The Wonkas are now bottle-free and have been formula-free since I moved them to the kitten room on Saturday.
“I sure am glad they’re off the bottle,” I said to Fred. “I don’t know that I really want to have bottle babies again. They make me worry too much.”
Cue the distant laughter of GOD.
Yesterday afternoon, the driveway alarm went off. Fred looked out the window and told me that it was our neighbor from two doors down and her oldest daughter. She rang the doorbell, and Fred went off to see what was what.
A minute later, he came back in the front door and called me.
“What?” I said, walking toward the front door.
“I need you out here,” he said.
“Why?” I said.
“Just! Come! Here!” he hissed.
So I did. And standing on the front porch was our neighbor and her oldest daughter.
Her daughter was holding a box. Of kittens. Tiny kittens.
I considered bellowing “OH HELL NO!” and going back inside the house, but I am far too polite for that.
It turns out that a mother cat had just been hit by a car and killed, leaving behind five – YES I SAID FIVE – babies. They were alert and had their eyes open, but were obviously still small enough to need to be bottle fed. Our neighbor couldn’t keep them because she has a job and can’t feed them every few hours, and she knows we’re crazy cat people so she threw herself on our mercy.
“Well,” I said. “The guest bedroom is free!”
We brought them inside, and I made bottles while Fred weighed them. The smallest weighed 9 ounces and the largest 11, which I decided means that they’re about three weeks old.
I stimulated them to pee (and they all peed well, which meant, I suppose, that they’d eaten well the last time they ate), and then we fed them. They weren’t terribly interested in eating, but we got some formula into all of them before we put them in the cage with a heating pad and stuffed animal.
They are adorable.
So, four kittens gone to the adoption center, and five added to the household. Apparently it’s very important to God that we have bottle babies in the house. SIGH.
(We haven’t even thought of names for them yet – but I’m sure we will in the next few days!)
There are four tabby-points (I think that’s what they are) (three girls, one boy) and one black and white (a boy).
The Wonkas are doing just fine. They like their new home, and they like that sun shines through the windows of their home, and they especially like that I come and visit with them lots (which they also liked in their OLD home, the guest bedroom downstairs).
::CHOMP::
“I KNEW there was something fishy about that “Balloon Boy” kid and his family.”
“Hey! GUYS! She’s handing out pettins. You better hurry, you don’t wanna miss out!”
Gus is totally the Cosmo Kramer of the kitten world.
And of course Sookie and Terry have made themselves RIGHT at home.
Terry gives Elwood a bath. Hey, SOMEONE’s gotta.
Sookie, playing in the guest bedroom.
Speaking of the True Bloods, the Saturday morning volunteer, who cleans cages at the adoption center at PetSmart told me this funny story about Hoyt and Bill:
I was cleaning their cage, and Sander (Mr. Alpha Male) was also out. Sander always attacks all the other kittens, (just playing I am sure to him). Well Hoyt and Bill were having none of that – they both ran after Sander and he went to hide in the litterbox that I had taken out of their cage while I was cleaning it. One sat on top, one sat in front of the box and Sander was so glad when I put him back in his cage!
I guess my boys are doing just fine.
The dryer is the happenin’ place to be, these days. I don’t know if it’s because it’s near a window overlooking the back yard or because it’s near the back door (it’s not because it’s warm, because when I actually start the dryer, whoever’s laying there usually leaves).
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Previously
2008: “Is that… are they EATING something?”
2007: No entry.
2006: I hope you people who wanted to know what happens when Maddy’s sleeping on the printer and I need to print something out are happy, because you’re all going to hell.
2005: There is nothing on god’s green earth that makes Sugarbutt happier than eating.