Our Kitty For a Day

In the late fall we noticed a pack of little tiny kitties hanging around outside our house for a few weeks.  They didn't appear to have a mother and I was worried about them surviving the winter (go figure....I don't even like cats!) We tried to catch them but they were way too fast!  One afternoon Gabe and I heard some whining coming from the garage and upon further investigation we found that we had trapped one of the kitties in our garage by accident.  the kitty was terrified and remember I don't like cats... ok...fine, I am scared of them, I will admit it!  They are a little stealthy and jumpy which just sort of freaks me out.  Kitties are adorable but cats just sort of stare and creep around.  Just so you know, I am very brave to admit this because most of  the world likes cats and in particular several of my in-laws are cat LOVERS ... so admitting this just might put me at the bottom of the favorite in-law list. (assuming I wasn't there to begin with, but you never know?!:)) So anyway I was a bit nervous to do anything about the kitty all by myself and I knew Gabe would be no help- so when Eli (he is the brave one) got home from school I told him about the kitty and I asked him to go and catch it.  He of course was so excited about this special assignment.  I have since learned that wild kittens/cats are very dangerous to say the least (I will save the story of Glen's rabid cat bite for later) but at the time I had no idea and seriously this kitty was tiny- like 5 weeks old!  How bad could it be?-I figured Eli could handle it and I did sort of helped him- I stood back, up on top of a chair to be exact, and I told Eli what to do!  The kitty was out of control- wild!  He was scared and running all around the garage trying to hide and then climbing anything within reach to get away- it was pretty insane, like nothing I have ever seen!  but amazingly, Eli caught him- my wanna be ninja, and he only had about a dozen scratches (or more) to show for it!  I love that kid- he is fearless.  We hastily stuffed the kitty under a box... it was quite the process but we had him-he was captured until Glen got home with further skills... or something like that?

Once he got home from work... being the man that he is, Glen stepped right in and to the rescue.  He put on his leather gloves and donned his best horse whisper voice... er I mean, cat whisper voice. He was all official... calm and easy and it worked!  The kitty loved him, no wild behavior, no scratches... the cat was actually purring.  Must be true what they say about animals sensing your fear.  I'm sure being chased by a fast child in a confined area with a crazy lady yelling from a top a chair was not very soothing?!  But Glen sure had the touch.

the boys were in heaven loving the kitty, petting the kitty, Ollie even kissed the kitty (several times) They could not keep their hands off him... especially Oliver- He was obsessed!  I was so afraid he was going to squish the poor thing.  He just could not get enough and was shaking he was so excited!  I must admit the kitty was so adorable- all black with a pink nose... but I did keep my senses and was sure to keep reminding them all that "we DO NOT do pets"  So after lots of loving, bringing the kitty into our house, feeding the kitty warm milk (which we learned is a no-no... thanks a lot Tom and Jerry cartoon people for leading us astray!)  wrapping the kitty in a blanket etc... we decided to call our neighbor friends who happen to foster stray cats and help them to find good homes. They told us to bring him over. 

 So after lots of begging, protesting and some tears... the boys finally gave up and said their goodbye's... Writing that last sentence I am feeling pretty heartless.  But seriously, we DO NOT do pets!  I am the meanest mom, I know.  But I just can't do it.  the boys bounced back quickly and after some good meds and therapy they are handling things fairly well now... just kidding...about the therapy and meds- the doing good part is true though... they got over it quickly but still occasionally talk fondly about the black little kitty we had for one day!  He was pretty cute and  I decided that a one day pet was not too bad!

A few weeks later we found this black kitty's siblings (three of them)  hiding out in our garage to stay warm... they were bigger and faster and so we borrowed a cat trap and enticed them with food.  They were crazy wild and even with Glen's whisper skills and leather gloves he got bitten when he was transferring one of the kitties from the trap to a holding box.  He was suppose to start on antibiotics and get a tetanus shot and there was talk of- terminating the cat... It was a BIG deal!  We have no insurance and so Glen being the man that he is opted to take his chances and wait until he started dying to pay for the meds... He is not dead yet but I have noticed his eye teeth in particular are more pointy and his chest hair is black - maybe I should be worried (wink, wink)

So after all that we still agree that we DO NOT do pets
and NO more kitties around here, not even for a day!