Dear Most Esteemed and Knowledgeable Kitties:
Keeping kitties off the counter is good advice. But how does your Mama keep you off her keyboard when she’s on the computer?
~ Mary
Bella: The answer is, she doesn’t! Tee hee hee!
Thomas: Now, Bella, you know that’s not quite true. She does have her darn opposable-thumbed ways of keeping us out of the way. But that’s not to say that we comply with her because, especially when we’re writing this blog, we need to be there to supervise her.
Tara: Thomas and Bella tell me that Mama really needs to be micromanaged when she helps us write, which you’d think wouldn’t be true after more than 10 years of writing this blog!
Thomas: Anyway, Mary, the truth is that there are some things you can do to help keep your kitties off your keyboard when you’re trying to do your computer work.
Bella: The first thing is to understand that when we’re all over you while you’re trying to write, the reason is that we want to be close to you, so if you make a space where your cat can be near you but not on top of you, that can help.
Tara: Like here, in this photo, Thomas is on the desk but not in Mama’s face, because there’s enough space for him to just enjoy her company without being on top of her while she’s trying to write.
Thomas: To be honest, this wasn’t quite enough space, so I’m sitting on the butt warmer instead.
Bella: Mama refers to the butt warmer as her external hard disk drive, whatever that means.
Tara: Oh, I remember those. I bet Mama has lots of pictures and stuff in there, so you’d better not sit on it too long or it might overheat!
Thomas: Does that mean Mama might lose all the lovely photos of me?
Tara: Yes, and Bella and me, too. And maybe even photos of Siouxsie and Dahlia!
Thomas: Oh, I don’t want to lose photos of my Dahlia!
Bella: There’s actually a company that makes shelves for cats that you can attach to your desk, if your desk is too small to accommodate a cat.
Tara: Another tactic is to put your cat on the floor every time he gets on your desk.
Thomas: You’re going to have to be very consistent in doing this. We cats are tenacious creatures and we’ll keep doing what we’re doing until we’re very sure there’s no reward in it for us. This can take a long time.
Bella: Of course, you could give us treats every time we get on the floor and don’t bother you, and then that might help the lesson sink in.
Tara: You can also distract your cat when he’s about to get on your desk. Keep a supply of fun toys on hand, and whenever you see your cat looking like he’s about to jump up in your lap, throw a toy. If it’s one your cat likes, he’ll go off and chase it instead of interrupting your work.
Thomas: But really, Mama can never argue with a kitty making a delightful “solicitation purr” and asking for attention, so we help her all the time. In fact, Bella’s busy head-bonking Mama’s hands and settling into her lap right now.
Bella: I love being in Mama’s lap!
Tara: So, Mary, although there are a few things you can do to keep your cat off your keyboard, it’s probably not going to work out too well unless you’re super-consistent in your efforts to keep your cat away … darn it, Bella, you’re making Mama have a hard time typing …
Bella: But it’s fun, and Mama needs me!
Thomas: Bella …
Bella: Or, if Mama just recycled that stupid paperweight of a dead printer, I could sit next to her monitor and then she could be distracted by my loveliness another way.
Tara: Good luck, Mary, and we hope such tips as we could give you will be of use.
Thomas: What about you other readers? Have you been able to keep your cats out of the way while you’re working on the computer? Please share your advice in the comments!
JaneA Kelley is a punk rock cat mom and award-winning blogger. She is a regular columnist for Catster Magazine, and she and the Paws and Effect Gang share a home in the beautiful Pacific Northwest.
I cleared a space and put a box lid big enough for kitties to sit in on my desk! That seems to help!
Good job! Like I said, if Mama removed the darn dead printer, there’d be plenty of space for me to hang out on the desk. I’d probably still get in Mama’s lap, though, because that’s the way I roll. ~ Bella
I don’t try to keep Parker Prettycat off the keyboard. I created a twitter account for her, and I try to make sure she only types on her own twitter account. Sometimes twitter doesn’t like what she types.
Congratulations! That’s what Mama did for us, too. Well. we have a Facebook page and this blog, and we do have a Twitter but we don’t use it that often.
Willie’s thing is when I’m using my tablet. That’s always when he wants to crawl on me and get his loving. Guess who wins.
My kitties are usually pretty good about the computer except there is one thing I shared with two kittens I fostered for a while. It’s a YouTube video called “Party in the Snow Hole”. It ‘s has a squirrel and birds and all kind of interesting things that kept them amused for 20 minutes. If you don’t want your kitties interacting with your computer definitely don’t show them this one. But it is so entertaining…
Wow, we’ll have to check that one out!
I let my cats go anywhere they want to with two exceptions. Willie, who is currently sharing his life with me, loves to drink water out of the toilet. I try to remember to keep the lid down. He can jump on any table he wants and the funny thing is, beggar that he is, he never jumps on the kitchen counters (there is no kitchen table). Right or wrong, I don’t care. The cat’s rule and I clean up after them. I get a lot of love in return for it.
haha lol GeoffreyHooker .
I loved the “you don’t” answer. It’s exactly what I was going to say. Always remember, dogs have masters, cat’s have staff.
The other words of wisdom to remember in relating to felines are:
Thousands of years ago cats were worshiped as gods. To this day they have NOT forgotten this fact.
As so many others have said, “I don’t”. Our older Ocicat girl Saphira (a surprise Christmas gift from our daughters in 2011) let me know shortly after she joined us that my laptop keyboard was HERS. She loves to walk across it, and also plant her cute fuzzy butt in the middle of it and give me “the stare”.
https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/ac0b9eb0ab83d41d6a4efef2d5909d3da847c98524ec9e21ba88a172defd3cf7.jpg
(NOT posed!)
The worst part is that she does not watch where she puts her paws, and it sometimes it can take daddy half an hour or more to undo the changes she has made to the system.
She even likes to sit on it when the case is closed!
https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/4b5be7a4958b977ae7dee3ed2b2ee0253a9458acf2996800cfe3f0a41fae0dc4.jpg
Our younger Oci girl Viola does not walk on the computer, but she does like to curl up beside me in bed and put her chin on my computer books.
https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/560c20dac7e1c02c2606c9de30640861b55a184f589bc23e276ecc68f77557e3.jpg
I do need to add that they are the best behaved felines to ever own us, going back over 40 years, and are just absolute joys.