Hello Tamu

So, last Monday, dashed into the petshop to get more hay for Sonic, boys stayed in car as I was in a hurry... grabbed bag of hay, noticed little black bunnies & was going to say 'hello' when I was distracted by a teeny little 'mew'. Looked up to see little black & white kitten pressed up against bars of his cage, paw right out trying to get my attention!! No, said I, stop it, stop being so cute... Back in car, told boys about cute little kitty & that was that. When Neil came home from work, told him about cute kitty...

Next day, my car went off for its MOT & when it was done, Neil walked up to garage to get it (what a nice man), said he might stop in petshop to have a look at cute kitty -- I warned him that it was not just cute, it was awfully cute! The man is a soft, soppy marshmallow when it comes to little baby things, worse than me!! He comes back with car, we discuss car then he goes on about how cute kitty is. I joked about having another cat, that we'd have to hide it from Mlia, our female tabby & Neil went quiet -- usually he rejects the idea of another cat straightaway, saying it wouldn't be fair on our existing 2. I asked if he was serious about having another one & we ended up discussing the practicalities!!

To cut a long story short, we now have little Tamu (Swahili for 'nice' or 'sweet') who's currently residing in the 'puppy' cage in the lounge. Ever since Wolvie died, Sonic hasn't shown any interest in going into the cage, spending all her time in the hutch (we'd had the cage set up against the side door of the hutch so they'd have more room to run around). We first let Tamu into the cage next to Sonic and she was NOT happy so we moved it to the other side of the room & she's much happier. In fact she hardly pays him any attention at all, even when he jumps up & grabs onto the top level of her hutch!

He is a handful, racing all over the place & he's got a loud, demanding miaow which he utilises everytime we're in the room but don't let him out of the cage. He has to learn that there are times Sonic's hutch doors are left open so she can wander out if she wants to. But having a little, 9 week old baby makes our other 2 look positively huge!

We haven't introduced them yet & won't be doing so for another week or more. And then it will be a gradual process with Tamu staying in his cage so that Mlia & Kipaku can't get to him but can still check him out & vice versa. We're hoping they'll accept him in time; they'll have 6 months or so to get used to the idea as he'll be living in the lounge till he's been neutered as we don't want him to have access to the cat flap till then.

How desperate can you get?!