Franny:
What about Personal Care: combing and brushing the cats, administering medications, clipping nails? I'd imagine you might need help with the latter two.
Mario:
Brushing is no problem that is a primarily tactile task anyway. The cat trying to eat your brush, while you're brushing him/her, is the big problem. I learned early on that, the same brush may not work for all cats. I use one style brush for my two long haired cats and, another style brush for the three short hair cats.
The only experience I've had administering medicine involved a dropper. That difficulty was easily avoided by dipping the dropper in some tuna juice or, even their canned food liquid. They open wide with no problem.
I've never had the need to clip their nails. I'm guessing we have enough scratching surfaces to take care of that; I'm not entirely sure.
Interactive Play
Franny:Do you engage in interactive play with the cats? Such as wand toys or flashlight play? Which begs the question: How do you keep from tripping over cat toys, if they have them? Do you think your cats are aware that you are without sight?
Mario:
Yes, I engage my cats in play daily. I however, make our games quite tactile in nature. For example, I found that a leather glove makes a nice wrestling opponent. Make sure it's a thick one. Both Rascal and Sandy, know exactly what the glove is for. If I leave it on the floor, they show no interest at all. As soon as I put it on, watch out!
Rascal in particular, thinks he's on the American Gladiator show. It's to the death, glove, I'll get you! Boy, do they know how to use those back feet. I know we like to think of our cats as "our babies", I do this all the time. But, don't forget, they're predators and darn good ones at that.
I also use small rubber objects on a string like, a small rubber snake. If you want to see something funny, watch Rascal running up and down the stairway, as I pull the little snake along on a string. He'll do this until he's worn out.
In a side note in one of his emails, Mario wrote, "There may be anomalies in the text, now and then. I could blame this on by lack of eye sight but that wouldn't be fair. I touch type rather well. The problem is, Rascal, my male Angora. He just jumped up on my lap, as he often does when I'm working at the computer. Chasing my fingers around the keyboard is one of his favorite cat games. What are those jumping, jittery flickering things, anyway? Can I catch one of them? Wack! Swat! Wack Pounce!! Drat! Now I have to go back and correct all those misspellings."
The point is, Erica could tell by Sandy's body language that she was about to attack. If Sandy knew I could not see, I don't think she would bother. That's my thoughts on the matter, for what they're worth. It's a good thing that, along with body language, cats use smell, taste, sound and touch, quite a bit.
That's where I live, smell, taste, sound and touch.
