Cat's strange addiction is 'raisin' some issues

QCS Columnist

I have written about my cat’s affection for bread products before.

Toby likes to tear the bread apart and create a breadcrumb wonderland.

Brownie actually enjoys eating the bread; his favorite is raisin bread.

I have been doing my best to avoid sweets in my pursuit to lose weight. This, of course, means not buying sweet treats to be tempted by at home.

Brownie has been disappointed because there is no raisin bread in the bags of groceries anymore.

Brownie seemed to have moved on from his raisin bread addiction.

Then out of the blue, my dad comes over and brings a box of coffee cakes with raisins.

I am not a fan of the cakes and they remained on top of the kitchen table for some time.

The cakes were in a cardboard box, safe from the cats.

A week went by and the cats had not bothered the coffee cakes.

Late one night, I had a craving for something sweet. So I decided to eat one of the cakes. This quickly staved off my sweet tooth.

I threw part of the cake away then went to bed without even giving it or the cats a second thought.

The next morning, I walked into the kitchen, to find a scene of destruction.

There is no video evidence of what actually happened that night. The evidence painted a picture of what transpired.

The trash can was knocked over and several items had been dug out by the cats. Among the items stretched out across the kitchen floor was a coffee cake wrapper.

On top of the table were the remains of the coffee cakes’ cardboard box. The top had been chewed on and ripped apart with portions of wrapper and coffee cake exposed in each opening.

One coffee cake had been removed from the box; its remains were on the table. The cake was shredded apart with crumbs spread out all across the surface.

This is exactly the kind of thing Toby loves to do to bread. So naturally, I was going to look for him.

I heard the crinkle of a wrapper come from beneath the table. I lifted the table cloth to find Brownie chowing down on a coffee cake.

I yelled at Brownie and took the coffee cake away, throwing it and the box in the trash.

Brownie ran off into the living room and hid by the recliner.

In the middle of cleaning, I noticed something odd. The cakes had all been destroyed but something was missing from the remains.

After cleaning, I spent a couple of hours trying to make sense of my discovery.

Finally, I decided to test a theory.

I took a box out of the cupboard and sat down on the couch. Brownie had moved to the living room floor and was taking a nap.

I opened the box, took out a single raisin, tossing it at Brownie. Brownie woke up and ate the raisin.

Brownie began to sniff around for another raisin and even came up to me to see what was in the box I was holding.

Turns out my cat likes raisins. Of course, I began doing some research on this and there are conflicted reports of raisins being bad for cats.

I’m not going to take any chances and have decided to keep raisins away from Brownie.

I never thought in a million years I would have to keep raisins out of my house because of my cat’s addiction.

Thomas Garcia is a senior writer at the Quay County Sun. He can be reached at [email protected]