SO... What is all this talk about a DUDE?

Well, I have to explain a few things before I introduce the leading player!

This is really my history with cats! Yes, I lost my allergies to everything it seems. Stink used to make me sneeze so I am pretty sure it is the great outdoors that triggers things.

She survived The Kid by quite a few years. I fed her outside, said "Hi" when she was around, kept water in her bowl and we co-existed. She had a bit of history with urinary problems and one Friday she looked slow and listless. I had determined to take her to the vet on Monday but woke up to see her sleeping in her shelter. But she wasn't asleep.

It was on the morning of my birthday.

I had a sudden sense of escape! I was going to be without a pet or an obligation for the first time in my life! We buried her in my condo and I gave away her cat food and threw out the scratching post and bowls. I was still waking up in the night hallucinating The Kid bouncing in the tub, but was sort of used to a pet free environment.

Now I was thinking of TRAVEL and freedom and it was sort of heady!!!

So..... there was this neighborhood Casanova named Oreo....

You might call him the "father of the complex". He was owned once by an neighbor and when he was no longer a kitten, he was sort of everybody's cat. I know personally of five people who had thought they had adopted him. He was big and husky and really a sweetie, but nobody really had "taken care of him" if you know what I mean. As he grew, even though the markings were not the same, the profile was unmistakable.

There was also a small scared little black pair of cats whom I had seen on occasion. One was pregnant a while back and the other, I think it had died some time ago... well there was a group of cats in the neighborhood.

So. It was the day after my birthday and my neighbor, a very nice retiree named Dorothy (who often pushed home a shopping cart with a half gallon of Jim Beam on top) knocked on my door and said "I have a problem. Maybe you do too? I think I have a cat in my wall."

Good old Dorothy!

She went on to say that she was hearing mewing noises while doing her laundry. We had attached storage in our patios and both had our own washer and dryers. It was apparent that one of the neighborhood mom's had thought a small opening in Dorothy's laundry room drywall might make a new home for her brood, but Dorothy must have shut the door on her plans!

Now, here I was... a free woman! Unencumbered by anyone but myself. A boyfriend who traveled and NOW I could hit the road too!

I thought.

"Well, it can't get out on its own, so we could leave it and it would die and smell." I said.

"Or I could go get a drill and see if I can drill a little hole and try to pull it out from below."

WHAT WAS I SAYING!?

I was all set to take it to a rescue. I was sure they would help out.

So as I drilled and heard the rather robust mews... I heard a voice in my head say "Now that Stinkerbell is gone, Kiddie is coming back!"

!!!!

When I made the fourth cut I bargained, that if it were a black cat, it was The Kid again and I would have to keep him.

So, the TINIEST little thing I had ever seen came out. I immediately called the vet and we assessed him to be about 8 weeks old. Out I ran to get the bottle for nursing and by golly I was a mother AGAIN!