Advice—March 2009

Dear Sparkle,
My house is full of the best toys! Q-tips, twist-ties, those plastic rings from the milk jugs my human brings home. I play with them constantly, sometimes long into the night. I even talk to them sometimes, even though I do admit that’s kind of an odd habit. But I really love my toys. The only problem is that I’m the only one who seems to treasure them. Every time my human finds me playing with one of my favorite toys, she takes it away from me! Even worse, she puts it in the trash — she thinks my toys are junk! I keep losing all my best possessions this way and I’m starting to get a complex. Doesn’t my human want me to have any fun at all?
Signed,
Treasure or Trash?

Dear TOT,
Here is a twofold example of human cluelessness: 1) they thoughtlessly throw away items of value, and 2) they have no respect for the belongings of non-human creatures. Your human should be grateful you love to play with Q-tips and twist-ties — it means that she doesn’t have to go to the store and spend her beloved money on cat toys, which are usually second-rate anyhow. Have you seen some of those lame store-bought catnip mice? They always seem to be filled with low-quality nip with most of the scent gone, and they have no play in them — you toss them in the air and they come right back down with a disappointing thud. Same thing with those plastic balls with the bells inside them. For one thing, those jingly bells sound kind of annoying, and most of them lumber along the floor, instead of skittering the way a good milk jug ring will. Let’s not even get into those elaborate mechanical toys that require batteries to work (and humans always seem to forget to buy the batteries anyhow). The majority of those pet store toys are a waste of space, and the higher the price tag, the more useless they generally are.

You don’t say whether your human has tried to replace your good toys with the store bought ones, or if she hasn’t bothered trying to replace them at all. Either way, it really doesn’t matter. It’s criminal to deprive you of your fun, and I think it’s about time you take the law into your own hands: go right into the trash and retrieve your possessions! The good thing is that many times, a trash can will reveal additional treasures, such as tuna and cat food cans that still contain juice, greasy butter wrappers and other items of value that humans carelessly throw away. Granted, your human will not be pleased to have you rummaging through the trash, so it’s best to do it when she’s not around. But really, she should have thought of that before she began treating your belongings like they were garbage.