Year of the cat

This is Winnie The Cat.

Not Winnie, the cat.

Winnie The Cat.

By my best calculations, she is 17 years old. I realize this is an absolutely absurd age for an outdoor farm cat but she was born several years after I got Connor, and I got him in 1994. So you do the math. Even if I'm off by a couple of years, she's still an antique.

She is the only cat at our place now.

Several years ago, I did The Great Farm Cat Purge. Many of our less-than-healthy farm cats made a one-way trip to the vet. Natural attrition (disease, the road, coyotes and raccoons)  reduced the remaining numbers.

This spring I want to introduce some new cats to our farm. A farm needs cats. Healthy, strong, spayed/neutered vaccinated cats. Cats who can catch mice and keep them out of my house. The Farmer is all about getting a couple of cats. He is NOT all about mice in the house.

Phoenix wants a cat.

Actually, he and Winnie The Cat get along fairly well. She doesn't move very fast. Some days, I don't think she moves at all. She hangs out in the garage. I occasionally see her sauntering around the farm as if she has no where to go and all day to get there. She lazes in spots of sunshine and greets me with happy (demanding) yowls every afternoon when I get home from work. She eats her kitty crunchies and sleeps in her Rubbermaid tote lined with old crate fuzzies and insulated with old rugs.

She's pretty agile though. She leaps around in the garage like she's half her age. Phoenix follows her around, pokes her with his nose and occasionally squashes her with a paw. She's tolerant. Or maybe she's oblivious. She seems to like him. He is fascinated by her, in that slightly creepy Malinois way that is borderline obsession.

So getting a couple of kittens is on my agenda this spring. I'm under no delusions that Phoenix will be as graciously patient with leaping, twirling, spinning, racing, hissing, spitting, swatting kittens. Not sure Winnie The Cat will be either.

But she has three names. The kittens will have one name each. So they should realize they are inferior.