04.43 pm
Well, here I am, at long, long last – and I still may have to dart off every few minutes or so to supervise the “cat-proofing” and/or the cat-catching! Yes, we brought our little Bengal boy home this afternoon, and he squalled and yowled most piteously, at the top of his fairly formidable voice, the whole way – from Mt Cottrell, to Vermont South! Once home, we brought him inside – of course, Sal had to come in to see what all the noise was about – and let our newest “child” out of the cat carry basket. He took one absolutely horrified look at us (Julian and me) and fled to the nearest hidey-hole he could find in this strange and unfamiliar place. This didn’t do him very much good however, because we were still in the hallway, and the nearest thing to a “safe and sheltered hidey-hole” was the narrow, but highly visible gap between the thin legs of the hall table, and the alcove wall in which it sat! He backed out in consternation, and started to investigate further. Sal sat there looking stunned! “What the…. !!!” his expression virtually screamed at us. (gone cat catching again…) (cat found – but not caught…) From a list of around twenty-five names, I’ve whittled it down to a short list of three names for this highly recalcitrant kitty – “Kiraat”, which apparently means “hunter” in Bengali, “Nebi”, which means “panther” in ancient Egyptian, and “Seti” (in this particular instance Seti I, who was a pharaoh of the New Kingdom Nineteenth Dynasty of Egypt, the son of Ramesses I and Sitre, and the father of Ramesses II) which means “dazzle”. At the moment I’m calling him “Nebi”, but this is liable to sudden change without notice – depending on how quickly, and how well he adjusts to “alternate humans” – or if he even decides to like us at all!
While he was in here (the Den) earlier, he was quite happy to strut around and examine every little nook and cranny (except for the ones near where we were sitting, of course!) He sniffed at all of Sal’s toys, examined the climbing stand, and even made a couple of attempts to go up and make friends with Sal, who rebuffed him, hissing and even growling at the poor little boy! (I mean, how dare that spotty little interloper sniff at his toys, and explore the many rooms of his climbing stand! The nerve!!) Finally we managed to grab him, and we took him into the lounge room, thinking to show him where the litter box was, in the Library, next to the lounge room, only before we could do that, he got away again, secreting himself under the recliner chairs and the couches… then just for good measure, he managed to get himself into the teeny-tiny gap underneath our very heavy, marble-topped dresser, and he didn’t know where his toilet was yet! After a great deal of scrabbling, wrenching of muscles, and sheer dogged determination, we managed to swivel the dresser around just enough for Julian – who was now lying flat out on the floor – to be able to stretch in his arm and pull the little blighter out! We put him in the Library and shut the door on him…
Julian went out again – this time to Bunnies, to get some “stuff” to make a “blockade” for the bottom of the stove – heaven help us if “kitten” got under the ruddy stove! “Mr Naughty Kitten” stayed in the Library until this was accomplished, and even though we’ve opened the door, as far as I know, he’s still in there – this time backed up against the wall – where human arms are simply too short to reach him – underneath a very large, square lamp table!
Well, we’ll simply have to wait and see how things go with the little boy – he is very beautiful, with more of a very light creamy-brown “base” coat, and “thinly smeared Vegemite” coloured whorls and spots. Personally I think he’s going to end up as a beautifully marbled Bengal, rather than having the dark brown rosettes that I’d thought I was getting – in fact, I’m not even sure that we were given the right kitten! There were two kittens in the “enclosure”, one of them hiding in terror behind a large scratching “thingy”. Mr. Breeder Person pulled this one out and I was surprised, because it had a much lighter coat than I remembered. There wasn’t much light in there, and it was hard to see the kitten that was trying to hide – but it did look quite a bit darker – and more like the colour that I thought I’d seen when we went out to have a look at him… But he/they are/were (presumably!) microchipped, so it’ll be interesting to see if the number on the microchip form that we given the first time matches the number on the papers we were given today! We’re hoping to be able to capture and cage him tomorrow afternoon so that we can take him up to our Vet for a quick once-over, and they’ll scan the microchip inside him so we can try to match it up with the papers we have. If he’ll settle down with us, I don’t really care if we’ve been given the wrong kitten, even if it turns out that he’s given us a girl instead of a boy (though he did keep referring to both of them as being “his brother” a lot) I wish I could post a photo of him for you, but I only managed to take a couple of him on WhatsApp for a friend before he scarpered, and both photos were taken from some distance away and are rather blurry, because he was running away from that horrible human woman at the time! Never mind – hopefully he’ll be more amenable tomorrow, and you shall get your much anticipated photos! 🙂
Anyway, that’s about all I have time for at the moment – this isn’t as much as I usually write, is it, but I have to go and get food ready and go and sit and talk to my boy, in an attempt to get him to know and trust me… so that’s about “it” from me for tonight – do drop in again tomorrow night to see if my cat is talking to me or not yet, and what Sean thought of him. Until then though, do try hard to bee good, remember that a closed mind is a good thing to lose, and don’t forget to look after yourselves, to always drive carefully, and to keep warm – or cool – depending on what you were planning to do… but above all, please – remember to stay safe! 🙂 ciao, all! 🙂
My Word! 