Jimmy's First Gotcha Day
Jimmy was the first kitten we'd adopted in over 20 years. He arrived to us about 2 months old, accidentally really -- we went to our local cat rescue to drop off some supplies and decided to visit the kitten room, and there he was: tiny orange baby playing with a ball that was twice his size, just batting it around the room, oblivious to anything else. I scooped him up and plopped him tummy-up on my legs, and he just laid there and closed his eyes and went to sleep as I rubbed his fat kitten belly. My wife and I looked at each other and knew this was the one -- 15+ years of coming to this place and playing with probably hundreds of kittens, this feeling never hit us. We were unsure of the timing, since our 19-year-old cat Earl had been sick for a long time and caring for him was a full-time, emotionally-draining job (he passed a week after we brought Jimmy home). But Jimmy proved to be that ray of sunshine we needed after getting hit with so much darkness in the years prior.
Then 2 months later he was fighting for his life with FIP. It was expensive and touch-and-go, but he beat the crap outta that horrible disease, and now one year in, he's a healthy, happy, confident, insanely loving orangie boy. Some folks think they only have one brain cell, but this guy is just so damn smart and clever. He does something every day that makes us laugh, and I'm so glad we visited the cat rescue that particular day (another weekend and he would've been someone else's guy, he was just that cute). He's also the absolute king of lounging.
And yeah, the mangled blind in the "now" cat tree photo is his handiwork from said cat tree. We had just bought them the week before, and someday we'll get around to replacing it.