Since Ninety-Nine began her rebound last Friday, the smaller Spies have been on a phenomenal weight-gain tear. She and Larrabee have each gained eight ounces, and April Dancer has gained almost seven. The others haven’t been far behind.

The best word I can think of to describe it is Groundhoggian.

It’s hard to say whether the bug that generated so much diarrhea and vomiting last week contributed to the Spies’ reluctance to start eating real food, or whether they caught the bug from Mata Hari (since she had both symptoms first). Either way, the result was a major stall that left even the healthiest Spies (Bond, Galore) behind the curve on the growth front.

April Dancer was still struggling to crack the one-pound barrier.

Not anymore.

One unexpected result of the rapid growth was that Smiley caught up to Ilya. A few days ago they registered exactly the same weight, which meant that we could no longer tell them apart. Since then, one of them has retaken the lead. We think it’s Ilya, but can’t be positive. It actually matters, because Smiley is a week behind on his FVRCP vaccination regimen, and has had one fewer shot. To play it safe, we decided to resynch him with his sibs, and give both our lookalike orange guys two more shots, starting this weekend. That way Smiley will definitely have had three, and Ilya will get one extra. (It’s not a risk for him – four shots is the norm for some organizations.)

We still have the entire back wall of the villa lined with litterboxes, and the message is finally getting through. With the exception of a spot near the dresser, the out-of-the-box pooping zones seem to have been closed down. I relocated one of the boxes to the dresser spot yesterday, with mixed results so far. It would help to catch the renegade pooper in action.

Mata Hari has become very social and spends most of her evenings hanging out with us in the back room. We leave the villa door open with the baby gate up, and so far we’ve only seen one Spy successfully scale it (Smiley, last night). This group isn’t exactly Seal Team Six.

But the Spies are transitioning into the playful, purring, super-cute stage. When I enter the villa to deliver meals and scoop out the boxes, Ninety Nine follows me around while Mata Hari and her sibs start chowing. After I pick her up to say hello, then she’s ready to join everyone at the buffet.

filed by: TS