Kite Jockey’s Weblog

This past week my wife’s boss Lori and her family found three baby kittens in their yard and tried to rescue them. I think this was on Monday night. Tuesday she told Vicki about the three cats and how they had tried to catch them. Wednesday morning Lori told Vicki that they caught one of the three cats but the other two were not to be found. Lori and her husband desperately tried to find this little fellow a place in a no kill shelter to no avail. Most of the shelters in this area fill up quick especially in the summer after the breeding season. They could not consider keeping the cat because their daughter has allergies to cats. Without having any other option Lori and Jeff decided to call animal control to come pick up the kitten.

Vicki had been keeping up with the progress of this kitten with great interest. We are cat parents and have three fur babies of our own. We have had cats since before we were married. Vicki’s love for felines was very addictive and rubbed off on me quickly. She had many cats growing up and I had only had one and it was not a good experience for me. However, I actually brought our first cat into our relationship in 1988 when I rescued Abber off of the Grenville Highway that winter. I guess to be fair Vicki married me but what she really got in this deal was the chance to become Abber’s adopted mother. We had no idea back then that we would not ever have children of our own and after we found out we were an infertile couple we began giving a lot of our love and affection to the many cats we would come to adopt. After Abber we adopted Samantha from a friend in Brevard and then we rescued another kitten, Max, off of the side of highway 191 near Pisgah Forest, NC. Sadly Max, Abber, and Samantha have all passed away. Max’s death was the worst of the three. He died shortly after we moved to Charlotte. We really don’t know what happened to him but for some reason he stopped eating and drinking and at Thanksgiving of 2002 we made the decision to have him put down. It was one of the hardest things we have ever done. He was only three. Abber lived to the ripe old age of twenty and died peacefully in my arms last January. Samantha died after a long battle with an infection in February of this year. We had her put down too because the vet said she only had of couple of weeks at the best to live and most likely she would suffer a lot before she died. We still have three other cats Checker who we adopted after Max died. Checker is our oldest and he is seven years old. We adopted him from the Furball Lady. The Furball Lady is a group of people who rescue stray cats and adopt them out in local Charlotte PetSmart stores. Ginger was a rescue off of Upwards Road in Fletcher, NC in May of 2004. She feel out from under a car that was in front of us. She was so tiny I remember thinking that she was a squirrel. I did not know she was a kitten until I reached down to pick her up. I think she was maybe five weeks old. Olive was to be our last cat, or so I thought. We rescued her off of a busy intersection on Billy Graham Parkway in Charlotte, NC in the spring of 2006. She was also about five weeks old when we found her. All of our current cats get along pretty good with the exception of Olive and Ginger. For some reason Ginger likes to chase Olive much to Olive’s chagrin.

Anyway back to Samson’s story. When Vicki found out that Lori and Jeff were going to call animal control to pick up the kitten (which is a death sentence in Charlotte) Vicki said that we would take the kitten. I have to admit I was not thrilled with the idea of another cat in the house. What you have to understand is unlike parents of human children, kitty parents never get a break. Eventually human children get older and move out. In the eighteen years that Vicki and I have been married we have never had a cat free home. It is not that I don’t love our cats because I really do. It is just that as we are getting older I would like a little bit of a break from cat hair, litter boxes, and some damage to our house that these little furry friends can cause. But like Vicki I can not turn my back on a feline friend in need.

Vicki picked the kitten up Wednesday evening and Lori was kind enough to let Vicki take the rest of the day to work from home so she could have a chance to get the kitten settled. That night after one of our other co-workers and co-cat lover gave me a ride home I got to get a good look at the kitten and I fell in love. He is about five weeks old and is a cute as a button. He sort of looks like a Norwegian Forest Cat with long grey and white fur big ears and big feet. We both noted that he had a very bad case of eye infection in both eyes and he looked malnourished. Vicki had already started him on some baby food and eye drops, but we knew he would need more care than that. Vicki took him to a local animal emergency clinic where he was given eye salve and oral antibiotics. They also tested him for intestinal parasites and even though they did not find anything they still treated him.

The next day we both had half a day off so Vicki stayed home and took care of our newest addition. It has now been four days since we brought him home and man what a difference four days make. His eyes look much better although he still needs some time to heal. He is doing what cats his age needs to do and that is eating, pooping, and sleeping. He is also playing and purring like crazy. As for a name Vicki picked out a great one for him, Samson. She picked that name because of his resilience and the fact he has long hair. I have managed to take some pictures of this new baby and some video. Click here for the photos and scroll down for two videos. More reports to come later…