Dear Sparkle,
What’s with humans and water bottles? Every time I try to enjoy myself — jump on the counter to see what’s for lunch or give myself a good, long stretch on the side of the sofa — out comes that confounded water bottle and I get squirted! Fortunately the humans have to go away for much of the day to their “work” thing, otherwise I’d never be able to have fun. Is there some way to make them stop squirting water at me?
Signed,
All Wet
Dear All Wet,
Even if you are not thrilled with your present situation, trust me, you are getting the last laugh. Humans have wasted many cat generations — not to mention a couple of human ones — trying to bend kitties to their will by squirting them with water bottles. And the funny thing is, it doesn’t work! Oh sure, it works when they are at home and near a water bottle. But as you have noted, when they are not around, you have free reign to do whatever you want, with no risk of getting wet. If humans really wanted us cats to stop counter diving or clawing the furniture, they would find better ways for us to occupy our time — maybe buy us fancy cat trees and deluxe scratching surfaces, or build cat shelves for us to hang out on in lieu of counters. But no, they think that as long as we are not “misbehaving” when they are there, we are always doing what they want! They must believe that if they can’t see it, it doesn’t exist — how self-centered can you get?
About the only advice I can give you regarding the water bottle is to knock it down and roll it under the sofa before you start clawing it. But really, who cares about the stupid thing, when you can do whatever you want the moment the humans walk out the door or go to sleep? Chances are that nothing you do can change this bad habit of your humans, because they are not bright enough to come up with a real solution. Didn’t some famous human once say “The definition of insanity is doing something over and over again and expecting different results?” Well, the whole water bottle thing proves that humans are insane.
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Just be mad and show it! Humans might get scared and won’t do the squirt bottle ever again.
The Squirt is not the best way ta go. A gentle removal from the counter or other “wrong” places is better. We learned that way, an we are happy about it.
Mum tried the squirty bottle on us years ago but we like water so much we thought it was a game.
Omg, you are so smart!Words full of wisdom my friend…indeed! 🙂
I wish you a lovely weekend,
purrs
Luna
We all get squirted occasionally, but in reality we rule the house so we’re allowed almost anywhere. What we really hate is the rattley jar of coins that startles the pants offa us. Daddy uses that when we spat.
You always give such great advice Sparkle! We used to get squirted when we were little but it didn’t really work so it didn’t last long. We rule the roost anyway.
Mom never used the water bottle on us. We’ve got a tall condo with sisal posts which is great, but that wing back chair is really special. Not sure why. Mom does a combo of all above when we get going on the chair. First she yells NO, which scares us, then she sweeps in and scoops up the one who is guilty and squeezes us real hard in “Corporal Cuddling” (thank you Cat) while carrying us to the condo where we show her that, yes, we like the sisal, too.
I tried the water bottle with Casper because he is deaf and clapping hands or saying a stern “no” does not work with him. But he always looked so hurt when I squirted him in the flank that I didn’t have the heart to continue. Casper doesn’t really love to be picked up, so now he gets “corporal cuddling” when he is naughty 🙂
As always, wise advice from Dear Sparkle. And hoomins really aren’t very bright, are they?
Oh Sparkle, you are so right!! In order for the humans to stop us from doing stuff they don’t want us doing, they have to watch us 24/7 and we know that’s impossible!!
(Actually, our animal behavorist told our mom that squirting us with a water bottle is not a good thing to do because it doesn’t promote positive reinforcement which is better. So our mom rarely uses a water bottle on us anymore.)
Ichiro–will you stop bothering Sparkle. I told you the same thing when you last got squirted…
Mom finally gave up trying to keep us off of the counter tops and breakfast bar. She said that is why man invented soap and disinfectant wipes! The only time we get in trouble is if we jump on top of the stove or if one of us jumps inside the warm dryer!
Wow, that sounds like good advise, we don’t have one of those at our house, really, we’re all pretty well behaved!
Oh, I knew it!!!! Sparkle, thanks for confirming. I kind of suspected mom was insane but didn’t really want to meow anything about it. You should see the parties we have around here when mom leaves and tells Grete to “babysit”!
That is such good advice Sparkle. Our mom hasn’t used a water bottle yet and we sure don’t want her to start. We are a little spooky anyway, so all she has to do is raise her voice and we are long gone. But that was some good advice. We will remember that. Have a terrific day.
We are going to delete your blog today Sparkle – we don’t want mum getting ideas about squirting water!!
Excellent advice. I used to get squired too, but now I only do those things when no one is looking! he he
Milo gets squirted all da time. Does dat make him a little squirt? Hahahahhaahaaaa!
Alfie xx