Mr. Puss

Yep. That's *Mister* Puss to you. And me. And most especially to the Girl.

A long, long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away, I made my kids a promise. They'd been asking for a pet since they could talk, but I had always put them off by saying it was not sanitary to have a pet in the same place where food is being prepared for others, and until my cake business was elsewhere, we could have nothing bigger than a sea monkey. The promise: "As soon as I get my own shop, we may get a pet." *sigh*

Good news: I moved into the shop in May.

Slightly less good news: the instant my mixer claimed a new postal code, the kids started in on me. "but you SAID we could!!!"

And so began the half-hearted attempts at looking for a new pet, which we quickly narrowed down to a cat ("Are you sure you guys don't want a goldfish?") for it's independant nature and lack of daily walking needs.  The looking online: "I don't know guys, there's a cat available in Vancouver, but it's about a week's drive from here..." They caught on about a month in, and so off we went to the city pound to see which lucky beast would be adopted.

I was somewhat horrified to note that to adopt an adult cat, it was well over $100. Kittens were the same, but came with a $40 voucher towards spaying or neutering. Not much when you consider that this costs in the $350 range. Hmmmm...this cat business was starting to seem a bit much. Sadly, we couldn't agree on a feline that day, so I suggested we sleep on it for a few days (weeks, months...)

Now, allow me to make a note here. I love cats. I've lived with cats almost my entire childhood and adolescence, right up until I got married, and we couldn't keep a cat in our first little apartment. It's just that, at the time, it seemed like the responsibility of pet ownership was just one more thing I'd have to add to my already overflowing plate.

My sister knew of our search, and of our criteria. The Girl's: that it be cute, fluffy, wonderful and the bestest friend she could ever have. The Boy's: playful and orange. The Man's: looks and barks like a dog. Mine: short hair, litter-trained, indoor, smallish, healthy, cheap. Enter Mr. Puss, the 5ish year old, black short-haired, trained, indoor, neutered, and best of all, free cat. His owner had to find him a new home ASAP because his new flatmate was deathly allergic. Yay for us. No, really. Yay. My sister put us in touch with his last family, and before you could say "Did you clean the litterbox today?" we had ourselves a cat.

The Girl is besotted. It's Mr. Puss this. And Mr. Pussy that. And oh, my sweet little pussy. Oh. My. God.

She wouldn't dream of changing his name and was horrified when we suggested it. Do you know how many diminutive forms of Mr. PUSS are available and how it sounds when a 7-year old little girl is squealing in public about how soft and squishy her little Mr. Puss is?

What can we do? It's been a month now, and we're all rather used to it, but every now and then a stranger will give her strange looks. (Yes, she still talks about him in public.) I know that in a few years she'll probably figure out why we wanted to change his name and I'm not sure it'll be as funny as I think when she does realize it. But in the meantime, I'd like to keep her innocence for as long as possible.

The Girl insisted on riding the cat on the carousel at an amusement park recently.