Saschathon: My adventures with Morita

It wasn't something that could just be ignored and wished away, the pathetic mewing of a stray kitten. No, instead, the first night he came (she? I'll keep it simple and call it a him since my cat's a boy too) and everyone on the block could hear his cries all night. The next night, it rained and I could still hear his cries so, suckered in, I ran out in the rain with a flashlight and tried to coo him out of hiding. I spotted him under a car and flashed my light on him and before I could make a move, he dashed out for under the car. That was my first encounter with the black and gray stripped kitten with a black button-nose and white muzzle. Very cute. In love? Sorta. I felt my heart melt when I saw him and would have tried to follow him except he was long gone. That night his yowling kept me up and guilty for not having had secured him in a warm house but my mom pointed out that if he was quick enough to run away, he's able to fend for himself. Unfortunately, a few others didn't feel that way and the next day, I learned from my mom that a few people came out to look for the kitten and actually left a bowl of cat food in our backyard. My mom wasn't amused in the slightest given the fact that we have a plethora of strays in this neighborhood. At this point, I think we were all starting to get annoyed with our little friend outside. He cried none stop that night. Today, my mom and I came home to find yet another set of people staring at out house, looking for the ellusive young feline. As we were trying to discourage our friendly nieghbors from getting overly friendly with the cat on and around our property, my mother and I both looked at these women with expressions of skepticism. However, that all cleared when one of them announced that she really wanted to take the youngster home with her. To make a long story short, I ended up camping outside using as much of my cat-whisperer skills as I could muster. It worked. Oliver and I were beginning to bond. Yes, I even gave him a name although, incidentally, his name has since been changed to Morita...my mom likes to give animals a Japanese lastname as its name. For example: Harada, my cat and Ito-san, Ken's former Beta fish.

Anyway, my point is that Morita came to love me over the span of two hours as I was constantly given him attention and experimenting with various methods of luring him out. My methods include: mimicing his cries (he seemed to respond more to my mom though), placing harada's senior cat-diet food out on by the porch, milk-bribery and finally, cat-in-a-box trap (a shopper with food hidden inside. Cats are curious ceatures, especially when they're young). Just as I had thought that I exhausted my options, my mom brought out the secret weapon: Harada's favorite toy--a stick with a stuffed carrot balanced at the top). By the time she thought of this, it was about 1130 and we were both getting tired. I think that if I were to try again tomorrow, Morita will come to us. As far as he's concerned, we're his only family (apparently, since he bugs me in the middle of the night by crying outside of my window). I feel obligated to help a kitty out.

Morita was super sneaky and I couldn't get a good picture of him but I did have other pictures to post so....enjoy!