Cat-astrophe
This may be something you cat lovers already knew, but I didn’t. So in case it’s new to you, too, I’m sharing it here. I’ve had cats since I was six years old. Now most of my cats have not been as active as Duncan is. He’s a ball of energy. If I could hook him up to a generator, I’d have lights for a year.
He’s got these feather wand toys that I bought at PetSmart that he absolutely loves. They can be interactive toys, but he also plays with them by himself. He even drags them up and down the stairs. And entertains himself when we are upstairs in my office, and when I’m away at work.
Last night when I got home, the first thing I noticed was that he wasn’t at the back door. Normally, he hears the alarm being turned off and runs to the kitchen door to wait for me, chirping and telling me about his evening.
I had to call him, loudly, several times. Even when he’s upstairs, asleep, he never fails to come to my call. This time, he finally came, after about five shout-outs. He came from Robert’s room. I was standing in the living room by the fireplace mantel, taking off my shoes. He ran past me, meowing. Behind him was part of his cat toy. WTF?
He ran into the dining room and started to go under the table. I flipped the light on, and picked him up. Part of the string that held the “feather” was wrapped so tightly around his back legs that it’s a wonder he could walk at all. I grabbed him and was finally able, after a bit of work, to free his back legs from the wand’s string. It took several more minutes to unravel the string completely. By this time, Duncan had run to the sofa. I went and sat down with him and he covered me with head butts and kisses. I sat there and held and comforted him for a few minutes. Clearly, I had come to his rescue and I was his hero.
I have no idea how long he’d been that way. I had been gone from the house for about 8 hours. And what would have happened if it had gotten wound around his neck instead? I don’t even want to think about that. This particular wand has been retired. I won’t use it at all anymore. And definitely won’t leave it out for him to play with unsupervised. I feel like a very bad cat mom. The other wands seem to be safe. Since there is no string involved, there’s nothing for him to get caught up on. So I’ll keep these out for him.
Duncan’s Safe Toy Inventory
