Welcome back to the Bluey Blog. After taking a short break, we have returned. This time, we will once again be talking about Bluey for a while. Two more stories await…

A Creature of Habit

As suggested by the title, this will be a story about Bluey, and all the things he does regularly, in other words – his habits. Bluey has many habits, some of which are so enforced that it’s a surprise to find out that not all cats actually do them. One of his favourite habits is attending family dinners. As we all know by now, Bluey loves to be considered a human, and a very important one at that; so when we all eat food without him, you can imagine what he’ll do. Yes. You guessed correctly. He will walk over to the table, and he will sit down next to one of our chairs, always in the same spot. Quite a lot of the time, he’ll even try to jump up onto the table to get some food or stand on his back two paws with his front two reaching up onto the table, looking for a stray scrap of dinner. When one of us leaves the table to get a drink, he’ll jump up onto their chair, and pretend to be a human. A lot of the time he does this even when we are still sat on the chairs, forcing us to move.

Another one of Bluey’s habits is going into what we call “behaviour loops”, we may have mentioned these before, however, as a reminder, this is when he will do a certain action, and then do another certain action, and then another, and then repeat the cycle. For example, one of his favourite behaviour loops is walking over to one of us to be stroked or picked up, then going to eat from his bowl, and then scratching at the sofa or floor, and then repeating the cycle. Over and over again. Until he gets bored and decides to do something else (this often comes as a surprise to the observer, who, by that time, will have grown accustomed to the behaviour loop, and will be shocked by Bluey doing anything else).

Bluey also likes to sit in the same few spots, which he regularly rotates through, and goes through phases of only ever sitting in one spot, and then only ever sitting in a different spot, and then a different spot, and then returning to the original spot. And so, whenever we look behind a curtain, in a cabinet, on top of a box or on a windowsill, we’re never quite sure if Bluey will be there or not.

Speaking of windowsills, another one of Bluey’s habits that whenever we leave the house, we always come home to find that Bluey is sitting on the windowsill facing the road, and waiting for us to return, and upon seeing us outside the door, rushing downstairs, so that when we enter the house, we find him waiting for us as soon as we step over the threshold. He will then proceed to meow incessantly at us and beg for attention.

Over the many previous chapters, you may have encountered some of these habits previously, and so have recognised them in this story. Or you might not have. Either way, this has been a recap of all the thing Bluey likes to do over and over again.

The Cupboard of Doom

As mentioned previously, Bluey likes to find the most comfortable places in the house, and sleep in them. This is one of his habits mentioned in the previous story and is something he has been doing since we first met him. Now some places in the house are, in Bluey’s opinion, more comfortable than others. One example of these particularly comfy places is the large shelf array/cupboard in the top floor of the house. A great number of things are stored in this item of furniture, and it has been there many years. Even longer than Bluey has lived here. As you can imagine, when he was still a kitten, Bluey’s quest for comfort led him to the cupboard. It is and always has been one of Bluey’s favourite locations to take a nap. This may sound like a harmless and benign thing, but when one is trying to use the shelves there for the storage of documents, clothes, boxes, and many other assorted household items, it can become a bit of a nuisance. There is one particular shelf in the cupboard that Bluey loves, most likely because it is usually covered in something soft and is often quite concealed. This behaviour began to get on the nerves of the users of the cupboard, and so they decided to place a layer of plastic bags on the shelf that Bluey slept in the most, to prevent him from going there. This worked for quite some time. That was, until Bluey decided that he wouldn’t let a few bags bother him and decided to go back there. This contributed, along with many other factors, to the removal of the plastic bag defence. Bluey had, however, began to learn that his habit of sleeping there was beginning to become obstructive. So, he began to go there less, and for quite a while, it remained this way. Around this time, coincidentally, he had started to lie down in the weirdest places again, similar to when he was a kitten. For example, he would lie on desks, play-boxes, bedroom floors, and other strange places. So, at this time, he had no shortages of places to lie down in. We, the family, got used to him not spending as much time there anymore, and so, it came as a great shock when we discovered him in there again. Recently, he has decided to move back into the cupboard, but having gotten used to being able to use the shelves there freely, we were frequently surprised by his presence there. For example, a few days ago, I reached my hand in there, and having not seen him there (due to the fact that this shelf’s front side, where you put thing in from, was covered with a bag – this may have contributed to his presence there), I received a surprise in the form of a swipe at my hand.

This is just another one of Bluey’s weird and wonderful behaviours.

I hope that you have enjoyed reading this episode/issue/whatever you may want to call it of the Bluey blog, and I hope that you will return to read the next one too.

© 2021 Rohan (13) and Dalia (10)

Help us to continue support to all neurodiverse families and individuals

PowerWood offers to neurodiverse families understanding, simple tools and strategies that enable us to support ourselves and our children through emotional overwhelm. If you enjoy reading the articles please support PowerWood making all information available to all by becoming a PowerWood Community FreeBee or Friend member. Thank YOU!