I’m in the Cat House!

Many cats ago, we had one adult mummy cat, her 6 month old slightly disabled kitten called KKU and her newborn kitten Sosej, and it seemed like we had 1 cat too many. I felt like I was on the kitty litter treadmill – never ending chore of cleaning out the kitty litter. (Let’s not start about the times they had, um, stomach flu and also the times when they “missed” the litter box completely.)

Of course that was before we had children, and when Abang and then Adik came along, the 4-legged kitty litter treadmill was nothing compared to the 2-legged version.

After all the cats that came through our home had left, either to the PAWS near Subang airport or the other, big PAWS in the sky, we took a ‘cat break’. Because KKU and Sosej were indoor-outdoor cats, going away for a holiday, or even overnight, was tough. Their food and litter boxes were always indoors since we didn’t want to feed the neighbourhood strays, nor offer them a public toilet as well. But then they relished the freedom of roaming about the neighbourhood as well. Whenever we went away, it was never for more than 24 hours, during which time the cats would be cooped up inside the house, going crazy!

So now we have found the right ‘cat balance’ again, with Harun and Thomas in our family. Then during the most recent weekly Kepong Run I caught sight of this extremely cute grey kitten, with white paws sleeping in the alley behind Nenek’s house. I managed to get some pictures although it tends to run off after awhile.

It’s hard to believe that I actually tried (am trying?) to convince Daddy that we should adopt this one too! We’ve discussed it, and the conclusion is that we haven’t come to a conclusion yet.

On one hand, it’s really cute. On the other, we don’t want to disturb the “chi” in our cat family. Harun and Thomas get along just fine and White Socks here might create some friction. Not to mention our ability, or lack thereof, to give it the necessary attention!

The boys would definitely love to have another kitten around the house. I’m sure the maid and my auntie wouldn’t, though. The maid would have even more litter to go through everyday and perhaps a dead rodent or two to dispose of. (Have I mentioned that Harun has been very good at flushing out the rats in the neighbourhood? Our poor maid gagged when she had to clean up the mess.) And my auntie is just not fond of cats, convinced that they’re “dirty” and always out to “bite the children”.

So, back to White Socks – time to sleep on the issue …