Absolutely Velma-riffic

Both Velma and Elfie despise winter with every ounce of their furry little beings. Velma often seems particularly offended by the snow and, most mornings, will refuse to put all four feet on the ground. She will hold one front paw up off the ground and tucked into her chubby little tummy as if to demonstrate that it is so freaking cold that she simply cannot bear having all four paws in the snow at once. It is simply too much to ask of her.

We love our cats. We do what we can to give them all the little creature comforts they deserve…within reason. (We have determined that snow blowing the entire yard is not within reason, sadly for them.) It turns out that they are part feline, part camel, and are constantly thirsty. This has proven to be a challenge here in northern Michigan because, as you might have guessed, it gets cold here in winter. Wet things outside tend to freeze when it’s 7 degrees outside. Now, because we are a good kitty mama and daddy, we bought them a heated water dish so that they would always have nice, unfrozen water to drink. The dish doesn’t make the water hot or anything, it just keeps the water temp above freezing to keep it liquid.

If you are a science geek like me (who recently got very upset with C.S.I.’s Gil Grissom for wrongly using the term “terminal velocity”), you might know that because of the humidity and the variation in temperature, standing water that cannot freeze tends to evaporate rather quickly (lake effect snow, anyone?). It follows naturally that, though the bowl holds 2 cups, between being ingested by the cats and the evaporation needs to be refilled every other morning to keep our babies in fresh water. This morning it was empty, as scheduled.

Also this morning, Velma made a brilliant discovery. There is never any snow inside the water dish. AND…when all the water is gone, not only is the bottom of the dish nice and dry, it is also vaguely warm. She then determined the empty water dish to be an absolutely perfect perch, keeping ALL FOUR paws nice and dry and, yes, even perhaps a little warm.