I have a barely 4 months tabby female and she now weighs in at 5 pounds, 14
ounces. She's not fat as she's already about as long as my former cat at adult
age: about seventeen inches long without stretching the nose.

Is there any place where I can compare her weight with cats of this age? I
believe she's going to be a fairly big cat. And, it's so funny, she eats
things that my former cat would never have eaten, even put under torture:
corn, green peas, sprouted soy beans. cheese and, her favorite treat, yogurt.

Of course, I only give her some of this when I eat it myself because she seems
to want to share what I eat, but I definitely cut the olive oil that floats on
top of Kalamata olives. (But she doesn't like real olive oil. Strange!)

Cats are a constant source of wonder, even when you already had one. My other
one, a red tabby, would spill a lot of litter out of the box, this one, not a
grain. If she spills one kibble out of her plate, she immediately eats it. She
cleans herself so much that she almost rubbed all the hairs off her nose. (I
changed to another moist food recently to see if it will help and we'll see
the vet next week for spaying. If 4 1/2 months old enough?)

Also, I've read very ggod reports on this forum about Nutro's Gourmet
Classics. I wonder if it's that good. If was recommended to me because there
is no by-products in it, but cats do eat by-products naturally: feathers and
gills and what not. When I took a closer look though, I figured there might be
less than 20% real meat in this food. The first ingredient is indeed chicken,
then 3 cereals, than fat, then another cereal. My former cat refused to eat
this. I wonder why this one is so fond of it she goes crazy when she sees the
bag. I wonder if some of this chicken is not processed into digest, which
gives crappy cat treats such a good taste for cats. What do you think? For the
present time, I offer this to her only as a treat, She's got kitty Eukanuba
for normal food: and this is meat, meat, meat!

As for the rest, it's ordinary life with a cat. Yesterday, my heart went
freewheeling. I was reading about Tom Cruise and scientology on my computer
when suddendly a wild beast jumped on me from the ceiling. The little (almost)
six pounds kitty had jumped on me from a nearby cloth closet. I laughed... but
it took a moment.

I would like to add a comment about what I read recently on this group about
teaching non-declawed cats not to scratch furniture.

I'm diabetic and, somehow, it seems my cat feels it. This cat hasn't scratched
me once, even when I play hard with her. (Bitting is another matter, but she's
never bitten me to the blood. Little teeth are coming out, apparently.) But
some of the forniture has suffered. For instance, even though I installed all
kind of things for her to play with all around the house, inclusing a big
scratch pole and some mosquito screen laid on a frame, she's removed all the
gaze beneath the base of my bed. She's scratched chairs and unsewed a thick
blanket, fooled around a bit with the curtains, etc.

People must understand that, when they adopt a cat, they will live with an
animal. In their natural state, those animals roam in the forest with thousand
of huge trees to climb into and have fun with. No scratch post will ever be an
equivalent. If you try to teach a cat to touch nothing in the house, you'll
drive him stir crazy.

For people who want nothing to be scratched in their house, there's an easy
solution: get a porcelain one. They look good and won't scratch your furniture.