Eddie the Cat Moving Fields

Something I'm asked frequently is 'How did you train Eddie Cat to live on the leash?', and first off the answer is 'you don't train cats'.

This may sound like a cheap way out of the conversation, but it is true, training cats is nothing like training dogs. With cats, especially Eddie Cat, it is always a matter of enhancing habits and desires the cat already wishes to do, and guiding these tendencies to the desired behavior.

The cart training is a perfect example. Eddie Cat already enjoyed the cart the day we purchased the first one. But keeping him cooperative with the cart came by always feeding him inside the cart. I mixed up his dinner and said to him "Cart" until he jumped into the cart, and then I gave him his dinner.

I'll try to write more on this topic soon, because, as I said, I get asked about it all the time.

Eddie the Cat is not the happiest of cats this morning. It seems that he has cleared out all gophers in the CAP Little League Field on Mission Gorge Road, so we are moving to the Major Field tonight, so he can have a decent hunt. He staid awake all night looking for gophers (or anything really). The last two nights we were in hotel, and Eddie Cat got a little stir crazy during the second night. After months of night-time hunting, I suppose it is difficult to amuse yourself with Late Night movies. Needless to say he was very excited to arrive at the hunting fields last night (didn't even wait until I stopped the Cart before jumping out to start his prowl).

I picked up some Blue paint to take care of some of the graffiti and a couple of tarps to replace the ones which are weather torn at the Cap Field. Normally I simply pick up some of the trash, but I've been getting more ambitious of late (not too ambitious obviously, its not like I'm going to do 'real' work, like mow the laws or something radical like that). Taking care of the graffiti seems to be easy enough.

The EddieCat.org cards are in, picked those up today, and will probably be passing them out soon. I think they turned out fairly good, and I've been wanting them for some time. There is something about Eddie Cat that simply raises questions in peoples minds, and being able to easily refer those who are honestly curious to this blog, is a good thing. I would like to hear comments and suggestions from as many sources as I can entice.

We are still looking for an apartment. I've made several phone calls, but haven't been getting any call backs. Terron is doing what he can, but right at this moment we've hit something of a stone wall. Hammers (of all sizes) are available however.

I am continuously surprised by the level of problems facing the homeless these days. While I did grow up on the streets, I don't remember it being like this back then. I'm perfectly capable of giving two months rent in advance plus a deposit, and can't find a place to let me move in... while, as I've suggested, I know several ways around this particular problem, I doubt many homeless coming off the street have the resources or even the right questions to ask. I'm not overly intelligent, but lets face it, getting sober and getting steady work, while surviving on low quality food and lack of sleep (because cops keep waking you up so you are sleep depraved), takes a lot out of anyone, and I'm not dealing with these particular obstructions.

I've been digging further into the HUD funding Santee has been getting over the years, and quite frankly, getting rather pissed off. The more I find out, the more I don't want to know. I'm teetering on the knife-edge of continuing my original goal set, or expanding the targets much further. But you will learn enough about that here soon enough.