You Will Meet A Small, Dark Stranger

We were out walking the dogs last night, and at the end of our road there was a little cat. He was very talkative and seemed unperturbed by the herd of canines, who had their usual "Hey! It's a cat!!!" response like they've never seen one before, even though they routinely bow down to their cat overlord at home. We live in a semi-rural area, so there's tons of strays, most completely feral, yet the dogs seem to find them quite exotic and worth hysterically chasing.

Back home for the night, I was feeling a twinge of guilt because it was cold and the little cat had seemed needy, so I briefly toyed with the idea of setting out a bowl of food. I talked myself out of it because, next to an outbreak of malaria, the last thing we need is another critter to be responsible for. Ha.

Some time after 11:00, kid #1 finds me at the desk and says, "I think there's someone at the door for you." It seems the little cat had astutely discerned which house we lived in and which door was the front door, and was busy whacking the screen door open and closed, punctuated with a pathetic "Mauo."

Ten minutes later it was all, "Oh, you've got chicken! I declare this chair mine!" and various other unspoken kitteh thoughts. I told myself if Spike was unhappy, the little cat was out the door first thing in the morning. But because this is all a vast kitteh conspiracy, the first thing Spike did when confronted with the little cat was to lick his head.

So now it's all over but the naming and the neutering. Kid #1 is going to call him Pedro regardless of what I say, although I was leaning toward Pete anyway. The S/O suggests Adolph, because he's singularly unhelpful in situations like this. Regardless of what his name ends up being, I guess he's here to stay.