Pet-Speak

I know that cats and dogs don't understand much English, but I like to think they do. It's way more interesting when I'm having a conversation with them to believe they know what I'm saying, rather than admit I shouldn't be having a conversation with a cat.


On Saturday at Casey's last obedience class, the instructor brought up the fact that dogs only associate with the sound words make when we say them, not a string of words in a sentence. Learning that, I immediately altered my training regimen to enforce the same words repetitiously in order for her to learn my commands better. I started leaving out unnecessary words like, "okay" and "the", when all I need to say is "free", and "ball". I found that doing this has already worked, so we're going to keep on it.


Now regarding the cats, I still believe they speak to me. When I start petting Buster's sweet spot on his back and he goes "mrawm", it sounds like "mom". Seriously! Missy does it too, just in a sweeter voice. So because this is extremely interesting to me, I figured my friend Wikipedia could probably shed some light. This is what I learned:

A meow is a sound used by cats to signal a request to their mother or to a human being. Adult cats do not meow to each other, and so the meowing to human beings that domesticated cats exhibit is likely partly an extension of the use by kittens of this plaintive signal.

Well I'll be! It signals a request "to their mother"! Since I consider myself to be such person, this makes a lot of sense! I know it doesn't mean that they carry on conversations with me, but I like to feel needed and that they know who I am :)

Do you have a chatty cat or dog? What do you think they're saying? I realize that many times the chatter can be due to something they need, especially with the cats. Casey barks a lot, but it's usually because she's not happy about something, whether it be that we're not throwing her the ball or she can't get outside to chase the taunting squirrel.

I guess the point is, I'm probably a very typical pet-parent who talks to their "kids" often and as if they are human beings. I'd be just plain mean if I didn't want to converse with them and treated them like mere animals!

My piece of pi today: 3.141592653589793238