Day 90: Sharing a bed with cats

Between You, Me and the Lamp Post

Day 90: Sharing a bed with cats

I’m quite sure that cat lovers are familiar with cats sleeping on their bed. They curl up in the middle of it, at the foot end, or snuggle between the pillows. Seeing them fast asleep is cute and we don’t want to wake them.

It’s a different story when we want to go to sleep and there is no room for us to get into bed, or to get comfortable.

Take last night for instance. It was 1:00 a.m., I wanted to go to sleep, but … there were four cats on my bed. 

Halley got up when she saw me coming, but Charlotte, Holly and Greyson gave no sign of moving.

Somehow I managed to squeeze myself under the duvet and lay down. That is to say, I tried to get into a comfortable position, but I but couldn’t stretch out because Greyson and Charlotte were side by side at the foot end of the bed.

Holly, who was on the other side of the bed, lifted her head and glared at me as if to say … you woke me up. 'Sorry,' I whispered, and she went back to sleep.

When my legs cramped up, I ever so carefully stretched them out, my feet under Greyson and Charlotte. If you think those two moved, think again. I got absolutely no reaction.

Still not comfortable, I moved my feet from here to there, causing Charlotte and Greyson to bounce and roll around a bit. Charlotte didn’t care, she was obviously of the opinion … go with the flow, but Greyson eventually lifted his head. The message he sent me was clear … do you mind, we’re trying to sleep. Yeah well, so was I.

About ten minutes later Greyson got up and came to kiss me goodnight, as he does every night. A kiss on my right cheek, a kiss on my left cheek and another kiss on my right cheek. Next, he lay down on my chest. “Greyson you have to move,” I told him. “You’re too heavy.” I wasn’t kidding, Greyson weighs a good 20 lbs and is as such quite heavy. Fine, he moved.

As I turned on my side, he moved with me and curled up against my chest, right under my chin. Now I had a different problem … his whiskers were tickling my nose and cheek. When that brought on a sneeze attack, Greyson had the good sense to move.

Now it was Charlotte’s turn. She got up from the foot end of the bed and joined me under the duvet. She stretched out behind me and I prepared for sleep. Well, that didn’t work at all. Every time I moved, I got a kick in my back.

Meanwhile, Holly who slept on my other side had finally drifted off and produced all kinds of sound effects. Don’t imagine a gentle purring, she was snoring, sputtering and sighing.

Sleeping with cats, I tell ya, it’s no joke. It's a shame I don't fit into one of their cat baskets. Maybe I would find some peace and quiet there.

    

Day 67: Sleeping with cats

Between You, Me and the Lamp Post

Day 67: Sleeping with cats

Yesterday someone posted on Facebook “Do you let your cats sleep on your bed?” That got a chuckle from me. A better question would have been “Do your cats let you sleep in your bed?”

For me, it’s every night more or less a battle. I have four cats, and they all want to sleep with me. When I go to bed, Halley and Charlotte are fast asleep at the foot end of the bed, while Holly and Greyson are near the pillows.

When I ask “Guys, can I get a spot?” they raise their heads and seem to say ... you can try. Which I do. I squeeze my way under the duvet as to not disturb them and often find myself in an uncomfortable position.

I try to get comfortable, but my four little buggers don’t move. When I stick my feet under Charlotte and try to get her to move, she bobs up and down and goes with the flow. Meanwhile, Halley gives me a look that says ... will you leave her alone, she’s sleeping.

Okay so eventually I’m ready for sleep, but now comes the next phase. Every night, and I do mean every night, Greyson comes and sits on my chest and nibbles on my ears. This can take anywhere from one minute to ten minutes. This taken care of, he gives me kisses. And he kisses like the French ... first right, then left, then right again. Then he moves to go to sleep.

I turn over and try to go to sleep as well. I do say try because it’s not that easy. Now Holly makes it known that she wants to be petted. Obligingly I pet her head, her cheeks, and her body. Sometimes she has enough after a little while, other times as soon as I stop she touches my hand with her paw as if to say ... keep going.

Finally, finally, everyone is happy and I can go to sleep. Sometimes that works, other times one of them throws a spanner in the wheel. Like yesterday for instance. I was drifting off nicely when suddenly ... wham, I got hit in the face by a tail. Charlotte must have been dreaming, must have been upset in her dream, because her tail was swooshing and I was on the receiving end of it.

Sleeping with cats ... let me tell you, it’s not that easy. They take up all the space, they clamber all over you, they walk over your hair, they come and purr in your ear ... but ... now that it’s getting colder, they keep you nice and warm.

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Day 11: Catching those zzzzz’s

Between You, me and the Lamp Post

Day 11: Catching those zzzzz’s

I’ve started a new job. Nothing to get excited about as it is temporary work, not a full-time job. Why do temp work rather than a permanent position …

At my age nobody will hire me anymore. They can say all they want that age discrimination is dead, I can assure you, it’s very much alive. If I apply for a position and a beautiful twenty something applies for the same position, guess who will get hired.

So I gave up the search for a full-time job and concentrated on temp work. Over the years I build up a reputation and now certain companies as for me by name to come back again, and again, and again.

The company I’m currently working for is one of my least favorites. There’s hardly anything to do and at times I’m so bored I could climb the walls.

And I’m not the only one who is bored.

Take Susan for instance. Susan, an administrative assistant, has her cubicle in a quiet part of the office. By quiet part I mean, not much foot traffic.

Yesterday I needed her help for something and made my way to her desk. When I got there I found Susan bend over her desk, her head propped up on her right hand. She appeared to be reading a document in front of her.

When Susan didn’t acknowledge me I figured that she couldn’t see me, so I moved in a little closer. When there was still no reaction I leaned in and found Susan … fast asleep.

I wasn’t sure what to do. Should I wake her and quietly make my way back to my desk and ask for her help later? As I started to back away, Susan suddenly woke up with a jolt.

Later that afternoon I returned a file to Susan, found her sitting back in her chair, once again … fast asleep. She obviously must have been very tired.

When it was time for us to go home, we congregated by the elevators. Alfred asked Susan how her day had been. “Oh I’ve been so busy I hardly know what to do first,” she said. I didn’t dare looking at her for fear of bursting out laughing.

Then again, Susan is hardly the only one who falls asleep on the job. A few years ago I worked for the Justice Office of Ontario. Every month the Justices of the Peace held a meeting to keep each other up to date on what was happening in the courts. As the minute taker I found this exciting at first, but it quickly got boring. (You try listening to them quibble about how many pleats a Justice of the Peace’s robe should have.)

Apparently I wasn’t the only one who was bored with the meeting. The conversation was suddenly interrupted by a loud bang, followed by hilarious laughter. One of the Justices of the Peace had fallen asleep, tumbled off his chair and was now under the table. After the man had clambered back onto his chair it was decided that we should break for lunch.

Strange isn’t it, plenty of people suffer from insomnia, but where it comes to napping, they have no problem catching those zzzzzz’s.

Day 129: Bed acrobatics

My Project: 365 Creative Writing Prompts

Day 129: Bed acrobatics

When bedtime comes around, everyone has their own routine. Some people take a shower, others make a cup of chamomile tea, while others still read a few pages of a book to calm down. Me, I count my cats before turning in.

Most of the time, finding them is no trouble at all. Charlotte usually sleeps curled up by Dieter’s feet while Gabriel, Holly, and Halley are already on my bed. As such, getting into bed requires some acrobatics on my part. With a cat here and a cat there, getting a space to lie down takes a certain amount a sliding, twisting and turning to get under the duvet.

While some cats get up at the slightest movement, Gabriel, Holly, and Halley are like rocks, they don’t move an inch. I can push them, put a foot under them and try to lift them, it makes no difference whatsoever.

As soon as I turn off the light there’s movement though. Holly comes and drapes herself on my chest. Not only is this a considerable weight, it’s also quite warm. Welcome in winter, but not so much now in summer. Meanwhile, Halley likes to position herself on my head. Another source of heat.

Smart as they are, they know my routine though. As long as I’m on my back they can expect to be petted, but once I turn on my side, I want to go to sleep. So, they move. Now there’s another problem though … purring and snoring.

Holly likes to share my pillow, which is fine, but with her happy noises, it sounds like there’s a helicopter hovering near my head. As for Halley, she’s only a big baby, but her purring reaches quite a few decibels.

In the morning things are quite different.

Charlotte and Holly are late sleepers, but Gabriel and Halley rise with the sun. They seem of the opinion when we’re up everybody should be up. As such, Gabriel starts meowing, only he doesn’t meow like a normal cat, he pronounces meow as mayo, as in mayonnaise. When I try to shush him, he adds a few decibels. Not that I have any intention of getting up at whatever time he starts his nonsense.

Halley never asks for food, she knows she’ll get her breakfast in good time and until then she plays with her favorite toy, a plastic spring. Unfortunately, we have hardwood as flooring and when she chases the spring her nails make a scratching noise. It’s like an army of mice running around.

Eventually, I give up and get up.

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Day 47: Cats and their quirks

My Project: 365 Creative Writing Prompts

Day 47: Cats and their quirks

Today is one of those rare days that I have nothing to do. No articles to write, no emails to answer, no research to do, and the prompt I’m supposed to write about doesn’t appeal to me. So, I’ll do what I always do when I’m short on inspiration … I write about my cat family, you could call them my four muses.

Right this moment, the fire alarm is being tested in my condo building. A series of sharp peep, peep, peep, sounds amounting to several decibels fit to pierce an eardrum.

While this is merely annoying for me, my cats are terrified of this noise. Charlotte is hiding under the duvet of my bed, Mickey is under the bed, Holly is more annoyed than scared that she can’t go to sleep, and Gabriel … well, Gabriel is Gabriel, he couldn’t care less. As far as Gabe is concerned, the fire alarm could be accompanied by an earthquake and a tornado and he wouldn’t care. As long as he has his basket it’s alright with him.

On the subject of sleeping … last night I came close to waking up Dieter. He was snoring again. Before I go any further, let me explain.

There was a time that Dieter snored every night, and by snoring, I mean SNORING. Several times a night, I had to get out of bed to go and wake him up because even with the door of his bedroom closed, the noise came through the walls to the point that it woke me out of a sound sleep.

He tried nose strips, I tried earplugs … nothing helped. Then I read that snoring is often caused by dry air in the bedroom. When I mentioned this to Dieter, he went and bought a humidifier. And low and behold, it worked. From day one, no more snoring. So, from then on, night after night Dieter switched on his humidifier and we were both able to get a good night sleep.

Until last night that is. Shortly after he’d gone to bed, I heard snoring. This surprised me because all these months he’d been so quiet. Did he perhaps forget to switch on his humidifier?

I was about to get up when I noticed that the snoring noise didn’t come from Dieter’s bedroom but from the armchair in the living room. Upon closer inspection, it wasn’t Dieter who was snoring, it was Charlotte. Yes, believe it or not, Charlottes' snores resembled a chainsaw!

When I mentioned this to Dieter he nodded in agreement. He knows all too well that Charlotte snores. When she sleeps with him on the foot end of his bed, he frequently has to give her a nudge when her snoring gets too loud.

As for Mickey … Mick is a fairly relaxed cat. He's clearly tired today, but he hasn’t forgotten yesterday’s drama, so he’s a little hesitant about putting his head down. 

That leaves Holly … Holly’s pose says it all. As far as she’s concerned, yesterday's fire alarm testing technicians can kiss her butt.

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Feathered engineers

A few days ago I reported that two finches had chosen a wrath on my balcony to make their nest. In the meantime, considerable progress has been made.

The work usually starts around 8:00 a.m. at which time the birds start flying to and from to get materials for their nest. At first, it was twigs and grasses, but now that the nest is built, Mrs. Finch is lining it with feathers.

I wonder where she gets those feathers. Does she use her own? Does the steal a few off Mr. Finch, or does she pluck them her unsuspecting feathered friends? Either way, the nest is looking good. See for yourself …

Considering Mrs. Finch only used her beak, this is just a magnificent piece of engineering.

How are the cats doing, you might wonder?

The poor things are tired. They are just pooped. While they were able to get some solid sleep during the day, now they get woken up every so often by the twittering of Mr. and Mrs. Finch. Whenever they hear the birds they wake up and go to the balcony to have a look.

But actually, I should put that in the past tense. While they’ve been active bird watchers all week, today their attention started to dwindle. They seem to realize that they can’t catch those birds, so why bother? At best, their ears prick up whenever the twittering starts, or they lazily open one eye.

Why would they want to catch such a small bird anyway? Take away the feathers and the bones and how much meat is on such a little finch, hardly any. It’s more of an appetizer than a meal, or worse, an amuse-bouche.

Either way, I think the cats will be glad when the building of the nest is finished. Then again, once completed Mrs. Finch will lay her eggs and sit on them practically 24/7, while Mr. Finch brings her food. And later still, once the little ones have hatched, they will start to twitter to be fed and generally to get mom’s attention.

Oh these poor cats. Maybe I should get them some earplugs.

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Meanwhile, don't forget to donate to the Toronto Cat Rescue. Shelter cats need your help. Any amount is appreciated but donations of $20 or more receive a tax receipt.

Donations can be made to my PayPal address at:
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or at
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A cure for insomnia?

People who can’t sleep will try just about anything to catch those elusive zzzzzz’s. I should know, falling asleep is a major problem for me and over the years I’ve tried it all: chamomile tea, counting sheep, meditation, lavender oil, lavender mist … nothing helps.

So when I learned of a sound machine that produces relaxing sounds I thought I should look into it. I researched the machine online and found that sound machines come in various sizes and prize ranges. Nearly all of them come with the following:

Ocean waves

Summer night

Rain

Thunder

White noise, and

A babbling brook

In all honesty, I wasn’t crazy about any of these sounds.

Ocean waves, a babbling brook or rain or anything to do with water is out of the question as it’s only a matter of time before I have to go to the bathroom.

Thunder … no, thank you. I very much suspect that bolts of thunder will keep me awake rather than put me to sleep.

Since I didn’t know what white noise is I had to go and look it up. Apparently, white noise is celestial sounds. I looked, or rather listened to a video online and it sounded like the space shuttle taking off.

As for summer night noises, I had to look that up to and it turned out that summer night noises involves birds, owls and crickets. I don’t have a problem with birds and owls, but crickets … no, I’m not a fan of those critters.

Eventually my research led me to relaxing music and that, by far, is the best choice. A word of caution though, during a time of depression this type of music should be avoided as it tends to make one rather melancholic.

Not only is relaxing music the better choice for me, it’s also more suitable for my cats. When I tried out various videos yesterday and clicked on ‘Bird songs’, Mickey, who had been sleeping, was instantly on high alert.

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How to Overcome Insomnia

Cats are masters of relaxation. They can sleep anytime, anywhere, in just about any position.

With humans it’s a little different.

Some people go to bed because it’s that time of the night and hope they fall asleep quickly. Some manage quite well, others toss and turn, others still fall asleep within minutes but wake up at night and can’t go back to sleep.

While some have no problem reaching for sleeping pills, others prefer a more natural way of catching those zzzzzzz’s.

Experts recommend chamomile tea, relaxing music, ocean or river sounds, whale sounds, bird songs, breathing techniques, or toe tapping.

Personally I have tried them all and these are my findings:

Chamomile: doesn’t work for me at all. I’ve even tried two tea bags in a cup to make the brew extra strong, but I was as awake at 3:00 a.m. as I was at 11:00 a.m. As an added disadvantage, I had to get up several times during the night to go to the washroom.

Relaxing music: this didn’t work because in my mind I was singing along with the song and when I switched to instrumental only, I found myself thinking of dance or ice-skating routines.

Ocean and river sounds: this had the same effect as chamomile tea. Not only could I not fall asleep, I had to get up several times to use the loo. In addition, the crashing waves made me think of boats capsizing and people drowning.

Whale sounds: this I found fairly relaxing, but my cats didn’t. As soon as the CD started producing the whale sounds, my cats appeared to be spooked. Those who were already sleeping on my bed jumped up and ran from the room.

Bird songs: perhaps you can imagine what kind of effect this had on the cats. From the first chirp, they were on high alert. They seemed to think that the birds were in the room, and were determined to find them. From the bed they jumped onto the nightstand, on the linen closed, on top of the bookcases and even the windowsill. Those birds drove them nuts. Of course, this made sleeping for me impossible.

Breathing techniques: this could have worked if it was not for Holly. With this type of technique you’re suppose to inhale for four seconds, hold your breath for seven seconds, and exhale for eight seconds. I did this and found it relaxing, but suddenly I felt a weight on my chest. When I opened my eyes I found Holly staring down on me like I was an alien. Her facial expression was comical, as if she was thinking “What the heck are you doing?”

Toe tapping: Experts say that toe tapping is very effective to relieve headaches, insomnia, tension and fatigue. While I don’t doubt it, I would not recommend doing this with cats on the bed. I tried it, with rather painful results. As I started the toe tapping, Charlotte saw something move under the duvet and decided to catch whatever it was. You can probably imagine what happened … exactly, she launched herself at my feet and bit my big toe.

All things considered, I think it’s best to just lay back and stroke a cat. The feel of its soft fur, combined with the cats’ purring noises has a relaxing effect too and might just result in sleep.

Friday is Cat Day - Sleeping Positions

I ADMIT, IT'S A LITTLE SNUG, BUT I CAN MAKE IT WORK.

A TOILETROLL IS A LITTLE CONTROVERSIAL, BUT IT'S BETTER THAN NOTHING.

THIS IS GOING TO GIVE ME A CRICK IN MY NECK.

THIS BOX ISN'T BIG ENOUGH FOR THE BOTH OF US.

I DON'T KNOW ABOUT YOU, BUT I'M COMFY.

Sleeping with cats

Do any of you sleep with a pet?  If you do, you have my sincerest sympathies. I slept with Chanel last night and oh my, it took forever for her to settle.

She was purring so loud that I wondered … is this a cat or a small propeller plane?

Usually Chanel sleeps elsewhere and Mickey and Gabriel curl up with me.  In fact, it’s a funny thing.

While I’m on the computer, Gabriel sleeps and when I say “sleeps” I mean he’s out like a light.  A bomb can go off next to that cat and he won’t flinch.  But … fast asleep as he is, as soon as I prepare to go to bed, he joins me.  He quite literally wakes up to go to sleep.

Once in bed he starts making funny noises, meaning … rub my cheeks, scratch my head, rub my belly, and rub my cheeks some more.  If it was up to him, I would be rubbing his cheeks until dawn.

Meanwhile Mickey wanders around.  He inspects the linen closets, sits on the windowsill, checks under the bed, before finally jumping on the bookcase and stretching out.

At some point the bookcase starts cramping his style and that when it happens … from roughly 6 feet 5 inches he launches himself on the bed.

This never fails to frighten the hell out a me.  Just imagine … it’s dark, it’s quiet, I’m just starting to drift off, when suddenly … boem, a weight lands on the bed shaking me wide awake.

While I’m trying to get my heart out of my throat, Gabriel barely opens an eye. It’s like he’s trying to say … “What?  What’s the big deal? He does this every night.”

And it’s true, Mickey does this every night, but I fall for it every time.

So last night I thought I would sleep in peace and quiet, without Gabriel’s need for attention or Mickey auditioning for Cirque du Soleil. I was wrong, now it was Chanel who kept me out of dreamland.

She snuggled up close to me and went … krrrrrr, krrrrrrrr, krrrrrrr. I’m telling you, she sounded like a plane getting ready for take-off.

Maybe tonight I should sleep with Charlotte.  Charlotte is a quiet cat. She doesn’t wander around, she doesn’t climb on furniture, and even though she can purr, she does so at a normal level.

The only thing is, Charlotte doesn’t move, for anything. She needs a lot of space and once she lies down, she lies down. Whether feet, legs or even a body are in her way, she doesn’t move, not an inch.

I wonder how people do it who sleep with a big dog ….