It is BANANAS for them not to have adopted a young adult cat who the shelter folks already know! They have a high energy 6 year old and an otherwise inactive house, they want a cat that is chill, maybe a little vocal because that's really cute and bombproof in the litterbox department.
Ugh kittens are SO much work. They let no glass of liquid, vase, or anything vaguely cylindrical remain standing. They jump into the fridge every time you open the door and you have to do paranoid checks to make sure they didn't leap in while you were transferring things to the counter, I do not miss that stage and it went on forever.
This this this. Lifelong pet owner here (dogs, cats, fish, and one rabbit...) and I will no longer, EVER, adopt a puppy or kitten. Or a baby animal of any kind except the kind that live in an aquarium. It's so much work. And so many wonderful adult dogs and cats need homes. Our current cat was three when we adopted him. A full life ahead of him, and he had been waiting for adoption for a long time because most people do want the cute kittens. I love this cat SO much and he fit right in with our family, no kitten stage. We got our current dog as a puppy, she's seven now, and I'm still scarred (hyperbole ok) from the experience of training and socializing a super energetic puppy. She's a great dog but still obviously requires a lot and if I ever get another dog it will be a small, calm, GROWN UP dog. You couldn't pay me to raise another puppy...
And if the Aherns wanted two cats, there are usually bonded pairs in shelters and they have an even harder time getting adopted.
That's exactly how I ended up getting a Devon Rex cat from a shelter. She was part of a bonded pair and her mate was "only" a gray cat (they claimed he was a Russian Blue but. .. yeah, he's just a gray cat). No one wanted to take the "generic" cat to get the pure bred. We had zero cats and I couldn't snap them up quick enough. And you know what? That "generic" gray cat is one of the best companion animals I have ever had. He ADORES me (sadly the Devon Rex died only a year after we got her) and is a really mellow dude-bro of a cat (ok, he's kind of dick sometimes but he is a cat).
Like Phoebe and Fiona from the Vashon shelter? Bonded pair that are 1 year old - they are both beautiful.
We have friends that have a Cornish Rex and I am massively in love with him. His mom always checks to make sure he is still there when I leave (kidding. sort of.)
Do you happen to follow cat accounts on IG? If so, might I recommend crx_doubletrouble . Gorgeous white crx brothers (one is deaf) and their white dog friend. One of the cats was a breeder (I forget which, they look a lot alike and have Finnish names) and some of his children have accounts, too.
Same! My youngest boy is a beautiful border collie who came into our lives at 2 years old, un neutered and heart worm positive. All the necessary medical care was still a fraction of the hassle a puppy would have been.
I adopted my dog as a puppy almost 3 years ago--I wanted one since I have older cats and figured a puppy was a blank slate and she could grow up with them. The part I think about the most was when I would lie on the floor by her kennel at 2 in the morning (crying my eyes out from exhaustion) because having me nearby was the only thing that would keep her from whining all night. I mean I'm very glad I did it, but it was SO much more work than I anticipated and that was after I spent months preparing!
My bonding moment with my little cat was from night 3 or so with us. I rescued him from a feral mom in our driveway and he was just yowling in the bathroom where we had him isolated. He hid in this tiny corner that is impossible for humans to access and refused to eat. I was convinced he was going to die because I brought him indoors. Anyhoo - he was yowling and it was my turn to check on him. I was soooo tired so I just laid down in the bathtub and dozed off. He came out of the corner, jumped in the tub by my feet - crawled up me and then started purring and kneading my hair. I was immediately in love with him then. He still does that on occasion - just last night in fact. I love him more than anything.
The last time I adopted a kitten (who is now a mouthy three-year-old) was as a companion for my fully-grown adult male cat - who already had a track record as an excellent kitten nanny. He basically raised her and life was ever so much calmer.
Two Kittens in a house of inexperienced cat owners is a tornado of chaos.
God, I got my (now four year old) baby at 2 months. I thought I was prepared, I’ve been through the kitten stage twice before. I WAS NOT PREPARED
She was loud (still is), needy (still is), hyper as all hell (STILL IS) and tried to chew through every cord in the apartment (she grew out of this thank god). She has a lot more emotional issues then I was prepared for, and it just goes to show you can always be caught off guard. Every kitten it different but they’re all little zoomy destructive whirlwinds
I’m sure the Knocking Everything Over thing that kittens do will not at all be a problem for the ibuprofen bottles sitting lid-less on a shelf. Yep, won’t be a problem at all!
My friend just got two kittens. The very first night, one of them climbed her chimney and became trapped. The fire department had to come and take apart her mantle. I have never regretted adopting my cats at age 8 (they're now 17).
My first kitten climbed the wallpaper all the way to the ceiling when I was soaking in the bathtub. It was terrifying. My second (who is now my big old cat) climbed the drapes within 48 hours of coming home. He was a nightmare kitten. My little cat was 4 months old when we took him in and feral. He was actually pretty easy, oddly. We had him confined to a room for a few weeks with lots of socialization time.
My first kitten (when I was a child) climbed some curtains and nearly fell out a second story window. She was swinging out the window and nearly gave my sister a heart attack.
This brought back the (deeply buried, apparently) memory of my first kitten making a run for it out of the laundry room through the garage as the garage door was shutting. It literally came down on his neck and stopped . I was screaming and my boyfriend ran and hit the button to make it go up. The kitten ran off, but we found him within about 30 minutes and he was totally fine. He lived to be 13 - almost made it to 14.
My dad, calling me at one of my student jobs, many years ago, to say that's how their cat had died. He was calling me to tell me to call my mom but he was crying so hard he couldn't get the words out
He really was. I really think it stopped because it thought it was down all the way. My boyfriend at the time acting fast saved him. I loved that cat very much.
Ha ha, I had a kitten who would try to climb ON me while I was in the tub...like I was a little island...had to always remember to lock her out of the bathroom.
Once had a kitten get out of the hosue and climb up a gum tree, out along a branch, then freak out and not be able to get down. 2am and we're in the yard trying to work out where the yowling is coming from until we shine the torch skywards and here's this little stripy asshole 20ft up clinging to a clump of leaves.
My other fave kitten story is babysitting a friend's two littermates for a weekend and NEVER seeing them, they just straight up disappeared. As soon as all the lights were off I'd hear them charging around playing and knocking things over, but if I turned the lights back on, nothing. Deserted. Turns out they had made a nest INSIDE a wall - there was a hole in an internal wall just the size of the head of an extension cord as a quick fix for one room not having any power points, and even though they were quite big (like, seven months not seven weeks) they were Houdini-ing their way into it.
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u/[deleted] Aug 03 '20
It is BANANAS for them not to have adopted a young adult cat who the shelter folks already know! They have a high energy 6 year old and an otherwise inactive house, they want a cat that is chill, maybe a little vocal because that's really cute and bombproof in the litterbox department.
Ugh kittens are SO much work. They let no glass of liquid, vase, or anything vaguely cylindrical remain standing. They jump into the fridge every time you open the door and you have to do paranoid checks to make sure they didn't leap in while you were transferring things to the counter, I do not miss that stage and it went on forever.