If you've seen this blog (and most haven't, I can see from the number of hits...) then you've seen this photo in the profile attached to it. The kitty is Boo Boo, as in mistake. She really wasn't, but when we first got her not long before I had open heart surgery, we thought she might have been.

She kept us up at night, playing. She developed a hairball cough from licking her fur too much, even though she's a shorthair. She was hyper most of the time. Then her post kitten personality kicked in. We still call her Boo Boo, but she has become an indispensible part of our gypsy household. We taught her to travel with us to Clayton, NY by taking her on progressively longer rides in the car. She took to staying in motels (we use Days Inns almost exclusively now, as they will take pets when most others won't) and settles right in when we let her out of her transporter. She'll be accompanying us on our 5th drive to Clayton this May. She settles into the Clayton routine quickly, using the screened porch as an observation post to keep track of the birds, squirrels and the neighbors' dog.

Carol really didn't want another cat after we had our 22 year old black and white Siamese/American Shorthair Minky put down; but we had been cat "owners" for 40 years, and after a summer without a cat, and me having grown up with a cat or three always present in the house, I convinced her we needed to have one around. Anyone seen the recent news about cat owners living longer?

As I said, we thought at first we'd made a mistake. Then we found that she thought she was a dog, or maybe a person. She's not like other cats. She actually fetches things that are thrown, with a particular fondness for the white plastic circles from paper milk carton tops and the tear off hoops from OJ bottles. I won't bore you with video footage of her trotting back proudly with one of the latter in her mouth like a retriever. She has become so devoted to this form of play that you would think she was one those police dog trainees being rewarded with her favorite toy. Unlike other felines, she comes right to the door with a friendly dog-like greeting, wagging her tail and meowing to tell us about her day when we've been gone more than a few minutes. Most cats would sulk and ignore their "owners" if they left them alone for a day. Not her. She makes it known that she's glad you're back, and wants to play right away.

She's three years old, very small, petite actually, and you can tell that she's our baby. We tell ourselves that that's OK, because our kids are grown and moved on. So we spoil her like an only child.