Harry Houdini has been reborn as a rabbit

Harry Houdini has been reborn as a rabbit. Lila has an uncanny ability to thwart all of my carefully planned attempts to keep her in her own space, preferring to run free all over my room, which usually includes a potty break on my bed.

First she learned to circumvent the various pens I made from the footboard of my bed and my luggage by knocking over pieces of the make-shift wall, squeezing through small holes I missed, etc. Then she learned use the small table that serves as a roof for her eating and sleeping area as a stepping stool to jump over the cage wall. Once outside of her normal cage area, she learned to use my carry-on sized luggage as a step to my tallest piece of luggage. Sometimes these pieces are about a foot away, but evidently she is willing to make the jump anyway.

Several times I step into my room only to find my little furball standing next to me on the tallest piece of luggage right next to my hand. After coming back from a week at Carly’s house, I was dismayed to find she had finally grown big enough and strong enough to jump on my bed, so that also wouldn’t work as an obstacle anymore. Fortunately last week the carpenter finished the pieces of her cage, so that gave me a new weapon in the fight against my jackrabbit at heart.

Lila’s new ‘cage’ is four independent pieces, 2 squares just under 2.5 feet in length, and 2 rectangles around 5 feet long and just under 2.5 feet high. I didn’t want them connected because I can arrange them in a variety of ways to give her a variety of pens, including one with a top. Very snazzy.

Sometimes Lila jumps onto the chicken wire with all four feet. My little Spiderman in the making hasn’t learned how to actually climb the chicken wire yet, but I wouldn’t be surprised if she figures it out eventually.

Today I arranged three of the cage pieces in a stretched out ‘Z’ formation so she could run around half of my room, without being able to get on the bed or near the dresser. I came home to find little poo balls on my bed, my jar of peanut butter on the floor [thank fully unopened], the measuring cup that I use to progressively dole out Lila’s daily allotment of oatmeal, and a few other items on the floor.

You see, after using the spokes of the front wheel of my bike to climb over the barrier, she jumped on my bed, and then onto my dresser, to get to the oatmeal. When she was done with the oatmeal, she probably jumped back onto my bed, and hopped back over the barrier to her allotted side of the room where I found her pleasantly munching grass in her litter box.

I don’t think I’ve mentioned before, but Lila is an oatmeal monster. She is almost as bad as Inigo was with his food at first, but she doesn’t bite. When I try to pour the oatmeal into her bowl, instead of waiting for what falls, she goes straight to the source, putting her head directly into the measuring cup. If I try to pull away, she uses her head, front paws, and sometimes her teeth to grab onto the cup to keep it from floating away back to the dresser.

Evidently she decided today that she would to cut out the middle man, me, and opt for the self-serve early dinner option.

I’m very tempted to give her a little more of that oatmeal that she craves so much to put a little junk in her bunny trunk and weigh that load down a bit.