Having been home recuperating from surgery for the last 6 weeks, I have encountered several interesting challenges that are absent from the normal office routines. Primary among these are the challenges associated with integrating the needs of two large cats into my moment to moment activities.
In this post I will examine the challenge of using my cat's head as a mouse pad.
First, I must set forth the motivation for this challenge.
While I have several work areas around the house that address different interests, my primary location is the left end of the sofa in the living room. My attraction to this particular seat has some Sheldon-esque aspects. For example, the light is balanced with a slight bias to the Eastern windows, and the air flow is minimal, i.e. no drafts. While the cushions are compressed from use, the general vantage of the entire living room, entry and kitchen door, as well as the dining room and back deck gives me a strategic sense of what is going on the space. I suspect that some of these reasons also attract Sterling, my 20 lb brindle cat of no particular breed.
Several times a day Sterling and I compete for the seat. If he has the seat first, and he notices that I am coming toward him to claim it, he will make a show of looking away from me then tucking his head under his arm, which recalls the child like faith that if one covers one's eyes, one becomes invisible oneself. I think Sterling is too smart for that, so I suspect he is simply indicating a lack of fear or respect for my intentions. His affectation of casual ignorance of my need for the seat forces me to initiate the confrontational aspect of the encounter. "Get off." I say in a collegial voice. "Get off the couch, you." I reserve the use of his name for urgent situations where he really does need to pay attention to me, such as when I am trying to maneuver over his body at the top of the stairs, and I am balancing a tray which will include a large glass of something. When I say "Dammit Sterling" under controlled circumstances, he does make a nominal effort to at least take note of my concern.
The second phase of the encounter in the first days after my chest surgery involved me leaning down to him and imploring him to move, since I couldn't lift or push more than five pounds at the time. He sensed he had me at a major disadvantage and resisted me Ghandi style, with a sublime passivity, secure in his judgement of my weakness, and ultimate lack of resolve. He was correct at the time. The first time some four weeks after surgery that I actually picked him partially off the prime space and pivoted him away from my butt's worth of real estate, he was surprised, but not surprised enough to actually undertake any movement on his own.
Eventually I regained the natural and appropriate advantage of a 250 lb six foot human over a 20lb cat that stands a few inches high at the shoulder. At this point, I would pick Sterling up and move him a full cat's length down the sofa. This rarely woke him up, much less provoked him to any response or action.
Since I am inclined to peck away at the laptop here, I used the 6 square inches or so of the upholstery immediately to the right of my thigh as a mouse pad. The modern laser mouse loves the rich textures of the textile, and it was working fine.
Until Sterling decided he needed to launch a new intitative against the coveted seat. His subtlety and wisdom in the discomfiture of humans was expressed in a new move he designed for the situation. When I was seated, laptop atop lap, deep in the fantasy of self expression, mouse twiddling and keys clicking with the industry of a squadron of deranged insects, Sterling would suddenly thrust his skull under my palm and wedge his body tightly against the assembly of mouse, wrist, thigh and upholstery.
The first few times this happened I simply stopped working and took a break. I even appreciated Sterling's indifference to my self-stimulated intensity at these moments. After a few days, however, it reverted back to an annoyance. I tried pushing him further down the sofa, but in the aftermath of surgery I couldn't risk the force and leverage required to really get him away from me. I tried compromising, and continuing to mouse after getting my hand under his head, and the skid of the mouse back in contact with the upholstery. I presumed the irritation of my knuckles and fist undulating and twisting beneath his chin would motivate him to remove himself shortly.
In fact, the motion seemed to please him. I realized it constituted a variant on the "skritching" gesture that cats expect as their due homage from all humans, and particularly the ones to whom they hold deed. Since he was happy and intent on holding his ground, and I was minimally capable of achieving the full range of mouse movement required to manage my grandiloquence, I thought I would try things his way for a change. There is always a high price to pay for such appeasement, of course.
After a few days of playing Chamberlain to his Hitler, I realized this arrangement of cat's head and neck on top of my hand while mousing was causing unusual strains on the tendons of my hand. Sterling was sufficiently talented as an intuitive engineer to modulate his weight and angle of repose slightly over time. This gradually reduced the already diminutive space allotted my fine motor needs. He shifted slightly and inexorably, like a boa constrictor, until I was constrained to a space of a dime and unconsciously had taken to avoiding any mouse activity whatever.
Unlike the frog coming casually to a boil, I took action. I pulled my mouse out from under Sterling's head and put it on top. Why couldn't I mouse on top of his head, I wondered, given the fur should provide enough optical texture to insure the laser's continued function.
I found however that there is a distinct nap, or bias to the texture. If I moused down from the crown of his skull toward his shoulder blades, the cursor followed my motion proportionally. If I moved the other direction, pushing his fur up, the laser got confused and worked intermittently or not at all. Sideways or diagonal motions were unpredictable. Sterling remained indifferent to the direction or intensity of mouse gesture as long as he could keep his head, neck and shoulders directly over the spot I would otherwise have used.
This wouldn't do.
I quit typing and mousing, and took to staring at whatever happened to be on the screen at the time. I began to think about the existential nothingness of life, and the dour conviction of the great pessimists, the Kierkegaards and Schopenhauers.
I realized that in my condition of recuperation, I couldn't afford the downward death spiral of mood brought on by the failure to dominate, or even cooperatively compromise with my pet. What is a man to do? While my head drooped forward and my shoulders slumped, I suddenly noticed that my stomach provided an unused expanse of mousable surface area. With a bit of experimentation I learned to ignore the visual direction the mouse took over the t-shirted terrain, and concentrated on the screen until I had developed the necessary coordination.
So I was back in control, mousing happily over my abdomen, while Sterling licked himself with the feigned modesty of a true victor. Another challenge met in the uphill struggle to regain my health and retain the sovereignty of my suburban castle.
In this post I will examine the challenge of using my cat's head as a mouse pad.
First, I must set forth the motivation for this challenge.
While I have several work areas around the house that address different interests, my primary location is the left end of the sofa in the living room. My attraction to this particular seat has some Sheldon-esque aspects. For example, the light is balanced with a slight bias to the Eastern windows, and the air flow is minimal, i.e. no drafts. While the cushions are compressed from use, the general vantage of the entire living room, entry and kitchen door, as well as the dining room and back deck gives me a strategic sense of what is going on the space. I suspect that some of these reasons also attract Sterling, my 20 lb brindle cat of no particular breed.
Several times a day Sterling and I compete for the seat. If he has the seat first, and he notices that I am coming toward him to claim it, he will make a show of looking away from me then tucking his head under his arm, which recalls the child like faith that if one covers one's eyes, one becomes invisible oneself. I think Sterling is too smart for that, so I suspect he is simply indicating a lack of fear or respect for my intentions. His affectation of casual ignorance of my need for the seat forces me to initiate the confrontational aspect of the encounter. "Get off." I say in a collegial voice. "Get off the couch, you." I reserve the use of his name for urgent situations where he really does need to pay attention to me, such as when I am trying to maneuver over his body at the top of the stairs, and I am balancing a tray which will include a large glass of something. When I say "Dammit Sterling" under controlled circumstances, he does make a nominal effort to at least take note of my concern.
The second phase of the encounter in the first days after my chest surgery involved me leaning down to him and imploring him to move, since I couldn't lift or push more than five pounds at the time. He sensed he had me at a major disadvantage and resisted me Ghandi style, with a sublime passivity, secure in his judgement of my weakness, and ultimate lack of resolve. He was correct at the time. The first time some four weeks after surgery that I actually picked him partially off the prime space and pivoted him away from my butt's worth of real estate, he was surprised, but not surprised enough to actually undertake any movement on his own.
Eventually I regained the natural and appropriate advantage of a 250 lb six foot human over a 20lb cat that stands a few inches high at the shoulder. At this point, I would pick Sterling up and move him a full cat's length down the sofa. This rarely woke him up, much less provoked him to any response or action.
Since I am inclined to peck away at the laptop here, I used the 6 square inches or so of the upholstery immediately to the right of my thigh as a mouse pad. The modern laser mouse loves the rich textures of the textile, and it was working fine.
Until Sterling decided he needed to launch a new intitative against the coveted seat. His subtlety and wisdom in the discomfiture of humans was expressed in a new move he designed for the situation. When I was seated, laptop atop lap, deep in the fantasy of self expression, mouse twiddling and keys clicking with the industry of a squadron of deranged insects, Sterling would suddenly thrust his skull under my palm and wedge his body tightly against the assembly of mouse, wrist, thigh and upholstery.
The first few times this happened I simply stopped working and took a break. I even appreciated Sterling's indifference to my self-stimulated intensity at these moments. After a few days, however, it reverted back to an annoyance. I tried pushing him further down the sofa, but in the aftermath of surgery I couldn't risk the force and leverage required to really get him away from me. I tried compromising, and continuing to mouse after getting my hand under his head, and the skid of the mouse back in contact with the upholstery. I presumed the irritation of my knuckles and fist undulating and twisting beneath his chin would motivate him to remove himself shortly.
In fact, the motion seemed to please him. I realized it constituted a variant on the "skritching" gesture that cats expect as their due homage from all humans, and particularly the ones to whom they hold deed. Since he was happy and intent on holding his ground, and I was minimally capable of achieving the full range of mouse movement required to manage my grandiloquence, I thought I would try things his way for a change. There is always a high price to pay for such appeasement, of course.
After a few days of playing Chamberlain to his Hitler, I realized this arrangement of cat's head and neck on top of my hand while mousing was causing unusual strains on the tendons of my hand. Sterling was sufficiently talented as an intuitive engineer to modulate his weight and angle of repose slightly over time. This gradually reduced the already diminutive space allotted my fine motor needs. He shifted slightly and inexorably, like a boa constrictor, until I was constrained to a space of a dime and unconsciously had taken to avoiding any mouse activity whatever.
Unlike the frog coming casually to a boil, I took action. I pulled my mouse out from under Sterling's head and put it on top. Why couldn't I mouse on top of his head, I wondered, given the fur should provide enough optical texture to insure the laser's continued function.
I found however that there is a distinct nap, or bias to the texture. If I moused down from the crown of his skull toward his shoulder blades, the cursor followed my motion proportionally. If I moved the other direction, pushing his fur up, the laser got confused and worked intermittently or not at all. Sideways or diagonal motions were unpredictable. Sterling remained indifferent to the direction or intensity of mouse gesture as long as he could keep his head, neck and shoulders directly over the spot I would otherwise have used.
This wouldn't do.
I quit typing and mousing, and took to staring at whatever happened to be on the screen at the time. I began to think about the existential nothingness of life, and the dour conviction of the great pessimists, the Kierkegaards and Schopenhauers.
I realized that in my condition of recuperation, I couldn't afford the downward death spiral of mood brought on by the failure to dominate, or even cooperatively compromise with my pet. What is a man to do? While my head drooped forward and my shoulders slumped, I suddenly noticed that my stomach provided an unused expanse of mousable surface area. With a bit of experimentation I learned to ignore the visual direction the mouse took over the t-shirted terrain, and concentrated on the screen until I had developed the necessary coordination.
So I was back in control, mousing happily over my abdomen, while Sterling licked himself with the feigned modesty of a true victor. Another challenge met in the uphill struggle to regain my health and retain the sovereignty of my suburban castle.
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