tub, waiting for us to turn on the faucet. "Oh, so this is *your* fault," said Emmett, after I sheepishly admitted that I was the one who'd encouraged her to meow for water.

Comments

[polytwo.livejournal.com]

You need to teach her how to make microwave popcorn next...

[puzzld1.livejournal.com]

don't you know that everyone bottoms to the cat!!

[merde.livejournal.com]

don't feel bad. i am exactly the same kind of fool.

but they're just so damn cute.

[dabroots.livejournal.com]

I had a huge white male cat for 14 years, aptly named "White Boy", a retiring Southern feline from North Carolina. To him, every day was a long, hot summer afternoon, requiring that he spend hours in the bathroom, sleeping on the cool surface of empty bathtubs, curled snugly inside bathroom sinks, or--best of all--curling his big belly around the base of a 1960's lime-green toilet, where he looked magnificent, sometimes earning the name "Hygeine Boy". He is missed.

[zyxwvut.livejournal.com]

This could have been avoided if you had just gotten yourself some kind of formal training
in psy--

Ooops.

%-}
Z

P.S.: You guys *know* who's in charge at your house. ;-7

[cyan-blue.livejournal.com]

*Thwap!*

Grin...

good one

[cyan-blue.livejournal.com]

Yeah, my attempts at behavioral conditioning do tend to go awry. The other memorable one is the time I tried to get my ferret Tempest acclimated to being held... I'd hold her for a bit and then give her some ferret treat. Which resulted only, of course, in her beginning to lick her chops whenever I picked her up. NOT endearing...