A couple of weeks ago we took a short 2-night trip to Yosemite, taking advantage of the late dry weather to see the valley without hordes of other people. It was a fine trip, and I was looking forward to making an LJ post about it. But when we got home, our old cat Harry had obviously become very ill. A quick trip to the vet emergency room made it clear it wasn't treatable for him, and we had him euthanized. I don't want to go into the details, at least yet.
The house was terribly empty with no cats -- this was the first time since
lin_mcallister and I started living together that we haven't had cats. So we tried to visit the Palo Alto pound to see if there were new friends to be had. They were having construction work done and the cat adoption rooms weren't open! Finally on Monday we got in, and we had no trouble making new friends.This is Ivan (after Ivan Vorpatril in the Bujold books.) He's about 4 years old.
As you see, he's ready for a fun ride in the dishwasher! There are some other signs he may be in the "sweet tempered but dumb" mold.
Here's Jirel, after the C. L. Moore sword-and-sorcery hero. She's about 4 months, seems to be a little small for her age -- she went through a spell of not eating while in the pound.
She's playing with her little doll friend the folks in the pound insisted had to come home with her since she loves it so.
They've certainly solved the problem of the house being empty. They are getting along really amazingly well considering Ivan's older and wants to calmly snooze and look out the window, while Jirel is a hyperactive kitten who wants to jump on everything including Ivan. We've had a little hissing on Ivan's part and one or two swats when she got too close, but they've both sat on me at the same time, even touching.
Unlike any cat we've lived with for years, they both like to be picked up. Ivan has already trained us to pick him up on command; he likes to go shoulder-riding around the house.
Jirel is affectionate and playful to the point of being a pest. She has quite a forward personality, perhaps even a bit of a bully. We noticed in the pound that she wouldn't let any of the other kittens have a cat toy -- she'd always take them away.
Current Mood: 
pleased
pleased