I think maybe our barn cats are getting spoiled. One of them, at least. I saw a cute kitty picture on
Maple's blog this morning that reminded me of a story I meant to tell you a few days ago. We've been having some pretty cold temperatures here lately at times, and so I have to carry water to the critters that don't have tank heaters. One of our cats, Geronimo, sometimes follows me around. One of the cold mornings when the water in the pans was frozen, I was carrying a bucket of water. Sometimes if the bucket isn't very full, after I ask Geronimo if he wants a drink, I'll set it down on the ground and tip the water up to the edge so he can reach it better. Then he'll drink and drink and drink. I guess when you're lapping with a cat-size tongue, it takes awhile to get over being thirsty. Anyway, that morning the bucket was pretty full, so I just set it down without tipping it over for him. He peered over the edge of the bucket, but decided it would just simply be too much trouble to stretch over to reach it and just sat there. I watched him for a second, and then having been trained as well as I am, I leaned down and tipped the bucket over a little. Now that he didn't have to stretch those few inches, Geronimo began to drink. (Never mind how many inches I stretched down to reach the bucket.) One evening then after this, he proved he was spoiled and not just stretch-challenged. There was some water down toward the bottom of a bucket in the barn where we feed the cats. I had gone outside to do something, and when I came back in, I saw Geronimo using one paw to tip the water bucket over and then reaching down to the bottom to get a drink! I guess he figured since I wasn't in there, he'd just have to do it himself. Spoiled, I tell ya!
The reason? Monkey the Pig, er, I mean Goat, has developed a taste for cat food. If Geronimo is eating anywhere she can reach, the next thing you know, she's stealing his food.
Don't worry, this particular sack she's diving into is cracked corn. I try to keep her out of the cat food if possible. It surely can't be good for her, can it? If I don't close the lid on the barrel where the cat food is when I leave the barn for a minute, upon my return I find her trying to get into that sack, too. One night when the wheel barrow was parked beside the feed barrel, she managed to climb high enough to reach Geronimo's "out-of-reach" shelf anyway.
