The Cat Whisperer

I alluded to this little episode in my Christmas recap, but here it is in all its glory.

My buddy, Dirty D, wanted to get his mom a new kitten for Christmas. His family has one, but they’d previously owned another one before it passed away, so he wanted to get the total back to two. Without having a car to drive, he asked me if I would mind taking him to get the new kitten. I had no qualms with it, and was happy to help a brotha out…especially when it comes to buying Mom Dukes a Christmas present. Due to needing to keep the kitten with its mother for a certain timeframe, the earliest we could pick up the kitten was Christmas Eve. No biggie, this would only take an hour or so, right?

Wrong.

We set off to get the kitten from a couple whose cat had just delivered a litter of them (I don’t know if “litter” is the proper term for cats, but I know that it is for dogs, so we’ll just use it anyway, ok? Thanks, I knew you’d understand). Dirty D picks up the kitten, makes some small talk with the couple, and then tells me that he’d appreciate it if we stopped by Wal-Mart or PetSmart to pick up a few things for Little Kitty Thing (who will now be referred to as ‘LKT’ for the remainder of the post). Yeah, not a problem, how long can it take? A half hour at most?

Try again.

Wal-Mart was more crowded than a mall with Justin Bieber playing, so we decided PetSmart would be the better option; especially since LKT could come in with us (for the record, I hate cats. I think they bring nothing to the table as pets and cost entirely too much since you get zero return on your investment. Well, except sass and attitude. And if I wanted sass and attitude, I’d just get a girlfriend, but that’s neither here nor there…). This is literally how the beginning of our trip to PetSmart went:

Dirty D (holding LKT): “Yo, could you grab a cart so we can put the stuff in it?”

Me (not holding LKT): “Yeah, sure.”

I turn around to grab a cart.

I hear some chatter going on behind me.

I grab the cart, whip back around, and BOOM, there she is…The Cat Whisperer.

I’m like 97.2% sure she rappelled from the ceiling or something. Maybe she came up from beneath us. I honestly wouldn’t call you a liar if you told me that she’d vaporized upon seeing us and then regenerated at our location. I mean, it was ninja-esque. As soon as she opened her mouth, I knew I’d better block out a solid hour for this trip to PetSmart. Yippee.

The Cat Whisperer: “Hi, my name is (The Cat Whisperer); do you need help with getting some things for your new kitten?”

Me (in my head, though I almost blurted it out): “For the love of God, D; please say no. Please, please, please say no.”

Dirty D: “Yeah, that’d be awesome.”

Me (again, in my head, but I got even closer to blurting this out): “Awesome? Seriously? You think that’d be awesome? I think I’d rather be tied down while a bunch of kindergartners pull my hair and paint all over my clothes. Awesome?”

The Cat Whisperer then proceeds to tell us that she owns like 3,148 cats, has worked in a cat adoption agency for years, and volunteers at PetSmart’s adoption clinic to help out new owners.

Fantastic. This just keeps getting better and better.

The Cat Whisperer grabs her cart, which has four cats in travel carriers in it. Seriously, I counted them. At first I thought they were empty travel carriers that she was stocking or something. But no, they definitely had cats in them. All of them. While sitting in a shopping cart. Am I the only one who thinks that’s kinda weird? Yes? Ok, never mind then.

Being an optimist, I try to convince myself that her experience is going to lead to a quick trip through PetSmart since she’ll know exactly where everything is, and exactly what LKT will need to grow up big and strong like ox. The 2% of me that’s a pessimist realized that this could also mean that she’d take her sweet time explaining every nuance of every product to us, “informing” us so that we could make the best decision for our new kitten (and by “we”, I mean “Dirty D”, because I didn’t care what we bought as long as it didn’t kill LKT).

I hate it when my pessimist side is right; I really do.

For the next 45 minutes, we peruse the aisles as The Cat Whisperer gives us the in-and-out of every product. Food, toys, beds, bowls; you name it, we got the lowdown on it. The sad thing is that Dirty D wasn’t looking for anything too fancy, because LKT just needed a temporary home until he was old enough to be introduced to the rest of the house (and the other cat). The other sad thing is that Dirty D could tell by the pained expression on my face that I really wanted to vamoose, but he proceeded to ask more and more questions anyway. I respect the fact that he’s a caring owner and wants to do right by LKT; I really do.

But Lank was ready to roll (yes, I just went third-person on you).

Finally, we get everything that we “needed” and say farewell to The Cat Whisperer. She lectured us on proper feeding techniques before she dismissed us from class, and told us to come back and see her if we had any questions or concerns. At least now I know what I can do if I ever have a good hour or so that I need to waste. Glad that’s cleared up.

We check out, put all of LKT’s goodies in my car and head home. Once we’re there, we smuggled LKT and his treasure trove into Dirty D’s room. His mother was unaware that he was getting her a kitten, so we had to be secretive once we got back to his house. That, and his dad probably would’ve punted LKT 50 yards had he known he existed before Dirty D presented LKT to his mom, so the stakes were high.

All’s well that ends well, right? Dirty D kept LKT hidden, his mom was very, very happy with her gift the next day, and LKT got a real name: Peanut.

So, Peanut, live a full, healthy life; respect your elders; say your prayers; take your vitamins; and behave for Uncle Lank whenever he comes to visit. Lord knows that he and Brother Dirty D had to dodge some bullets to get you where you are, so appreciate our efforts and make our trip worthwhile.

Man, the more I think about it, the more it sounds like I should have titled this post “Saving Private Peanut".

~~ Lank