I love cats. Don't get me wrong. But we already have one. And I didn't really want another one. So I kept saying no, despite all the pleas I had to listen to from my daughter.
But then yesterday she comes home from playing with her friend down the street. She rushed into her room and shut the door. I didn't know what she was doing. But apparently she had smuggled the kitten into the house under her shirt.
When I opened her bedroom door, there it was. And it was awfully cute. I guess she thought she could reasonably keep the cat inside her room forever and we'd never know about it.
I told her she had to take it back and she started throwing a fit. There was crying and hysterics and she told me I was the meanest dad in the entire world if I didn't let her keep the cat.
What's a man to do? Especially since my wife was standing there shrugging her shoulders and saying that the cat was kind of cute. And would it really be that horrible if we kept it?
I was outnumbered. And now we've got a kitten. I went down to the neighbors to make sure it was actually alright that we kept it. For all I knew, Harper snatched it out of their house and ran down the street with it.
But it was in fact up for grabs. They told me the kitten was 11 weeks old but it looks younger. It's really super small. But it's litter trained and all of that good stuff.
Not that it mattered for me this morning. One of the conditions of the kitten agreement was that Harper keep the stinky box in her room. Our other cat goes outside but this kitten isn't quite ready for that.
Well this morning the kitten was frolicking around the house and Harper shut her door. So the cat couldn't get to the box. And it took a crap in the hallway. Which of course I stepped right in. Barefoot.
I was not pleased at all. I didn't really blame the cat since it's too little to know better. But why did Harper close her door?! That upset me. So I called her over and showed her the mess on my foot and the rug.
She said she'd clean it up because that was also one of our conditions to keep the cat. She had to be responsible enough to scoop up poop and any accidents the cat might have.
She grabbed some paper towels and reached down to pick up the smelly squished poop. Then she threw up. Seriously. She barfed. And now we had an even bigger mess. So much for having her be in charge of that task. She doesn't have the stomach for it.
So now it's my job. Just as I always suspected it would be. But when you look at the kitten it is awfully cute. I guess I can handle the job.
Here's the little ball of poop and trouble:
