Tips for Possum

Dear Pablo,

Now that little Possum has found a safe home, I thought that it would be good to give her some tips about life with humans. Here are a few pointers to start. Monica may decide to give some tips of her own later on.

1. be adorable. This is not a hard thing for you now, Possum, since you are a little kitten. People find kittens to be irresistible. But when you get older, you will need to be sure to maintain an adorable quality. Grooming is important here, to keep your fur nice and soft so that the people want to pet you.
2. be aloof. Be sure to make it clear to your people that you do not need their attention. Although it is very nice and fun and pleasant to be around your people, it is important to always keep them wanting more of your attention and not the other way around.
3. be polite and demure. This is similar to the previous tip. By being polite and undemanding, the people want to be around you more. This can gain a cat some special privelidges such as being allowed into the bedroom at night when other cats are kept out.
4. always keep them wanting more. I know I said that already, but it is the most basic and most important rule of living with people.

Good luck Possum.

Delinquent

Dear Pablo,

I'm sorry that it has been SOOOOO long since I wrote anything on our blog. Tracy has been hogging the computer since we got back from our New Year's holiday at Grandma's house. Supposedly, she has been "catching up" on her email, financial matters, work stuff, etc. Above you can see one of the ways that we passed the time while waiting for our turn on the computer.

Now, I have to draw your attention to an important matter. Here in the US, the producers of pet food have been making it increasingly difficult to obtain the products we need. I will explain. Phoebe and I have been accustomed to eating a particular cat food called IVD Neutral formula. This is the food that is good for Phoebe's stomach and we have been eating it for several years now. Our veterinary office was specially ordering this food for us as we needed it, since it is not one that they usually carry in stock. But in the last several months, the food manufacturers have changed the rules. First they changed the bag they packaged it in to a smaller bag and charged more money for it. Then they changed the name of the company to Royal Canin. And the final blow is that they refuse to fill orders for less than 200lbs of the stuff at a time. From our vet's office, there is only us and one dog who are eating food from this company, so the office can no longer provide this food for us.

This is truly an outrage, and I wanted to warn you and any others who may read our blog. This may happen in your area as well. AS you know, cat's stomachs can be temeramental and it is not good to be changing your food all the time. Perhaps you can make sure that such monkey business will not affect Tasmanian animals.

At any rate, we have been changed to a new food which our vet's office always keeps in stock. The good news is that it tastes good and it comes in pleasant little round bits. They are very crunchy and bounce nicely when dropped on the floor. So, we will survive. Here is a picture of our new food.