Contrary Cats

My two cats will be having their eighth birthday next month and for all the time I have had them there has been a sort of underground warfare between them.  It seems to be a dominance thing.  Although they were both sterilised when they were young there are still some behaviours inherent in their makeup.

Poppy 'calls' Parsifal who responds with appropriate cat-calls and after grooming Poppy he tries to mate with her.  As he has her in a firm grip by the scruff of her neck she submits for a short time and then, true to her female nature she attacks him.  This is typical mating behaviour for cats except that Parsifal is unable to play his part fully.  It is all a bit noisy and for almost eight years I have been trying to break things up.

However, I have finally decided to let things simply progress and see what happens.  It is interesting; Poppy appears to be the dominant one and for 24 hours poor Parsifal wandered around looking very hangcat and demanding excessive amounts of lap-time and cuddles while Poppy smirked.

They seem to have settled into the new scheme of things and spend most of the day curled up together asleep in Poppy's bed in my study.  Admittedly the weather has been very cold so it is a sensible thing to do.  They emerge to be groomed if/when I clean the litter trays and at feeding time but life is much more peaceful for all of us.

My new spectacles have not arrived yet but hopefully they will be ready sometime this week as all my reading has to be done on my e-reader with the font blown up or with my right eye covered as I am still tending to see double despite focusing with my left eye.  The computer is more difficult and I now have the monitor as far  back as possible  -  about a metre which is where the focus in my right eye kicks in.  And the ophthalmologist promised that I would be able to throw away my glasses and buy cheap reading glasses from a pharmacy.  He must have known that I had severe astigmatism which he would be unable to correct.  But my right eye was deteriorating rapidly so, whatever the outcome, the surgery needed to be done.

The limerick:-

The Marquis de Sade and Genet
Are most highly thought of today;
But torture and treachery
Are not my sort of lechery
So I've given my copies away.