Valentine’s Day at John and Kim’s is always a fun time. It’s an anniversary of sorts and generally lends itself to extra snuggling and such. This year Kim sent me on a treasure hunt where I found a cake, a balloon and some Valentine beer (My sweetie knows me). Then she tells me it’s time to go for a ride.
I’m game. What’s the worst that could happen? She might be secretly planning to sell me to medical science, but I think it unlikely that she would have gone to the trouble of buying me beer first. As we get closer to downtown I am told to close my eyes. After a time, we stop and she says to me, “Honey, we’re expecting.”
I showed great control and managed not to wet myself. Instead, I opened my eyes to find we were in front of the Atlanta Humane Society. This made me a bit misty eyed. Cricket the Wonder Kitty has been without a copilot since my other cat Fuzzy died two years ago. I hadn’t gotten another cat because I wasn’t sure I was ready and I didn’t know if Kim was up for another furry hellion in the house. However, as it turned out, Kim was ready to take the plunge and so was I.
We wandered around looking for a bit and finally asked to take one of the cats from her cage. She was a shy kitty, but absolutely gorgeous, a big, white, fluffy, “No Mr. Bond… I expect you to die.” kind of cat. She had miss-matched eyes (one blue, one green) and a crooked tail.
It took us three days to get her. She had just arrived at the shelter and they had to wait three days to see if her owner would claim her. She had a slight infection in one eye and kept it closed for the most part. Leading me to make stupid pirate jokes and continually say “Rrrrr” to the cat. She humored me as best she could.
When we got her home she went into kitty-ninja mode and hid every chance she got. After almost a week, she has managed to be a bit more social. She has Fuzzy’s odd habit of wanting to sleep under the covers. Although in her case, it seems to be more of a “I am shy. You can’t see me.” thing than Fuzzy’s “I am cold and shall now proceed to suck the warmth from your body like a bad Star Trek Monster” thing.
So without further delay, I am proud to present the latest family member, Valentine.
John E Clark 