Don’t you know pets all over the nation woke up Sunday morning thinking to themselves, “What in the world are Mom and Dad doing up at this hour???????”
Pets are like kids: the more regular their schedule, the better they do. Back in my childhood dairy farm days, Uncle Sam kept one alarm clock set to “slow time,” meaning standard time, because he didn’t want the cows to go “off their milk” because their schedule got changed. Dairy cows are funny that way; they don’t adapt to change easily.
Like kids.
As I’ve mentioned before, Maxx’s food comes from a feeder on a timer. I don’t change the timer when Daylight Saving Time rolls around. He gets four small meals each day, which allows him to follow his natural feline tendency to “grazing,” and keeps him from gorging himself on one or two huge meals per day, which almost always resulted in vomiting after every meal. He might think it’s strange that I used to be up for an hour before he was fed, but now he gets fed soon after I get up. But, probably not, because his culinary expectations are based on what that machine does, not on what Brenda or I do.
Willie? He just has to roll with it because he’s crated at night and can’t go to the Potty Park until one of us gets up and lets him out. Which is fine, because he’s an incredibly adaptable, easygoing dog. Easily the most trouble-free dog we’ve ever had.
PS: After all this, we ended up reversing our decision. Click here to read the followup.
See you next week, Dr. Randolph.
