Thimble and Colby Come Home Part III: Introductions

When I got up, after lunch, I went into the pink room to hang out with Thimble and Colby for a little while. I sat on the guest bed, which is a daybed, and leaned against the pillows which are piled up to my shoulder height. And I played games on my phone.

Colby decided the pillows were an excellent place to view the phone. He climbed up me and over my shoulder and onto the pillows so his butt was resting on the pillows and his front half was resting on my shoulders. Since he seemed so very fascinated with the phone, I held it up closer to him. Cats are very near-sighted anyway.

At the time I was checking in on Dragonvale. This has little animated dragons who live in habitats and make money. When a habitat has collected enough money for you to get easily, a little treasure chest appears floating, bobbing in the "air" above the habitat. You tap on it to get the money. There's a list at the top of how much you have in which game currency, and if you tap on those, you get an option to buy more, only using real money this time.

When I showed Apricot the phone with Dragonvale playing, he tried to catch the movement of things on the screen but his paws did nothing. It all comes of having fur between your toes; kept his skin from touching the screen, so the touchscreen didn't respond.

Maine Coons have fur between their toes, so I didn't think anything was going to happen when Colby reached out to the bobbing treasure chest. Apparently baby 'Coons don't have fur between their toes yet.

He not only collected my money for me, but he tapped on the "gems" (different kind of in-game currency) and brought up the "buy with real money" screen. I said, um, yeah, Colby, let's not have you buy gems for me with my own money, and put the phone back down where I could use it and he couldn't. He was disappointed. (Granted, I have in-app purchases disabled, just in case I have no self-control one day, but it's the principle of the thing.)

They are extremely social kitties and do not like being locked away by themselves. At least they do have each other. I got video of the two of them playing together. They like to play with toys, but for them, the other kitten counts as a toy!

I call this one Paddy Cake Paddy Cake Baker's POUNCE.

When I came back out, Apricot was (still or again) in the topmost level of the tallest cat tree in the living room. This tree is so tall that when he's on that spot, I have to stand on the hearth to reach him for a head kiss, and if he doesn't want one, all he has to do is turn around the other way, because I can't reach. This is actually nice because then I know he really does want one if he's turned where I can reach him, since the other rotation means he can look out the window.

He didn't seem inclined to come down any time soon. A text to Ginger got a response that perhaps it was the unknown that was freaking him out. This made sense--I don't like the unknown and it upsets my anxiety far worse than a known unpleasant thing would.

Apricot is astonished.

So I put the CarGo against the opposite wall so Apricot could see down into it, and got Thimble and Colby and put them in the CarGo. Of course, being me, I had forgotten that two sides of the four available were unzipped, so I had to keep kittens confined while closing both exits. This was challenging but I managed. There they were, visible through the mesh (and a lot more visible from above, I discovered later when I stood up and looked down at them from what was close to Apricot's vantage point.)

Thimble sees Apricot

Apricot was astonished. He had a look on his face that rather indicated that of all the things he thought that smell would mean, it certainly wasn't a pair of baby kittens! He stared down at them for the longest time. He did, however, look aside occasionally, and toward the end of the hour (previous conversation with Ginger gave me no-more-than-an-hour for inside the CarGo for the kittens) he was even doing slow eye blinks at them.

Thimble did not like being in the CarGo and meowed at me to tell me so. I ignored him. He had Colby and two other toys, and he should be fine. Colby didn't care; he had his brother and his toys and that was fine by him. Thimble gave up and started purring. Those two purr at the drop of a hat. I told my mother this was slightly insulting, considering one doesn't have to work at it to be rewarded by a purr. All I have to do is show up!

I was sitting with the laptop, writing the previous two Come Home stories, positioned halfway between Apricot's cat tree and the CarGo so I could keep an eye on everybody. Thimble and Colby played a little bit, but then fell asleep. Colby really went into deep sleep; I don't think Thimble did.

Because at the end of the hour, Apricot showed no signs of coming down, and no signs of further interest, either. So I opened the front of the CarGo and let the kittens come out and explore. Thimble came out almost immediately and went right (as in compared to left) into the hallway and the bathroom, where the toilet (lid down), got sniffed.

Colby sleeps silly!

Colby was sleeping with one paw tossed over his head. I've never seen a cat sleep like that. He was so far asleep that it took him a while to wake up and realize Thimble was gone. At that point, he was immediately awake and hunting down his brother. He followed in Thimble's footsteps (even sniffing the same spot on the toilet bowl) but then Thimble came back out of the living room where he'd gone in the other entrance (I have a weird living room / hallway junction. Just go with the flow here).

So Colby joined Thimble as they went down the hall and into the bedroom. My bedroom, not the pink room. Thimble made a short detour into the tv room but, envisioning kittens under the couch, I decided not, snagged his harness and put him back in the hall, and closed the door to the tv room. Assume in all future rambles today I've closed that door so he couldn't explore there.

Because Colby goes where Thimble goes. So if anyone's doing exploring, it's Thimble. Occasionally Colby will strike out on his own, but it's like hiking with someone. You may pause to look at the moss by the side of the trail, but you hurry up and catch up with the leader after the short side trip.

The two of them went into the bedroom, and then explored everywhere. (Well, not everywhere, actually; everywhere on floor level). They discovered you could go under the headboard from both sides of the bed (that's not going to last much longer as Apricot can barely make it through the one side). This was great fun, especially with the bedskirt covering the one entrance. There was some back and forthing with Thimble in under and Colby out in front, playing with each other's paws.

They discovered the cat stairs but not the final jump to the top of the bed. Mostly they discovered that one cat could be on the stairs and one underneath, and this was fun. (Again, something that depends on their size.)

They both sniffed Apricot's food and water but didn't taste either one. Colby discovered the litter box and went in, all but his tail, and backed out again. Apparently he reported on this to Thimble, because Thimble never bothered. Then again, Colby's the one with the fascination with my clear litterboxes!

Exploring my bedroom
Yes, I like Winnie-the-Pooh.

After they'd pretty much explored the whole room, I gathered them up and put them back in the pink room to give everybody a break.

***

Later the same day.

Apricot finally came down from the cat tree and started walking around. I was much relieved as he has shown a stubborn streak previously. (Like he never came down when my sister was in the house.) Speaking of stubborn, he hadn't eaten up until just a few minutes ago. I only infer that he ate something considering when I was eating supper he walked in licking his lips. But that was after all this happened that I am about to relate. (I wasn't too worried about the food thing. He's shown he has a fine-edged survival instinct about food. He may restrict his food intake when his anxiety is high, same as myself actually, but he won't let himself starve. He's got too many memories of what real hunger is like to do that. Er, I hope.)

Anyway, he'd come down and was being friendly cat to me. He seemed more relaxed and he lay down in the area of the living room which, thanks to a desk, has a kind of mini-hallway leading to the kitchen doorway.

So I decided, wisely or not, to push matters. I went and fetched Thimble and Colby again and put them in the CarGo, in its same position on the opposite side of the living room. This time Apricot was viewing it end-on, but I figured that wouldn't make a difference.

Once again Thimble let me know by meowing at me that he did not appreciate the CarGo. (I wonder if he'd be so opposed to it if I hadn't screwed up by putting them in it for the journey home.)

Apricot's ears pricked up. He stood up. For a second he wavered and then he walked toward them. I couldn't believe it. He actually covered about a third of the distance before thinking better of the notion and retreating all the way into the kitchen and onto one of the kitchen cat trees.

And there he seemed determined to stay. Keeping in mind his earlier behavior, where he'd stayed in the cat tree while they explored, I let them out to explore again.

This time they chose to explore the living room. This is Apricot's favorite room, the one where most all of his toys live scattered throughout the room, the room where he sleeps both during the day and, I suspect, at night. (I'm asleep when he goes to night-time-sleep, so I don't know for sure.)

I wonder if the reason they didn't explore it before was because he was watching them from the cat tree. They didn't seem to notice him up there, and it's possible they didn't know, since his scent would be all through the house and as long as he didn't move much, it wouldn't show much of a disturbance in the scent patter. I don't think anyway. My nose may be ultra-sensitive for a human but it's not anywhere in comparison to a cat.

Thimble and Colby were investigating not only the room and its contents, but also the trails of Apricot. They pinpointed every place where he spends a lot of time, and every toy got thoroughly sniffed, and occasionally played with but only for a little bit. As if they were nervous they might get yelled at by the owner of the toy!

Thimble's getting squashed again.

They liked the green cup stairway cat tree, and discovered you could be on the bookshelf beside it and one of you in the cup, and bat at each other back and forth. Thimble also discovered the toy hanging from the cup that's tucked back behind the last stair because it's a jingle toy and Apricot didn't like it jingling when he walked up to sleep in the green cup part. Thimble loves toys that jingle. The fact that it was semi-confined made it more fun, as he hadn't encountered that kind of thing before, I suspect.

I was standing at the end of the desk/wall minihallway and watching them, facing the living room with my side to the kitchen. Thimble came over and was standing over one of Apricot's favorite toys. It's a kick toy that I swear should be too small for him but it works somehow.

Thimble goes weird on me.

Thimble seemed taller and fluffier in the middle than usual. I reached down to pet him and realized he was arched and wary. Over a toy? Huh?

And then I heard a low hiss, from the side. I turned my head and there, against all expectation, stood Apricot in the doorway to the kitchen!

Thimble approached slowly and cautiously. Apricot let him get within the five feet boundary, and then hissed at him.

Thimble metaphorically threw up his hands to show he had no weapons and backed away very hastily.

Apricot retreated into the kitchen, having used up his limited store of bravery in that one show. But he didn't retreat before he saw Thimble retreat first, which is good.

Well, Apricot is back on the cat tree, and the kittens, Colby especially, are still interested in exploring. Colby had been on one of his side jaunts and hadn't noticed a lot of the interaction between Thimble and Apricot.

I let them keep exploring. I wanted to show Apricot when I gathered them up to "put them away" and I thought giving him some time to calm down before letting him see them again would be a good idea. Someone needs to tell me to stop thinking like that ...

Colby wandered into the kitchen but turned into the prep area, not the table area where the cat trees, and a ruffled Apricot, were. Okay, I'll let him ... and here comes Thimble. Who turns the other way and goes wandering under the table. Colby soon joins him, as usual.

Apricot was this time in the tunnel cat tree, since it's more protected. He was watching the kittens very closely. He watched silently as Thimble investigated my shoes.

Colby meandered across the five foot barrier Apricot seems to have decided on. It's about three feet up to where Apricot was, so Colby was very nearly at the base of the cat tree when Apricot decided all right, enough is enough!

Blurry, but all three cats are
in this picture. 

He hissed, and Colby wanted to back away but couldn't immediately figure out where the hiss came from. So since he didn't move fast enough to suit Apricot, he got the hiss followed by a low growl. First time I have ever heard Apricot growl.

Colby practically ran out of the kitchen, with Thimble on his heels. Apricot looked a little confused. He had a couple different expressions at the same time. Satisfaction that the invaders had left, bafflement that they'd obeyed him, and just a touch of ... disappointment? Perhaps I am imagining that last.

I rescued the rather shook-up pair, and showed them to Apricot (from across the kitchen) and told him I was putting them away.

Thimble realized halfway down the (real) hall where we were going. He didn't want to be put away. He wanted to stay out here with me. Colby decided the same thing. So I had squirmy kittens on the trip back to the pink room.

However, they are more resilient than Apricot and have each other, so Apricot gets the primary human companionship until we can all be together without hissing.

Before the second encounter.
Colby is on my shoes, Thimble is approaching.

And I was right; they just fell asleep together. I checked in on them after supper and that's where they were, all in a heap together.

Apricot, much to my astonishment, not only came down from his safe perch in the kitchen while I ate supper, but apparently went and got his own. He's been around ever since, keeping me in sight. I played with him with his feather toy which he was very glad to see (I wasn't sure if he'd want the distraction or not).

But instead of actually playing with it, he used it as an excuse to draw himself into the living room and go over every place Thimble and Colby went. It was funny, because with my misplaced memory*, I could remember the trails they left like I was seeing them walk it, and I could tell Apricot was tracing out their path. Not in order, more like working his way across the living room. He checked on every toy they'd checked out, and spent more time on the ones that they'd played with.

I finally decided he didn't want to play, and started putting the wand away. It collapses into itself, and makes a soft noise (snick, snick, snick) as each piece collapses. Apricot came running over to me, the look on his face enough to tell me that no, he didn't want me to put it away. That's when I figured out he must be using it as an excuse to make himself investigate everything "they" had touched.

I do that too, sometimes. I use a familiar routine as an excuse to force myself to do something scary. Like when we go to a new restaurant with my friends. I eat out at a restaurant every Saturday night with them. Given a choice, I wouldn't go somewhere new. New is scary. But I use the routine of "eating out with friends" to force myself to go to the new place. I wouldn't have to. I could stay home and eat by myself. But the routine makes it easier to branch out.

Finally he let me put the toy away. He did make a few conciliatory attacks to the feathers, as if to make me feel useful! And since then we have been in the living room, with him wandering around and coming over to me randomly to get head bumps and kisses.

I went into to check on the Rowdy Boys, who were almost asleep. But they didn't want me to leave and when they saw me going to the door, they both jumped down from the fish bed at the window (where they sleep, apparently, since I've caught them piled together on it three times now) and ran over to me, purring madly.

So I sat down and petted. I'd turned the lights off already so they had the advantage on me. I could hardly see more than furry shapes in the dark. But I can already tell Thimble from Colby, even with the bad lighting. It's behavior more than shape! And they were very cuddly and made me feel very guilty when I finally did leave and had to shut the door with them on the other side.

I do hope that we make rapid progress so everybody can be out together and at least a mild truce involved!

* I have prosopagnosia, otherwise known as face-blindness. The part of your brain dedicated to remembering and recalling the countless details that differentiate your father's face from, say, your uncle's face, in my head it doesn't work right. Instead of remembering faces, it remembers things and placement of things. So I know where everything is in the drawers of my kitchen and in my house, but I can't recognize my mother if I see her unexpectedly in a store.