Behavior change-due to contractor work...mostly me blabbering

[jeff kushner]

Kerry motivated me a couple of weeks ago to finally, after nearly a decade together, to drain my bed and give her access to the rear wall in my bedroom so she could remove the wall paper installed by "old girlfriend". As an aside, I watch a lot of nature shows and girls are much like male lions....in that when they move into the relationship, they seek out and remove all remnants of the last. Kerry, and you guys know I adore her...has done the same, patiently and incrementally...the wall paper was the last of Lori, who passed 5 yrs ago btw....didn't seem to matter to Kerry, that crap was still going! LOL

Anyway, the wall turned into a room and before you know it, we've relocated Matilda to my master bathroom and moved the furniture and painted everything above the floor and it's time for trim....enter Darren. He's a local handyman contractor. He is a dinosaur too. He always shows up when he says and always texts if he can't. He's more talented than I at anything "wood, like TRIM so he comes in to install & paint 300' of crown, baseboard and shoe all around. He let himself in and started Monday and has been there all week.....and done everything except a threshold in a different room for me.

Finally some relevance....

Matilda "went dark" after I saw her from 2-4am Monday morning. Even though her new room is has closed doors and is adjacent to the room where the work is taking place, she seems to be VERY AWARE and decided to bug out and hide. She finally came out last night at 6pm to take a piece of meat(steak day) into her fitting, then she dug in outside for the night, all w/i 5 minutes. Strawberries, refreshed daily(cause they'll go bad in the fridge anyway) are untouched. Even her water bowl which she does a ritualistic drink-bath-crap every morning, was still clean when I changed it each morning.

Darren should finish today but now I've got a room full of furniture and no "vision" for the new room yet......maybe a '70s Contemporary-rustic? I've got that big, blocky pine 1970's furniture so I might paint it with a Transformation kit to bring it into the 20th century then compliment with .....I'm blabbering....sry.

I just think it's kind of cool when we notice changes in behavior. When it happened to my kids,(as every parent here knows) as they grew up, it usually indicated a mental or physical growth spurt was about to happen.

 

[Yvonne G]

So are you saying that you've moved out of the master b/r and the tortoise has moved in? If that's the case, it's relocation stress. They really don't like leaving their old territory.

 

[jeff kushner]

Exactly almost! She has been relocated; tank-night table and all to the bathroom, against the wall. My old bedroom is gone. She has a front row seat to CONSTRUCTION when the door is open

I think you are very correct....

Again, even after a lifetime of keeping box turtles outdoors or water turtles in tanks.....I've never had to relocate one before... it just never came up before. When Darren did the kitchen/fam room off of the bedroom in the Spring, she wasn't really affected and she wasn't relocated. That was a month or so after her "dance with death" and carrot soaks saved her.

The things I've learned in a year or so.....who da thunk?

 

[Jan A]

Exactly almost! She has been relocated; tank-night table and all to the bathroom, against the wall. My old bedroom is gone. She has a front row seat to CONSTRUCTION when the door is open

I think you are very correct....

Again, even after a lifetime of keeping box turtles outdoors or water turtles in tanks.....I've never had to relocate one before... it just never came up before. When Darren did the kitchen/fam room off of the bedroom in the Spring, she wasn't really affected and she wasn't relocated. That was a month or so after her "dance with death" and carrot soaks saved her.

The things I've learned in a year or so.....who da thunk?

Pouting seems to be a typical reaction for them all across species. Or maybe they're just downright cranky because they don't get much of a choice in what we decide for them.