Thursday, November 20, 2008

Profiles in Kittens

While the kittens are at the vet's today having measures taken to ensure that they do not beget kittens of their own, I thought I'd jot down a few memories. Hard to believe that they're six months old already.

The Runt:

When The Runt was younger, he was the instigator of the litter. He'd stir up trouble with the other kittens, then saunter out of the room, leaving them to take the rap.

He has really large ears. When he was teeny, he looked more like some kind of alien being than like a kitten. And now he's really long and lean.

He will tolerate being held, although he doesn't really seem to enjoy it. If I pet him, he gets up and moves, which - honestly? Hurts my feelings, just a little. He only purrs when spending quality time with his nuk-nuk towel.

Little Girl:

She likes to sleep curled up against my head at night, which is fine until I roll over in my sleep and get a face full of kitten. And lately, her favored play time seems to be four a.m., when she wakes up, goes down to the foot of the bed, makes a flying leap, and lands square on my head. Her attitude seems to be, "If I'm awake, everybody's gonna be awake!"

When you first pick her up, she lets out a wail, like she's saying, "oh my doodness! OH MY DOODNESS!" Then she calms down and starts purring.

She still has googly eyes. I'm hoping these straighten out, as it's really disconcerting. Although as I've said, it doesn't seem to bother HER at all, so I guess I should just calm down.

The two of them:

They both love to be outside, running around the backyard as fast as they can. They will chase anything that moves, including rabbits bigger than they are. Oh, and The Runt finally seems to be learning "the rules" about tree-climbing, i.e., don't climb any higher than you can turn around and jump down from.

When they are together, I can easily tell them apart. The Runt is bigger and has darker fur; Little Girl is more compact and is lighter and more stripe-ier. When they're apart, well, honestly? I have a hard time telling which one's which. Sorry, guys. They're now wearing different-colored collars, which should help some with ID.

They remind me of my sister Alabama's sons, V and M, who are eight and ten years younger than me. I swear that V was born with a furrowed brow; he was a serious, worried little kid who grew up into a serious, worried man, sometimes taking breaks from the seriousness of it all to get himself into almost unbelievable amounts of trouble. M, on the other hand, was a smiling, friendly little kid who grew up into a smiling, friendly man. When he was younger, we used to joke that he would grow up to be either a bank robber or a bank president, because he could talk himself out of just about anything. (For the record, he grew up to use his powers for good.) The Runt is very much like V - Serious, with splashes of "oops!". And Little Girl is just like M - smiling and sunny and very likely to have a trick or two up her sleeve.

They are both fearless. They are not afraid of loud noises, of water, of anything. They are not even afraid of the vacuum cleaner.

How they got their names:

These two were part of a litter of four, with their mama, whom I started fostering when they were four weeks old. None of them had names when they came from the shelter, and I had to call them something. I named their sister and brother Fluffy and Tuffy, for the obvious reasons. The Runt was the smallest of the litter and the first to get kicked to the curb when they were all nursing; thus, "The Runt". Little Girl was the last to be named, and I really never did come up with anything formal. I just started calling her "Little Girl", and it stuck.

And incidentally, I really thought about calling her Sandy, because her fur is the color of a Pecan Sandie cookie, but everytime I thought "Sandy", I got a visual of John Travolta singing, "Oh Sandy baaaayybeeeeeee, soommedaayy, when high-eye-school is through...." from "Grease", and that sort of scotched that idea.

Good luck at the vet's today, guys! Full food bowls and a warm bed await you when you get home.

No comments: