Loki

On Tuesday afternoon, the Lone Star Girl and I found a very tiny baby kitty wandering around beneath parked cars, scaring a couple who didn't want to hit it when they pulled out. No other kittens or mama-cat could be found and the couple said they had seen it climb out of a car's undercarriage and thought it had accidentally hitched a ride. I went into the shop where the car was parked and asked its owners if they had kittens at home or nearby, but they knew nothing of the little stowaway. I confess that I might have left it at that on my own, but the Lone Star Girl wasn't going to go for that and the poor little thing was cruising to be run over...it obviously had no sense yet.

So.

Lone Star Pa won't have an indoor cat anymore, even just for a bit - he is quite firm on this - as past attempts have wrecked havoc with his allergies and this itty guy is too small to have the run of the yard yet as something (likely a possum, if not a big rat) would definitely eat him. As a temporary solution, we put him in a great, big, two-level rat cage in the garage by a fan, which he wasn't very thrilled about but which is bigger than the cages that cats get boarded in at vets and kennels. On Wednesday, we took him to the vet and he checked out okay and at around six weeks old. We then were going to just block the door of the big playhouse out back and let him have the run of that when we weren't out there with him until he's a little bigger, but he climbed up the wall and out the window immediately, so he's back in the cage until we feel he's tough enough to be safe on his own. He does not like it, but it seems a better fate than the street, given his lack of car-sense, and the girls take him out into the yard to play.

He's a sweet kitty who never scratches or bites, although he is very active and agile. Lone Star Pa wanted to name him a comic book name (Cap), the Lone Star Girl wanted to name him a Star Trek name (Neelix) or Thor, the Lone Star Baby wanted to name him a Dora name (Swiper or Tiko) and I wanted to name him a Harry Potter name (Dumbledore, Muggle or Hufflepuff). We settled on Loki, in keeping with our tradition of naming pets after characters in mythology. He's a cutie.