Changing the Water
Our pets and children mostly live in a symbiotic relationship, each relying on the other. The dog relies on Abbie for table scraps. The cats and dog rely on the children chasing them for exercise. The boys rely on the dog to keep her food accessible so they can keep eating after they run out of Tasteeos.
Then there’s the house’s biggest piece of pet paraphernalia turned child entertainment device: The pet water dish. Everybody takes turns knocking water out of it. The cats bat at it. The dog slurps water all over the kitchen. The kids splash in it.
Abbie never really played in the pet water. Occasionally she’d splash the water, and sometimes drop a toy in the pet water in a potential experiment to determine how many germs can coat a ball, but she quickly lost interest and moved onto more exciting activities, like climbing on top of the television. The boys love playing with the pet water, though, possibly because they lack the aptitude to climb on furniture. They’ll bat at the water, use the reservoir container as a standing aid, tip the reservoir container over, and generally make a mess of things.
Their propensity to play in the water creates several problems. They knock water all over the kitchen floor, which makes the linoleum dangerously slippery and soaks the random pieces of paper that fall off our kitchen table and we never bother to pick up. They drench their outfits. This was acceptable in the summer when a wet onesie would help cool them off, but now that winter is approaching and frost regularly encrusts my windshield in the morning, a cold wet outfit just makes them mad. Worst of all, they’ll drain the dish dry, depriving the pets of the water they need for an healthy lifestyle until their begging* drives me to finally refill it. Oh, and the fact that a young child can drown in as little as two-inches of water making a pet water dish a potential death-trap; that’s a problem too.
I used to have a similar problem with the children digging into the pet food. I remedied things by keeping the pet food out of reach, with the cat food downstairs where children never tread, and the dog food locked inside her kennel while the kids are awake. This deprives the dog of food for most of the day, but she gets through by pigging out when the door is open, and Abbie helps by slipping her cereal and vegetables off her tray. The only way a child can play in the pet food is when I forget to shut the kennel door, or when Abbie climbs up to the pet food, which only happens two or three times a day.
Pet water is different. I can’t deprive the pets access to water for hours at a time. I can’t sleep through the night without waking for a drink, and I’m not doing anything more strenuous than drooling; there’s no way the pets could go that long without a drink either. Unfortunately there’s nowhere for me to leave water where the pets could drink from it but the kids couldn’t reach it.
Finally, spurred by the boys’ ever-increasing mobility and ever-stagnant listening skills, I grew fed up with the wet floors and soaked outfits, and changed the pet water. I put an old whipped topping container full of water downstairs where the cats can reach it but not the dog. I don’t know if they’re drinking from it, but I do know they’re cleaning they’re paws in it after using the litter box, so it’s at least accomplishing something. I then dumped the main pet water dish and let the dog fend for herself.
After realizing the dog was not going to learn osmosis, I set the main water dish back on the ground, but without the reservoir. That way when the kids get that “oh boy!” look in their eyes, I can easily dump the water dish and leave it out of reach until they forget about it and the dog starts begging for water again. Even if they do splash in it without me noticing, they can only spill enough water to dampen their sleeves.
We’ve been on this arrangement for a couple days, and things are going smoothly. There’s less water on the floor, less water on the children, and I suppose less water in the dog. Most importantly, there’s less aggravation for me, as I no longer have to scold children with the listening skills of a cat.
There’s another one; the boys rely on the cats to teach them how to ignore me.
* The pets’ begging, not the boys’.
Then there’s the house’s biggest piece of pet paraphernalia turned child entertainment device: The pet water dish. Everybody takes turns knocking water out of it. The cats bat at it. The dog slurps water all over the kitchen. The kids splash in it.
Abbie never really played in the pet water. Occasionally she’d splash the water, and sometimes drop a toy in the pet water in a potential experiment to determine how many germs can coat a ball, but she quickly lost interest and moved onto more exciting activities, like climbing on top of the television. The boys love playing with the pet water, though, possibly because they lack the aptitude to climb on furniture. They’ll bat at the water, use the reservoir container as a standing aid, tip the reservoir container over, and generally make a mess of things.
Their propensity to play in the water creates several problems. They knock water all over the kitchen floor, which makes the linoleum dangerously slippery and soaks the random pieces of paper that fall off our kitchen table and we never bother to pick up. They drench their outfits. This was acceptable in the summer when a wet onesie would help cool them off, but now that winter is approaching and frost regularly encrusts my windshield in the morning, a cold wet outfit just makes them mad. Worst of all, they’ll drain the dish dry, depriving the pets of the water they need for an healthy lifestyle until their begging* drives me to finally refill it. Oh, and the fact that a young child can drown in as little as two-inches of water making a pet water dish a potential death-trap; that’s a problem too.
I used to have a similar problem with the children digging into the pet food. I remedied things by keeping the pet food out of reach, with the cat food downstairs where children never tread, and the dog food locked inside her kennel while the kids are awake. This deprives the dog of food for most of the day, but she gets through by pigging out when the door is open, and Abbie helps by slipping her cereal and vegetables off her tray. The only way a child can play in the pet food is when I forget to shut the kennel door, or when Abbie climbs up to the pet food, which only happens two or three times a day.
Pet water is different. I can’t deprive the pets access to water for hours at a time. I can’t sleep through the night without waking for a drink, and I’m not doing anything more strenuous than drooling; there’s no way the pets could go that long without a drink either. Unfortunately there’s nowhere for me to leave water where the pets could drink from it but the kids couldn’t reach it.
Finally, spurred by the boys’ ever-increasing mobility and ever-stagnant listening skills, I grew fed up with the wet floors and soaked outfits, and changed the pet water. I put an old whipped topping container full of water downstairs where the cats can reach it but not the dog. I don’t know if they’re drinking from it, but I do know they’re cleaning they’re paws in it after using the litter box, so it’s at least accomplishing something. I then dumped the main pet water dish and let the dog fend for herself.
After realizing the dog was not going to learn osmosis, I set the main water dish back on the ground, but without the reservoir. That way when the kids get that “oh boy!” look in their eyes, I can easily dump the water dish and leave it out of reach until they forget about it and the dog starts begging for water again. Even if they do splash in it without me noticing, they can only spill enough water to dampen their sleeves.
We’ve been on this arrangement for a couple days, and things are going smoothly. There’s less water on the floor, less water on the children, and I suppose less water in the dog. Most importantly, there’s less aggravation for me, as I no longer have to scold children with the listening skills of a cat.
There’s another one; the boys rely on the cats to teach them how to ignore me.
* The pets’ begging, not the boys’.
posted by Matt at
11:08 PM
2 Comments:
I'm all for less aggravation. That and more beer.
Hey, btw, you know this?
"Sweater (n) - A knitted upper body garment that your mother makes you wear when she's cold"
So ... when do YOU put a sweater on a kid?
By
Becky, at 8:38 AM
I'm not opposed to staying warm, I just hate sweaters. My mother and I had many battles when I was younger as she kept buying me sweaters and I kept refusing to wear them. I would never put a sweater on one of my kids unless it was really really cute.
By
Matt, at 11:33 AM
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