hello, kitty

10-12-99

I've done a horrible thing.

Everyone always explains how wonderfully easy it is and nobody else has any trouble with it, ever.

But I can't, for my life, get two cats to get along with one another.

I brought a tiny kitten home from work today. The guys caught it back in the warehouse. It's tiny, dirty, half-starved, half-feral and I knew that I was the only person there who could take it home and take care of it. The other guy who wanted it has a history of accidentally running over his cats with the car.

I dropped it off at the vet before coming home, to make sure it wasn't sick. No way was I bringing a sick cat into the house with Julia.

When I came in I told John: "I have a surprise for you...." I'd decided to give it to John and let him decide whether or not to keep it. "It's a little, little surprise...but it's a BIG surprise...And I want you to know, in case it's too big of a surprise, you can use it to surprise someone else and I won't mind, because I made sure I didn't get too surprised by it...."

John went with me to pick the kitty up from the vet and by the time we got home he had named him Conrad. Conrad is a precious little guy, though he might not be a guy, it's too soon to tell. He's roughly six weeks old, barely weaned. Kept grabbing our fingers with his teeth. He's basically a tuxedo cat, with more white and less black. His body's black, but his tummy, legs, and nose are white. (Well, gray. He's VERY dirty.) Dark yellowy eyes. And he's very vocal, hates to be left alone. Right now he's locked in the bathroom.

Julia reacted pretty violently. She sat on my lap for a few minutes without noticing Conrad on John's lap. When the tiny kitty saw Jules, he hopped over to say hi and she knocked him off the chair with one paw. Now she's pouting. She won't go near John, and neither of us can touch her.

I'm lost. Becky says she had a week of hell when she brought Sammy home and introduced him to Sable. I might be able to stand it for a week. But what if it doesn't work? What if our sweet Julia hates us forever? What if she goes outside and never comes back?

I'm going to go drink. What a terrible mistake.