How Dare You!

Willow has outdone herself at the same time as maintaining that she is indeed the most finicky, sensitive, and high maintenance of all my pets.  With a dog who has issues with other dogs and being away from home and another cat who has nonstop stomach issues, that is saying a lot.  I have been called high maintenance by ex-boyfriends and other men who decided they'd rather not date me.  I never thought of myself as high maintenance and then it occurred to me after this latest fiasco.  Maybe it's not me.  Maybe they just meet my pets and run for the  hills.

The high maintenance performance actually began with Percy.  Precious darling has developed a tummy issue.  Three times a day he has the trots something awful, proceeds to stink up the house and foul the litter boxes (yes, all of them) and then slams water like it's going out of style.  I thought kitty had stomach cancer and rushed him to the vet where he received a complete work over.  It turns out darling's tum-tum is just sensitive and he probably has food allergies or Irritable Bowel Syndrome.  Considering what this cat will ingest given the opportunity, IBS does not surprise me.  Food allergies, on the other hand, are extremely inconvenient for me, never mind that I embrace my gluten intolerance that makes me an inconvenience for everyone else.  Particularly at dinner parties.

But I digress.

I have been feeding Their Royal Highnesses the most high quality, high protein pet food I can find since researching that commercial pet food is basically junk food for animals.  Tess, the German shepherd with the tender tummy herself, can't handle commercial food anyway so I thought I was doing all my pets a favor by feeding them the high quality stuff.  Apparently Percy's tummy is even more tender than Tess' and now he's on an even more special diet.  The vet recommended Science Diet I/D.  I have fed this to pets before.  It's supposed to be super gentle on tummies.  The vet also said to just switch the food out and all three cats can eat it.  It's meant for sensitive tummies and therefore everyone can have it.  I took the bag home and filled three bowls with it. I wasn't too worried about Percy.  He actually will eat anything.  I was most worried about Willow as she despises change and every little thing makes her freak out (and express her opinion on the floor beside the litter box).  Puckett I'm never sure about.  She usually expresses her displeasure by pooping in my shoe.  Willow walked up to the bowls first and sniffed each bowl one way.  Then she sniffed them backwards.  Then she wrinkled her nose and stepped back.  Next came Puckett.  She sniffed each bowl.  Then she sniffed them backwards.  Then she sat back as well.  Percy came last.  He sniffed each bowl one way, then the opposite way, then the first way again and finally began hogging out on the middle bowl.  The other two cats joined him again as if thinking, "Hey, the old food magically appeared!"  Willow turned away immediately after sniffing and jumped on the box sitting on my kitchen floor.  She glared at me with one very pissed off expression like I just performed a betrayal of epic proportions.  Puckett watched Percy hog out for a moment, then smacked his ear to move him over to the next bowl.  She sniffed where Percy had been eating, then turned and returned to her bed, kneading it and purring loudly.  At this point I'm still not sure if she's fine with the food and just not hungry, or if she's going to leave me a gift later this evening.  I decided for as sensitive and finicky as Willow is, I would feed her in her cage with the old food.  I'm a bit worried she might decide to start peeing on the floor again.  I just got her to stop that (again).  I plopped her and her bowl of (regular) food in the cage and closed the door.  Usually when I put her in her cage, she eats a little something, maybe uses her litter box, then jumps into her kitty bed and takes a nap.  This time she sat frozen on the floor of her cage glaring at me through the bars.  She sniffed her bowl then looked up at me again, her face promising horrible things to come when I get home from work.  If looks could kill, I would probably be having my face eaten by all three of them at this point.

The world has wronged her and I have a feeling she isn't going to take it lying down.