Step one: let him hide or shy away from you if he wants to. He wouldn’t let me touch him for a couple days after we got back from the shelter. His comfort was more important than me getting to touch him.
Step two: make yourself nonthreatening. In my case this meant being very quiet, bringing food and lying down on the ground within his eyesight as an invitation to investigate.
Step three: watch his body language and don’t do things that make him uncomfortable. Turns out my cat often bit when he was overstimulated so I made sure not to overwhelm him.
Step four: draw lines, but not with brute force. Even though his biting wasn’t meant to hurt, I wanted to make sure he wouldn’t injure anyone in the future. So I decided when he bit me, I’d yelp “ow!” And then withdraw all physical contact for a few minutes, sometimes leaving the room. Now he never bites, but sometimes he puts his teeth on my hand and then thinks better of it.
Step five: provide a good outlet for destructive behaviors. Aka PLAY WITH HIM, SEVERAL TIMES A DAY.
Step six: be patient.
Step seven: get lucky and somehow pick up the best cat in the entire shelter. I don’t know how it happened but he’s a godsend. He’s literally cuddled me out of a panic attack. We both really needed each other.
I was recently hired
by a small local library to help with advertising the events they held. I was
surprised at how many great things they sponsored, since I live in the area and
had never heard of any of them. The first one I went to, two people showed up
outside the library staff.
Me: Well,
whatever ads you were putting out before aren’t very effective. What have you
been doing to get the word out?
Client: We put
out a sign in front of the library the day before and of the event.
Me: Okay, what
else?
Client: That’s
it.
Sure enough, as I was
leaving I spotted a 3'x3’ sign standing in front of the library. It wasn’t even visible from the main road.
I guess this means
they’re actually perfect clients because
I can really help them out, but I still can’t believe it.
