Names

I can't walk dogs at the humane society anymore because it's brutal on my hands. I asked for another job and took the cat handling class this morning so I could hopefully socialize cats. The preference is that I work in adoption/socialization and there's a potential of socializing dogs instead of walking them. Regardless, I'm starting out with cats one of these days - I'm just not sure how yet. We had the usual introduction to cat handling and then saw a really depressing movie about two animal shelters - one in Los Angeles, the other in Chicago - which followed a cat and a dog that had been picked up and taken to shelters. Only one of them survives. So after quoting dismal statistics, interviewing a clueless public, and showing the dead animal after it had been euthanized, the film was cut off before it ended. We were supposed to take a break. Lots of people were crying and no one got up to have snacks right away. We were rather somber. I was told we accidentally saw the long version and that's why they didn't finish. I asked if anything ever got better, but of course it doesn't. The only redeeming factor is that it was narrated by David Duchovny (Mulder).

So, we took a tour and ended up in the cattery. I know you probably know where this story is going. I stood beside the cage of a 6-month-old kitten named Ballofur who kept reaching out to pat my face. I've followed Ballofur and always liked the cat, but never could figure out if it was a male or female - the web page said male, the card on the cage said female. Anyway, I was charmed.

After I went home I mentioned Ballofur to Lyn and suggested we go visit him. We were supposed to drive to Stevenson to see how far the drive was (I'm considering changing guide dog clubs). The short version of this story is that we never made it to Stevenson - we adopted Ballofur. Ballofur is a female and is one of those kittens that just relaxes in any position you hold her in and she's a typical wild 6-month old kitten that is a lot of fun. I really think she needs another name though and we're trying to decide between Willamina (Mina) or Minerva (Minnie). She could easily fit both, so I'm asking for outside name preference. Our other female cat is called Misha and I thought Mina and Misha or Minnie and Misha sounded nice together (not that they care).

My camera battery is dead. I'll post a picture tomorrow.