Working from Home – With Cats #wfh

We are writing this from our home office as we are some of the lucky people who can continue their job from home amidst the craziness which is developing around us. Firstly, we hope you are all safe and well and that you are taking care of yourselves. Secondly, thanks to all of those who are continuing to work outside of your homes to keep everything functioning. We are very grateful.

We have now been on ‘lockdown’ for 9 days (well this is the 9th and who’s counting?) and are continuing to work our normal office hours (as best we can). My husband and I both work for the same architectural practice (he’s a graphic designer and I’m an urban designer) so have gone from seeing each other every day in the office (where we don’t work together too much), to working in the same room in the house. So far – so good (but it’s early days!) While our lives have changed significantly, Patrick and Norma’s are relatively unharmed by the experience, if anything, they’re lives have changed for the better.

As housecats, they spend their days sleeping, eating, and a bit more sleeping, before we get home from work in the evenings, then it’s more eating, a bit of playtime, then sleeping (but on us or near us rather than a comfy chair in the sun). We have definitely disrupted their usual routines, and I’m sure they’re pretty happy about it.

Norma seems relatively unchanged in herself, she’s more aloof than Patrick in the sense that she likes to take herself off to sleep (though she sleeps less than him). Patrick has always been very attached and likes to be in the same room as us at all times, which has meant we have definitely noticed more of a change in him. He has been a bit like a naughty child, overstimulated and not sure what to do with himself. He has been displaying all the happy symbols, lots of head bumping, vibrating his tail in happiness and general playfulness, but all of this means he isn’t getting his usual 22 hours of sleep per day. Although he is awake more, he is quite calm in the office and sits in the chair in the window, watching the world go by, hopping onto the desk for cuddles every now and again. Patrick does love that all our little office plants have had to come home, meaning he has lots of greenery to nibble on (help prune).

Norma very much treats every day like a weekend day and sticks to her normal routine of sleeping under the bed for a while before undertaking her daily tasks every now and again. Unfortunately her daily tasks now involve office admin – or being a nuisance at our desks. She loves to sit on the keyboards, roll on the desk etc. She also loves the sound of people’s voices through the speakers when we’re on video-calls – I don’t think I’m too worried about all our colleagues and clients realising we’re crazy cat people – anyway, we don’t really have a choice in the matter.

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  ‘Why look at that when you can look at me?’

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  Keeping track of breakfast

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  Helping set the desk up

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  ‘Look at me – don’t look at him’ (this is our boss!)

https://www.instagram.com/p/B-cFL1nFGtj/

Norma likes to be on my shoulders, whether it’s when I’m getting ready in the morning, or hanging the laundry out. This is no different when it comes to working and she loves to jump from the floor to my shoulders when I least expect it (this is when I have to refrain from using any expletives if I’m audible) and refuses to jump off. We have nice cuddles, and the usual loud purrs, but the ear nibbling gets a little awkward during video calls. If only cats understood social distancing eh?

In addition to the work side of home life, we are obviously spending more time at home, only going out for essential shopping or exercise. This means we are generally spending more time in the house, playing video games, doing home workouts etc all of which the cats can get involved with (and very much do!) The lovely spring weather has enabled us to spend lots of time in the garden which both Patrick & Norma have enjoyed. We recognise in these trying times, that we are very lucky to be in the situation we are in, in the house we have, with access to a garden and local amenities.

We hope you’ll enjoy seeing Patrick & Norma’s exploits at home with us over the next few weeks (or months – who knows?!) We’d love to hear how you guys are getting along, either working from home, or just being home more due to the current situation. Let us know in the comments below.

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