Kitten Adventures

Being owned by two adult cats and one adult dog definitely makes us animal lovers. We love our eight-year-old purebred Russian Blue cat named "Lily," whom we adopted about five years ago. Oliver, or "Ollie," we sought out eight years ago after our seventeen-year-old tuxedo cat, B.C., died from congestive heart failure. Ollie appears to be a Ragdoll/Himalayan mix and is scared of everything. Megan, our eight-year-old Australian Shepherd, is a huge bundle of energy and is so loving. We adopted her about two years ago from a friend who raised Aussies.

A few weeks ago, my husband, Tim, stopped to pay a bill at our storage company. There are always cats around the place, being good mousers for the business. Tim saw some kittens. He fell in love with a little orange scrapper and came home to tell me about it. I know he thought I would just pooh, pooh the idea of a kitten but he was wrong! I jumped at the chance to have one.

That Saturday I stopped at storage and didn't see the kitten (or any kittens, for that matter) anywhere and the office was closed. It was quite hot so I thought they sheltered under some of the buildings. Our son, Michael, and I came back later in the day - still no kittens. We ran an errand and came back. The manager was outside so we asked about adopting one of the little kittens. He was agreeable and told us that it might be better to come back in the early evening when the cats were out. Disappointed, we left.

Our adventure continued after supper as Tim drove me, Michael and my mom to storage. I had brought a towel and some lunchmeat in a sandwich bag. I sat a good ten yards from the building and peered underneath. The kittens were there! It was pretty hard to see them but I saw two orange kittens. I tossed some meat in their direction but no one was biting.

I brought the towel right up to the edge and looked again. There they were. I tossed some of the lunchmeat just under the building and the mama cat came for the bait. The kittens were not far behind. After a little patient waiting, I grabbed one!

You would have thought I had snared a tiger - there was such spitting and hissing and flailing. The mama cat wasn't any too happy about this arrangement either. I scooped the kitten into the towel and triumphantly went to the car with my prize. Keeping the baby firmly wrapped in the towel, I stroked its tiny head and marveled at his huge blue eyes.

We named him "Aubie," after the Auburn tiger mascot. Most of the time, though, we call him, "H.T.," for "holy terror." He has acclimated well to our home. Our other pets have not acclimated well to him. Lily hates him, Ollie is scared to death of him and Megan wants to eat him. We humans love him.

Aubie is officially our toddler and seems to be going through the "terrible twos." He claws his way up the bed, falls in the bathtub water, attacks the cats, chews our fingers and toes (as well as the rug, couch, shoes and blankets), climbs the walls (really) and curtains and sleeps like an angel. Nothing like it - and we love it!