Saturday, July 31, 2010

Does my tum look big on this floor? STS - the truth.



Dear George,
My name is Tom-Tom and I live in a lovely flat in Paris. I am very, very affectionate and always welcome everyone who comes to visit me. I stay with my friend, Mimi when my mum goes away and we generally get on very well but she won't let me share her croquettes because she says I am too fat. You can see she is warning me off in this picture which I feel is a bit mean. Do you think she should let me share her food?
Love,
Paris-Tom-Tom.


Dear Tom-Tom,
We cats call this STS, or Saggy Tummy Syndrome. It is an increasingly common side effect of natural human adoration. In an attempt to please us, our de
votees cannot say no. They will go to any lengths to do what we want. It is gratifying. Very gratifying and, of course, natural.
Your delightful photo shows the results - the little (well not so little) pink love handles at the back of the body, the absence of "waist" or the area after the rib cage which should curve inwards up to the inner thigh). The extra weight is not evenly distributed (our humans know about that!) so the head and the paws and the tail all look unduly slim in comparison. And the bigger the belly, the less we want to move around - all that weight makes exercise hard work.
No croquettes. No. Not a single crumb of them.
Of course, I blame your human. (We cats always do). She is your enabler. But it is up to you to initiate change. Send her off to the vet (sorry, Tom-Tom) for a weigh-in and a large packet of prescription food. Don't let her forget the dispenser, usually a transparent cup with measurements on it. You might even purrsuade her to buy some baby scales. These are good at weighing cats. I am adding photo of Pushkin on his scales. You will find that if she places a little food on the scales, you will find it worth your while to sit on them.
Frankly, Tom-tom you need more exercise and it is your human's responsibility to help you get it. She must start making your appartement life more interesting by hiding your food so you have to run round the place to find it. There are also food dispensing balls she could make or make her own from an old loo roll and sticky paper. And she can j
ust throw food for you. No more just putting it in a bowl. It might also be worth your while to learn some tricks.
I heard from Fatty Pushkin the other day (his letter was in January). He is in his new home - still slimming down, still doing his interesting tricks of jumping over human legs and sitting up to do a high five. And his new pet human is taking him for walks on a lead. He is still FIV positive so cannot live at large. Take encouragement from him, Tom-Tom and start the slimming programme.
Love
George

9 comments:

  1. George, I simply don't understand why my lot keep visiting Tom-Tom and Mimi when I am the most adorable, SLENDER, active, creative pet imaginable even though I live indoors too. Have you seen my latest artistic fabric design on my blog? I am always busy, sorting, binkying, scrabbling and generally keeping fit. Don't you agree that a house rabbit would be a perfect pet in a flat? So many of us need loving homes.

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  2. Guess this is the most popular syndrom among North Americans (sorry guys)!
    Even the cats got it from their humans!
    Sebastian

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  3. I'm with you Tom-Tom! And you are pretty - even if the picture is not very flattering!
    I'm on a "limited portion" diet since my mom got some ideas from Celia. I still don't understand why she's trying to make me run up and down the stairs and then rub my belly and cut on my food portion! Does this make me "a good girl"? I don't think so!

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  4. Tom-Tom ....you have to be a fussy eater, that's the trick to stay fit! I love running up and down the stairs but my sister hates it. She likes food and she likes to eat. These days she's quite grumpy since she doesn't get as much food as she wants. I'm quite frugal but I love to play - I think I can play 24h
    Love
    Fluffy

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  5. Excellent news - we are really happy for Pushkin!
    Cayenne & Fluffy

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  6. Ah! I look exactly like you Tom-Tom during wintertime (and I'm not living in a flat in Paris)
    But....spring coming....I go hunting in the ravine and I'm back in shape :-)
    George is right....you need more "activity" not croissants or croquette!
    Love
    Minnie

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  7. Well done Pushkin for getting a new home, we hope you are very happy there forever.

    Poor Tom-Tom, these apes stuff us stupid with carbohydrate laden fuuds then whine and moan when we become portly. There is no end to ape hypocrisy. I think you should gallop about your home at night Tom-Tom, bopuncing off your sleeping apes alllllllll night long.

    Kind regards

    Wicked Wuudler

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  8. The gall of these humans is unending. Mine is at me as well, and I haven't even got STS yet! All because I meated up a little bit while I was away visiting my men friends. Well, what was I to do, be impolite? When you're out for dinner, we all know it's good manners to show appreciation by eating what you're given and liking it. The fact that I now want it at home is besides the point. She's going on about how dried food is much less fattening than wet, and I did Ok on it until now, and yet she eats nothing but wet, and more than three times a day! Hypocrites, the lot of them. I need moral support to keep on at her to give me the wet stuff. If you wouldn't mind supporting me, feel free to leave comments at cuddlesandcatnip.blogspot.com. If we all tell her dried is bad, it might just save my tummy from its lack of good food! Help! Tia

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  9. The gall of these humans is unending. Mine is at me as well, and I haven't even got STS yet! All because I meated up a little bit while I was away visiting my men friends. Well, what was I to do, be impolite? When you're out for dinner, we all know it's good manners to show appreciation by eating what you're given and liking it. The fact that I now want it at home is besides the point. She's going on about how dried food is much less fattening than wet, and I did Ok on it until now, and yet she eats nothing but wet, and more than three times a day! Hypocrites, the lot of them. I need moral support to keep on at her to give me the wet stuff. If you wouldn't mind supporting me, feel free to leave comments at cuddlesandcatnip.blogspot.com. If we all tell her dried is bad, it might just save my tummy from its lack of good food! Help!

    ReplyDelete

Help for cats whose humans show behaviour problems.

This blog is devoted to the study of human behaviour. We cats, who live with this sometimes unpredictable and always feeble minded species, can benefit from seeing their behaviour in its proper scientific context. The study of feline dilemmas, training problems, and difficulties with humans, can only benefit all of us. All of us train our humans - to buy the right food, for instance, but many of us do not have knowledge of how to improve our training methods. The human species is obviously not as intelligent as the cat, but nevertheless can learn quite a lot - if properly managed. Topics of interest include the use of claw and order, purring as a human reward, rubbing your human up the right way, when to bite, spraying as a method of making our wishes known, ignoring the human, human harassment, human inattention and sheer human stupidity. I welcome your questions. Photos can be sent via my secretary's website, www.celiahaddon.com This blog has been chosen as one of the top 50 feline blogs by Online VetTechprogramms.org