No. Turns out that Ray does better going through her day if you say “No” and mean it sometimes. The interdiction doesn’t last very long (thirty seconds), and she’s upset, but she isn’t hurt. She seems happier dealing with a straight-out “no” than a general sense of annoyance. It seems obvious, but I’d always wondered.

It seems like she understands that people have emotions now, that it is possible to communicate emotions from herself to someone else and back. (I don’t know if she understands that two people that are not her can do this yet.) I don’t think it’s empathy (beecause she doesn’t care yet that it hurts when she yanks that cat around), it seems more like a pre-talking thing. When she babbles, now, she isn’t just expressing what she feels, she’s trying to communicate what she feels, on purpose.

In basic English, that means she’s started whining.