short-term thinking

[cellio]

It appears that, sometime in the past, someone either taught Giovanni to be a shoulder-and-neck-sitter or declined to discourage the behavior. That's really cute with a 2-pound kitten. Ahem: they do not stay two-pound kittens forever. This is a terrible picture (Giovanni loves to investigate the camera instead of sitting still if he detects it), but to get an idea of scale:

And here are a couple pictures of Orlando:

Orlando did not go into hiding again after the vet visit, and yesterday afternoon he spent an hour or so in my lap in the living room (yay). Giovanni likes my office, particularly the computer desk, but is reluctant to explore the house much -- coming into the room next door while I was watching TV last night was a big stretch, and he's made some brief late-night forays into the bedroom. So far as I know he has not yet been downstairs under his own power. How do I nudge him along in that? I don't want a litterbox in my office forever.

For all the suitable places in the house, particularly for Orlando, I'm surprised that they both tend to sleep under the same chair in my office, concurrently.

Comments

[kmelion.livejournal.com]

Why not slowly start moving the litter box towards the door, then right outside the door, etc?

[cellio]

I could get as far as "right outside the door", but then the steps are going to pose a problem. When I moved the food bowl to right outside the door he didn't eat as much. For whatever reason, he doesn't seem to be ready to venture out from this room much yet, and certainly not to go down stairs.

There's not really room to put the box on the landing of the stairs, which means the next stop after "just outside my office" would be in the main hall downstairs. I don't know if "steps" that involve it being out of sight (from the old location) work. There is also the husband factor...

I guess he just needs more time. (Giovanni, I mean. :-) )

[alienor.livejournal.com]

You could put a box in both locations, and stop cleaning the "just outside the office box". He'd have the box available if he refused to go downstairs, but it would be pretty undesirable after awhile.

Or just wait. They really haven't lived with you for a long time, yet (ours seem to take 6-10 months to get settled in).