Waiting for Leonard

Our apartment is in chaos tonight. The Flying Fellini Sisters, Bianca and the Weebles are racing in as many different directions as five cats can run, in a state of perfect terror...The Cage has returned!

Now, Ronny and Rena have never seen the cage before, but if it frightens Aunty Xena and Aunt Brie, that's enough to discourage them! And it does no good to explain to them that I'm just making up the spare room, because we are Waiting for Leonard.

The Tall Lady was busy packing for her trip to the Cabin when Mickey phoned us last night. Once again, Sheral tells us that she is going up to prune fruit trees and to check on the house, but the cats and I suspect that she's just going to eat quiche, drink zinfandel and watch chick flicks with her mom and sister.

Mickey is the foster manager for VOKRA, and she was calling to ask if we had room in the CatHouse for one more resident. We were, of course, perfectly free to say no. After two and a half years, Mickey has gotten to know us pretty well. WE DON'T SAY "NO"!

A few weeks ago, some of our volunteers trapped a very small black and white kitten at a Burnaby lumber yard. Because one of our old-timers, Leonard, had just died, the little fellow was named in his honour. The poor kitten is now known to all and sundry as "Baby Leonard"...uggh!. They noticed that one of his front paws was injured. In fact, it was so badly damaged, that it's had to be amputated. So, Baby...uggh!... Leonard has been living at Karen Duncan's House for the past month, wearing a lampshade, and getting analgesic injections in his skinny little cat butt.

Tonight, as if he hasn't been through enough already, he has returned to the vet, to have his stitches removed, and to be deprived of a couple of his other favourite body parts. Mickey tells us that he can be a little bit grumpy. If I'd gone through what he has, I think that I might tend to be a mite owly myself.

Leonard gets his parole at eight o'clock tomorrow morning, and will be moving into the halfway house soon afterwards. We'll have to keep him isolated until we've seen how the bigger cons treat him. Ronny is such a perfect gentleman, and Bianca has come to love every cat she's ever met. Rena is a wild card, and as for Xena and Brie - good luck, Leonard! I think that, once he learns to duck, he'll be fine.

After he's been with us for awhile, and before Sheral comes home, I was thinking that there should be some sort of a bonding ceremony in honour of ...uggh!...Baby Leonard. Maybe I'll put on some Pink Floyd, break out the catnip and a few cold ones, and all seven of us could get legless one evening.

What do you think?

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