Isis has been screaming, shrieking, making horrible tortured noises lately. He has spent the last 15 months testing the acoustics of the apartment. And so, he knows that the front door is the thing for effectively screaming at.
Why is he screaming? Oh, because he hates the food we bought him. That's my guess. The can are not labelled clearly. It says it's something fish-like. But he likes fish-like food that comes in chunks and a gravy substance and not fish-like food that comes in a pate-like shape. Whatever.
Since the cat is coming up on five years of HOWLING at me, I have learned to completely ignore these noises. Except for the part where I worry that a neighbor walking down the hall might hear and think we're actually boiling a cat alive in here. Other than that, it doesn't bother me much.
The boyfriend, however, is not so heartless.
And what has he been doing about the fucking screaming? He finds a bag of treats and crumples it until Isis comes running.
"That's right, Isis, I am reinforcing your horrible behavior with treats. Mondale, I don't know why you want a treat. You don't even like them. Okay, here, you can just sniff this and that's right, walk away. Okay, Isis, here's another one. Don't go over there and howl at the door... or I'll just have to... give you another treat."
On the cookies I'm in the process of baking for the company potluck tomorrow...
"They're a little crunchy for fresh baked cookies." "Let me try." "You can have your own!" "No, I just want a nibble... oh, these are... going to be like rocks." "Yeah." "They're really bad. Or they will be when they're cold." "They're not the worst cookies you've ever baked." "Thanks." I begin coughing. "Are you okay?" "Yeah. They're sort of dusty." "Yep." [...] "Can I have another?" "Yeah." "What? They're good. I just think... they'll be... less good as time goes on. I feel like now is the time to eat them.... Oh yeah, that's crunchy."