The Kitten Story

With our past experiences with kittens not being so great, I was a bit reluctant when a friend called to offer us a kitten she had just adopted the day before. She had met our wonderful cat, Max and decided it would be fun for her kids to have a cat. Well, Max is just that wonderful that anyone would want to go out and find a kitty just like him to bring home. Except she didn't get a nice healthy kitty, she unknowingly got a sickly 6 week old kitten who had been orphaned.

RIP June/Cookie/Jak (we had trouble picking a name)

The night before she called to offer us the kitten, we had met the extremely skinny calico. My 5 yo sat with the kitty for hours in her lap, while all the other kids played. She had no interest in doing anything else but hold that tiny little kitten. So, after my friend realized her husband was a bit upset about their new addition, naturally she called me. It took me all of about 3 hours to 'think on it' before calling her back and scheduling the pick up.

We brought her to the vet before bringing her home and the vet seemed a little concerned about her weight, but didn't give me any cause to grow alarmed. Nothing an automatic feeder wouldn't cure, so I thought. Well, to make a short story even shorter. We had her for 4 days, which most of the time she looked for various places to crap in the house and slowly stopped eating all together. By the time I realized there was something severely wrong with her, it was in the middle of the night and nothing I could do. No one to call (the 24 hr emergency service all but laughed out loud at me when I called them), and no where to bring her. I was lost. I brought her to the vet immediately the next morning and she died 4 hours and a lot of money later.

Maybe it was feeling like there was more I could have done, or maybe it was the sadness I was feeling about not being able to properly nurture a living thing, but it only took me two days to bring home another kitten. And I have to say I'm so glad I did. He's a great ball of fun. We still haven't named him yet. I think I'm worried that I'll jinx it somehow. I want to wait until we know for sure that he'll be with us.


The kitty without a name
The only problem we've had so far is his lack of pooping. But with a few painful grunts he managed to squeeze some out this morning. I'll have to figure out how to prevent this from happening again. I think it's his food. Honestly, I don't think this little guy will ever do wrong where I'm concerned. As he grips his claws into my bare legs to climb into my lap, "AH, oh you're so sweet...ouch...okay, in my lap finally." When he wakes me at 1am for some frisky play time, that I'm assuming he had with his mom and sister, I oblige, "he he, you want to play...ouch claws..okay, you're so sweet...he he." *yawn* And I can't really see that his love for playing with electrical wiring will grow into anything to be concerned about.

Our poor hamster will now have two cats terrorizing it and knocking over his cage. My husband is away right now, but when he called and I told him we had a new addition, he seemed relieved that it was a pet and not a baby. Even though he made some snide reference to our "expanding farmhouse," it's obvious that he truly does love me.