the weather has cooled and it's raining cats and dogs over here.

almost literally, since the kids found a lost wet kitten the other day by the library. (i say "almost" because i'm pretty sure that this kitten did not fall out of the sky). nobody seemed to know who he belonged to and he was wet, cold, and scared.

and, as the kids of my library already know, what does one do with a lost unhappy kitten? bring it to laura! so there they came, parading into the library with a shivering orange lump in one of their backpacks.

the kids were of course fascinated by it. we even put in a bid to keep him as the library cat (it's been done before!), but we have motion detector cameras so that would NOT have worked. since we couldn't keep him at the library, we began the "find the kitten a home" campaign. several kids wanted him, but i told them that i needed explicit permission from their parents (with vocal confirmation) before i would let them take him. the last thing the little guy needed was to be left out in the rain again.

about five of them called their parents and were denied. a father and his son said they would ask the mom of the family - but they were also turned down.

so i called mike. i opened with "i looooove you" and his immediate answer was "how many cats are you bringing home this time?"

in the end, at the eleventh hour (about a minute before i closed the library and took him home with me), a mother and her son decided to keep him.

and before you go blaming me for bringing home lots of cats for mike to put up with, you should know that he was actually disappointed when i came home empty-handed.

which just means that when my child calls from her local library saying a kitten needs a home, this is one mom (and dad) who will say yes.

is it possible to be a crazy cat family? some day, i'm gonna know.