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Desk for people who work at home with a cat

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Re: Desk for people who work at home with a cat

#41

Post by ChrisMarshallNY »

pdpi wrote: post #9
ivraatiems wrote: post #7

The problem is that cats can flawlessly detect when something was made for them to use, and then will not deign to use it. Meanwhile, the cardboard box you have forgotten to take to the recycling for three weeks will become their palace.

I deliberately leave the most recent delivery box out for my cat to lounge in. Sometimes it’s a small studio flat, other times (like when my 3d printer arrived) it’s a whole palace. She likes them either way.

Chewy.com deliberately indicates that its boxes are for cats.

Also, their brown paper filler is loved by my cat. He doesn’t like Amazon packaging paper, but is all over Chewy paper. I wonder if they add a scent.

Re: Desk for people who work at home with a cat

#43

Post by dboreham »

andai wrote: post #39
mrweasel wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also illegal here in Denmark, if you use it while working from home. Desks must be height adjustable. Your employer is responsible for providing ergonomically correct office equipment. Basically any influencer and YouTuber who's showing "clever" desk hacks or builds fails because their creations aren't height adjustable. And my cat sleeps behind the laptop anyway.

Remarkable. What else is illegal there?

Not proper bacon, which seems to be illegal in the USA!

Re: Desk for people who work at home with a cat

#45

Post by PeterStuer »

Seems designed by people who definetly do not work from home with cats.

The cats demand to be on top of the desk, within attention reach at all times.

Pro tip: even big cats love to lay in the top cover of a printer paper box. You can adorn the outside, but keep the inside plain smooth cardboard as they are extremely fond of that feel.

Re: Desk for people who work at home with a cat

#46

Post by x______________ »

MichaelDickens wrote: post #13

I can foresee a design flaw, which is that the cat will ignore all the specially designated areas and sit on your keyboard instead.

Past experience with cat-wrangling over the years have taught me one thing (amongst many): It doesn't matter what the object is, if human cares about it, cat will use said object as a cat would, in order to communicate with human.

Communications from cat tend to be along the lines of: I'm hungry, or in most cases, I want attention (play/stimulation).

Past objects observed: Keyboards, houseplants, pens & pencils, kitchen area counter and anything on it, pet ants, rock and fossil collection.. the list goes on.

And related to cat areas, the secret that I've found was to never rely on buying fancy cat furniture but rather making a unique spot for cat every few days. Blanket for comfort, areas always in sight range of the work desk but not in it (to be distracting for work). Bonus points if you visit and pet cat when they're sleeping in those spots to reinforce that this is their spot and all is well with safety and comfort.

And same for toys, makeshift toys are cheaper and more effective than overpriced pet store shenanigans (Eg: elastics, pieces of string tied together, sandwich bag clips, small bouncy toys). The secret there is also reinforcing playtime with those toys by simply playing with cat!

Edit: written with cat at arm's length distance in makeshift bed in a chair~

Re: Desk for people who work at home with a cat

#47

Post by stronglikedan »

Heh, cool. It's the complete opposite of my idea - an office chair for people who work at home with a dog. It's just a regular office chair but double wide - an office loveseat maybe? Anyway, the point is that the couch just isn't ergonomic enough for me to be productive, but I like when my dog cuddles me while I work.

Re: Desk for people who work at home with a cat

#48

Post by olyjohn »

kleiba wrote: post #29
ge96 wrote: post #25

Every time I get up my cat steals my chair even though he has his own next to mine

Get two identical chairs.

I think they like the heat. They also love to sit on warm car hoods after the car is shut off. Maybe a heating pad set on low would attract them.

Re: Desk for people who work at home with a cat

#49

Post by fullstop »

ivraatiems wrote: post #7

The problem is that cats can flawlessly detect when something was made for them to use, and then will not deign to use it. Meanwhile, the cardboard box you have forgotten to take to the recycling for three weeks will become their palace.

I have food periodically delivered from Chewy, and I keep the box. Each month, the old box is recycled and the new box is put to use: https://i.imgur.com/lFgp63O.jpeg

There is definitely an attraction aspect related the "freshness" of the box, as there are squabbles over which cat gets to use the new box. These squabbles wane over time, until the new box arrives.

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