My cat likes to scratch on this weird vinyl/fake leather chair that I have. I’ve tried covering it in tape, and he still scratches it. One day, I realized that whenever he scratches it, he almost immediately turns to look at me, so I started to wonder if he might be doing it for attention. On top of that, as soon as I tell him “no”, he usually walks over to me, looking for attention. It took a lot of patience, but since the chair was already ruined, I decided to try just totally ignoring him whenever he scratched the chair, and giving him positive attention when he scratched on his post. Somehow, it actually worked!

Another suggestion would be to put a scratching post as close as possible to the couch corners as possible, and when you do catch her scratching the couch, very calmly reposition her to the post. Praise her for using the post, completely ignore her for scratching the couch.

I know you mentioned that she has a cat tree nearby, but the geometry of the couch might be giving her a better stretch, she may like the material better, and/or she may be looking for a way to better claim the couch as part of her territory, as a scratching is also an important way that they leave their sent on things.

https://www.jacksongalaxy.com/blogs/news/how-to-stop-your-cats-from-scratching-furniture

Figured out how to DM you.

Edit: figured out how to DM OP

If she’s not spayed, there is a very high chance that she will find a way outdoors, and pregnancy is very draining on their bodies. They generally have quite a few kittens because so many of them don’t survive. My most recent foster momma came to me practically skin & bones, and we lost 2 out of 5 kittens. Kittens are super fragile, and you can do everything right, but still lose them. And if they do survive, the shelters are already overflowing with homeless cats, so many get euthanized purely due to lack of space.

This is more targeted to other people than you, but was the post right next to the couch? One of the smaller details that people often overlook is that scratching leaves their scent behind and says “I live here”, so they will often want to scratch in socially significant parts of the house. So, if the only acceptable scratching surfaces are hidden away from the rooms you actually hang out in, they’re probably going to find something else to scratch on.

Unfortunately, the same logic is sometimes behind litter box issues too.

Awesome! A friend of mine recently found a whole litter of abandoned kittens, so I was trying to help them find some low cost options, and everything around here was booked months out too.

What an adorable little standard issue cat! Looks a lot like my princess.

Please be sure to get her spayed ASAP, if she’s not already. They can go into their first heat as early as 4 months old, and will become desperate to get outside!

Niche interests and/or local stuff. My city has basically no activity over here, so I still browse the local subreddit regularly.

🙋

I went crabbing and the resources I found said that killing them before cooking them was likely more humane than boiling them alive, so that’s what I did.

My old neighbor’s cat once left a paralyzed/twitching rat outside my door, which I found in the morning. I quickly realized that the rat was not going to recover (it had already been there for hours), so I had to figure out a way to quickly end its suffering. I did not eat the rat though.

While I do share similar feelings, selectively bred cats and dogs do also wind up in shelters and rescues too.

I’ve used Windows since I can remember… at least since Windows 95, then probably early 2000’s, added OSX into the mix. I currently use an old Mac Mini as my Plex machine, and the computer provided by my employer runs Windows.

My “journey” began around 2015 on an old Dell laptop that I set up to dual boot Windows and Linux. I tried 2 or 3 distros, one of which was probably Ubuntu, before settling on Mint. I remember having enough minor issues with Mint that I kept booting back to Windows, and eventually stopped booting to Mint at all.

Then one day, I have no clue what I was trying to do, but I was confident that I knew what I was doing, so I just went for it without pulling up the instructions. Welp, I ended up deleting my bootloader, or something like that, and now couldn’t boot to any OS. I tried using my parents’ Mac to create a bootable USB, but that wasn’t working. I wound up buying and returning a random open box laptop from Best Buy just so I could create a functional bootable USB. I also found help from a very kind internet stranger who walked me through the process to fix my bootloader. They happened to only use Arch btw, so that’s what we used to get my laptop fixed.

That whole drama really scared me away from fiddling with it for a while, then I just got busy and had no motivation. That laptop is collecting dust and still dual boots Windows (7?) and headless Arch. I’m thinking of fiddling around with Linux again, but most definitely need something more noobie friendly than Arch without a DE.

Pretty sure Venmo is owned by PayPal.

Glad to hear things have settled down a bit! Feel free to ping me or PM me if you need to bounce any plans off a real person, particularly when it comes to modifying things to work with your situation and/or gauge when to move on to the next steps. I’ll be keeping an eye out for your updates either way.

I foster and have 2 resident cats, so I do introductions a few times per year. I highly recommend Jackson Galaxy’s guide. I’ve linked part 1, but there’s 5 parts, the rest are linked within. It’s worth reading the entire thing, because he does a great job of explaining why he recommends each step, which is helpful if you need to modify things a bit.

You need to figure out a room in your house that can be The Boy’s basecamp. This is where The Boy is going to spend most of his time until Anya can tolerate him, and hopefully isn’t a “high value” space for Anya. Without knowing either cat, I’d say you should plan for a minimum of 2 weeks of very carefully managing the process of introducing them to each other, and probably at least a month before things really settle in.

Also, make sure The Boy gets neutered ASAP, if he isn’t already!

I have one of those perches that mounts on a window with suction cups, and sometimes I close the curtains over it. My cats absolutely love hanging out in the little “tent” it creates. They don’t ever cuddle with each other, but I’ve caught them peacefully hanging out in the “tent” together.

Maybe you’re thinking tabby? Brown tabbies are often referred to as the “standard issue cat”, and are commonly found as both XX and XY cats. Torties are black/brown and orange, and their coloring is the result of having one X chromosome for black/brown, and a second one for orange.

My apologies, I just find their genetics so fascinating!

If you want to be extra safe, stick with stuff specifically intended for cats. My local pet store carries these small, cooked fish fillets that have only 1 ingredient.

https://applaws.com/us/products/salmon-filet-treat/

FYI, the catnip that comes with scratching toys is often pretty shit quality. If you really want to treat him to the nip, get some high quality stuff. From the Field and Yeowww! are two brands that seem to usually be pretty high quality, and silvervine is a related plant that may be even more potent for some cats.

https://www.fromthefieldpet.com/ https://yeowww.com/our-products/catnip/

Sorry to go slightly off topic here, but do you have a male tortie?? Those are quite rare, because it requires 2 X chromosomes to produce the tortie coat.

Shit, I’d just make a spreadsheet, but then again, I love spreadsheets. Not FOSS, but you could set up a Google Forms to collect the entries in a more user friendly format.