#not that i wouldn't forgive a plain or ugly cat just as quickly but you have to admit she does look angelic

[naamahdarling]

Jasper's poor little hind leggies. He has the jumping ability of an 8- to 10-week-old kitten. He can do it, but it isn't easy for him and he misses a lot and has terrible balance as he lands. (Some of it is his weight relative to his hind leg strength. He would do better if he were the size of a kitten, and not a meatloaf.)

But god save you if you're on the top platform of a cat tree because he can CLIMB just fine. He has arms and shoulders like a little bear, he is VERY strong.

I think it might be lack of climbing surfaces where they were raised, and that's all. It still worries me, and if he doesn't improve in a couple of weeks of working with him I'll take him to the vet for it.

He was willing to jump high today going for a toy, and he cleared the ground by several inches a few times; he did very, very well. So that's an improvement over what I have been seeing. His feet still often splay out to the sides when he sits, but it has improved a little. That he was willing to jump the way he did is a good sign.

Junie, who initially had the same problem, has done very well for herself. She is small and light and prefers to jump rather than climb, and she runs everywhere. She also likes the wheel and while she doesn't use it on her own, she will run like crazy on it to chase a toy or a treat. So her back legs are much closer to normal. She's sitting with her hind feet properly under her most of the time.

She goes flat-out on that wheel. I need to get video of her going at top speed, because it's really, really impressive. She gets creative with it, too. She will run, stop, and let the wheel swing her back, then use the more solid footing there to jump forward and catch anything on the opposite side of the wheel, and she'll jump when running, too. She's smart and pretty fast, and she's fearless.

Their behavior needs a lot of work but they're just babies who have never been asked to be nice. I was expecting Jasper, as the stupid one, to be harder to deal with, but he isn't. It's Junie. She's terrible. But she also looks like this:

So one forgives her almost immediately.