How I Found My Home: The Series

Here, in one easy-to-navigate post, are all the entries in my saga. Enjoy them all!

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

Part 5

Part 6: Conclusion

Autumn

Well, as I predicted the rain has started. Where I live it rains pretty well all the time from October to about April, so I'm pretty used to it. Those chumps want to wait as long as possible before they light a fire or turn on the furnace, but IT'S REALLY COLD IN HERE. I don't want to have to resort to SNUGGLING just to keep warm if I don't have to. I did snuggle the girl on the couch last night for more than an hour, but I swear I'm just doing it for the body heat - not because I NEED snuggling or pats or affection or anything like that.

Come on peeps - a fire in the fireplace - you know you want to! Oh, and how I love to roast my furry white belly by the fire. It's my favourite part of winter.

How I Found My Home: Conclusion

I had definitely found my home-for-life, and I had received my first thorough veterinary examination. The Can Opener had gone around the neighbourhood and torn down the “We Found A Kitty” signs that hadn’t already been removed or covered up. The only thing that was left was a name. Though only a (relatively) small kitten, I had already established my regal manner. All who gazed upon me were in awe of my magnificence. What name to bestow on an Empress?

The peeps made a list. This list of two-dozen names came from all manner of sources and inspirations. Days went by without a decision. The lists were updated, ordered by preference and discussed at length.They weighed the pros and cons of each name. “What do you think of Esmerelda?” “I’m not sure. Let’s call her that for the next hour and see how it feels.”

I was not an Esmerelda. Or a Jinx. Or a Suzy Lee. Or a Mignon. Or a Zephyr ('cause that's a boys name!) Or any of the many other names they considered.

Finally and thankfully, I was deemed to be Musette. It was the Can Openers favourite and it just seemed to suit me so well. Why Musette? Well, one of its meanings is a lovely but rather meloncholy form of French accordion music. If you think about Paris, the only soundtrack you can possibly have in your head is musette. And if there’s one thing the Door Opener likes, it’s accordion music. She thinks she'd like to have an accordian and learn how to play it, but we cats think that's a BAD IDEA. Mostly I think she just wants one becaue she thinks she'd look "cool" holding it. Silly humans. And the name Musette has connotations of class and elegance even if you don't know what it means. The peeps took a big long trip to Paris before they met me and they have an appreciation for all things French. Enough said. Plus, it’s got the “Mew” sound that I’ve been known to make on occasion. But you had already figured that part out, hadn’t you, dear reader? You’re a smart one, you are. There is also a Mewsette who I have some connection with too - maybe I'll write another post about her soon...

Well, I suppose that’s it. A home, a name, a bowl-full of kibble always sitting in my corner of the kitchen. My needs are few. Life is good.

There’s more I could write about - like how I came to love the outside again (after my previous scary experiences). And of course I could write a book about the tumultuous time Zephyr came to live with us. But I’ll leave that for another occasion. I have the feeling the recent mild weather is almost over, so I’m going to make the best of the nice days we’ve been having and head outside.

How I Found My Home: Part Five

Sorry I've been so long in continuing my story. The fall weather has been SOOOO nice and I've been spending ALL my days outside. I know that very soon the rain will come and I'll be spending lots of time in front of the fire, so I need to enjoy the sunshine while I can...

So...10 days went by and nobody had come to claim me, so I had found my new home! The peeps took me to the super nice Veterinarian who only treats cats and everyone there oohed and ahhed over how pretty I was and they said that I was very healthy and a very BIG and TALL girl and that I was much younger than I looked. I was really excited because I knew that I had gotten VERY lucky and had found myself a happy home with some peeps who were really growing to love me and who would take care of me and wait on me and treat me like the Empress I am forever. The fleshies thought it was BAD TIMING, but they couldn't have given me up then - they were too smitten. They were planning to get a kitten in the summer, after they finished the worst of the house renovations, but I came along in the autumn, so I had to endure months of electricians, drywallers, cabinet installers and other assorted men taking over MY house and making me stay locked up in the den while they made lots of noise and dust. It was okay though - I didn't know about outside yet, so I was happy to play with all my great toys and sleep on the girl's lap while she worked on the computer and watched TV and read (she was hiding from the men too). I was a VERY loving and cuddly kitten...and a very bitey one, I must admit. The picture above may look like I'm just sweetly licking the hand of the Can Opener, but in fact I'm biting him - HARD. And when I was done biting him I was probably going to claw him too. Nobody had ever taught me to be gentle and I was VERY playful (okay, maybe a little crazy too), so I used to get in trouble for attacking the hands and feet of the fleshies. It was just so much FUN and so very tempting... Sometimes I would hide and stalk them and as they walked by I would leap out and wrap myself around their ankles, holding on tight with my claws and fangs. That was SO!MUCH!FUN! and I really do wish they were okay with it, because I'd still kind of like to do it... but they taught me that it wasn't okay and that TOYS were for playing, not peeps.

There was only one small problem... At the Vet they had to put "Unknown" where my name should have been on my records because the peeps just couldn't decide what I should be called...

To Be Continued...

How I Found My Home: Part Four

So there I found myself in what I hoped was my happy new home. I LIKED it there - lots of snuggling (I was a very SNUGGLY kitten) lots of playing (I was a CRAZYCRAZY kitten) and lots of food (I was a HUNGRY kitten). My peeps think that maybe I didn't get fed at my first house because I would steal and hide food any chance I got and I would eat ANYTHING. That first Halloween I even stole and ate all the guts out of the pumpkin! I would cry and cry when the fleshies were having human food or when they were cooking. It took me awhile, but I learned that the bowl is always full of delicious crunchies and that the can arrives every morning, so I never have to stoop as low as eating VEGETABLES to keep my belly full. My fleshies wondered a lot about my first home and they had some guesses about it. I was found right across the street from a big park with woods and they think it's possible that someone left me in those woods. How terrible! I hope if they left my brothers and sisters there too that all of them found happy homes. I can hardly bear to think about it! The girl human went and looked around the park thinking that I might not have been alone there, but she didn't find anything. They also think that maybe I could have come from a house near where I was found that always has LOTS of new kittens every year and cats all over the place. Maybe they knew I was gone but they were glad to be rid of me. My peeps knew that in my first house I spent a lot of time around people, because I wasn't afraid of anything and I knew all about how kitchens were where the food came from, that human laps were good for pats and that in the bed snuggled into the neck or between the knees of the girl was the perfect place to spend the night. However I came to find myself on that busy street, no one seemed to be looking for me. The posters were up all over the neighbourhood, the SPCA and the City Pound both had my description, but nobody was calling. The peeps said that they weren't getting attached to me at all. They wouldn't even give me a name. They just called me "Kitty" or "Baby" or "That Insane Kitten". They decided to give it 10 days and if I hadn't found my home they would "think" about keeping me forever. Who were they kidding? They were TOTALLY in love with me almost right away and couldn't help but get attached. As the 10 days crawled by, they even began to hope that nobody was crying over me and when the phone rang they always looked a little worried...

To Be Continued...

How I Found My Home: Part Three

The boy peep remained convinced (because I was such a beautiful cat) that somebody simply had to have been looking for me, but they gave my description to the SPCA and heard nothing back. "We have to alert the neighbourhood," the peeps said. "If this was our kitten, we'd be heartbroken if she was missing!" So the boy made a poster and walked up and down nearby streets, putting it up on telephone poles and bulletin boards, sure in the belief that my owners would see the poster and come to pick me up.


But after a few days, they still hadn't heard from my owners.

To be continued...

So cute, no?

How I Found My Home: Part Two

So there I was - alternating between making a break for the hedge and being hissed and swatted at by the mean cats, running out into traffic and huddling in the gutter. I was SCARED and I didn't know what to do and none of the humans going by on the sidewalk would stop and help me! But then I saw someone coming...she had 3 bags of groceries and she saw me from a long way off and she looked worried... When she got to where I was she stopped to talk to me. She told me that I was too little to be outside and too little to be on the street and that I was going to get splatted. Like I didn't already know all that!!! She tried to get me to scoot into the yard, thinking that was my home, but then she realized that the bad cats weren't going to let me come in. She knew that if she left me there, I would keep running out into the road to get away from those cats and that I would surely be killed. A kind-hearted and kitty-loving girl she was, and she couldn't bear to think about my sweet self under the wheels of a car. So she scooped me up with one hand and picked up all 3 bags of her groceries with the other. I was so scared and so happy to be UP, that I just snuggled right into her chest and I didn't struggle at all. She could feel my little heart beating fast. She was sure that a nice kitten like me must have a good home and was surely just lost, so she knocked on all the doors on that street, but I didn't belong at any of those houses. What else could she do but take me home? I kept my face snuggled into her sweater the whole trip - I wouldn't even look around. It took about 5 minutes for us to get home and I was SO glad to be there. I was still really scared though. I missed my cat Mama and my brothers and sisters and I wasn't over the trauma of being out in the street, so I insisted that my new peep hold me ALL DAY. She couldn't even put me down for a minute or I would cry and cry. The girl phoned the boy at work and told him all about me and told him to bring home kitten food and litter. They agreed that I was so pretty and so sweet that I MUST have humans that were missing me a lot, so they planned ways to find my family. But it proved to be harder than they thought...

To be continued...

How I Found My Home: Part One

Two years ago at this time I was just a tiny wee kitten. The cutest kitten ever? Probably. But not cute enough for my first family to keep me. I don't really remember much about those days or the humans or cats that shared my start in life. I'm sure I had a very beautiful Mama who was maybe a lovely mackerel tabby like me. And I'm sure I had some fun brothers and sisters to play with. And I think I remember being hungry sometimes. I don't like remembering that. I do remember the day the female fleshy rescued me from certain death and brought me to this great place to be a part of this family.

It was a sunny October day and I was just a wee slip of a 9 week old kitten. Too young to be away from my Mama and way too young to be all alone out in the big scary world, but that's where I found myself. I was on a busy street and I was in BIG TROUBLE. The worst part is that there were a couple of MEAN grown-up cats who kept trying to chase me out into the traffic. I was REALLY scared and didn't know what to do. The yard that was there looked like it had some nice, safe hedges that I could hide in until I figured out what I was going to do, but those BAD cats wouldn't let me anywhere near it and were trying to chase me out under the wheels of all the cars and buses on the busy street. I was scared of all the giant cars whizzing by, so mostly I just huddled in the gutter. Occasionally I would make a run for the other side of the road - there was a nice quiet park there - but the cars would scare me and I'd run back to the sidewalk. But once I was on the sidewalk those cats would start to menace me again. It was a bad situation for a kitten (even one as smart as me). Some humans came by and they were worried about me and told me to be safe, but they DIDN'T HELP ME AT ALL. I was in a bad situation and it was getting worse all the time...

To be continued...

My Favourite Spot

This is absolutely my favourite spot in the whole of outside. It's in the side garden underneath the laurel tree and I spend a lot of my time watching over the yard and sleeping in this perfect spot. I've worked hard to make this place just right. I pushed all the leaves and the mulch to the side and made myself a sweet little nest that is just Musette-shaped. Perfect. The fleshies did a lot of planting pretty close to my favourite spot this afternoon (I supervised, of course), but they know how much I adore my spot, so they left it for me. Good peeps. I like it when they do what they should.


I know, I know, You're all waiting for my story. Soon, my patient readers, soon!

Snuggletime!

You didn't think I could stay mad at my fleshies did you? They're really very good to me you know...what with all the oh-so-savoury canned food, the in and out and in and out and in and out, the snuggles, the playing, the scritches and the general tolerance to all my many moods. They're pretty good peeps, all in all. Maybe soon I'll tell you the story of how I found my home here. It's a good story. Full of drama and suspense. And of course it has a happy ending!

I've Been VERY Good!

3 months, 20 days, 6 hours until Christmas. I expect GOOD THINGS in my stocking this year. Maybe I should start working on my letter to Santa soon.

The Birthday Present

I'm still a little apprehensive about my birthday mousie (yes, I did get a mousie tossed at me along with an "Oh yeah. Happy Birthday, I guess"). On my gift list I DID ask for a new mousie, but as you'll recall I asked for one with a TAIL. I like mousies with tails. Mousies should have tails. Look closely at the picture... as you can see from the photo, this mousie has FEATHERS growing out of it's posterior. I don't want to know what sort of bizarre and unsavoury nighttime dalliances went into producing a creature this strange. It's just wrong.

But I have been playing with it when I think they're not looking...

So very, very mad. Still can't even talk about the trainwreck that was my birthday.

12:01 AM, September 2

Spitting mad. I can't even talk about it now.

11:50 PM

The Empress is not amused. No mention yet. But there's still ten minutes left in the day. If they're going to make me turducken, they had better get it in the oven NOW.

2:01

Oh, I know what it must be - a surprise party planned for tonight! Wow, I bet it's going to be a huge blow-out, judging by the way people are so tight-lipped about it. The Grandma's indeed in town today, and so far, everybody's doing a fabulous job of remaining absolutely quiet about my most special of days. That takes effort, fleshies. Way to keep a secret!

9:21

Very funny fleshies, very funny. They're trying to make me think that they've forgotten my birthday and don't have a fabulous party planned for me. So far they haven't even mentioned my big day and have just gone about their day like nothing is different. HA! I'm on to them! I KNOW that they HAVE to have something GIGANTIC planned for me. It's my birthday after all! It must be starting this afternoon. Maybe they had to fly in some of the guests...