Thumper Thinks Out Loud

I woke at 4:30 this morning to something I haven’t woken to in a very long time: Max curled up next to the pillow, his paw tapping my nose. As I stirred awake he started to purr and inched his way closer; my hand automatically went to his head and I scratched behind his ears, hoping that’s all he wanted.

That was it, but he wasn’t content with 30 seconds of attention. No, at 4:30 in the morning Max wanted a full-on head rub, complete with chin skritches. I humored him for 10 minutes or so, and as I drifted off again he set his head on my hand and went to sleep.

This matters. It’s not so much the annoyance factor, but it’s on a list of the things he used to do but hasn’t done in a very long time that he’s now doing again.

The 3 a.m. singing; that’s back with a vengeance. In fact, he talks all freaking night long. Like he used to.

He sits in my lap as much as possible; he hasn’t really done that since we left Ohio. If he’s not sitting, he’s standing on me, shoving his nose up mine or rubbing his face all over my glasses, his wet nose leaving skid marks. He’s realized I find his rubbery lips on mine incredibly gross, so he makes an effort to get that in on a daily basis.

Begging for dinner and snack starts 2 hours early.

We’d thought he was back to 100% before, but with the return of some almost forgotten behaviors, we realize he wasn’t. And that he may have felt a little off as long as a year ago. Long before Buddah.

I do worry what moving again is going to do to him; stress is obviously not Max’s friend. Hopefully by keeping him on the antibiotics 2 weeks on, 2 weeks off, we’ll make it as pain free as possible…but for now he’s Full Throttle Snarky, and I may never get to sleep through the night again.