Hey all, this is Lance,
I guess it's time for me to contribute to this Blog (and Kristin refused to post this story anyway)
Monday morning we had a very unexpected house guest. Kristin was on her way to a cooking class with a very grandmotherly Muslim lady, who was introducing her to the group, when they almost hit a little brown kitten which was curled up in fear in the middle of the busy road behind our house. They wanted to stop and get the kitten but there was just too much traffic to even consider it.
Fast forward three hours...
I just returned from French class (bien sur) when Kristin gets home. She is excitedly talking about her morning with a whole group of grandmotherly Muslim ladies (talk about an interesting cultural experience!) When she suddenly stops mid sentence and asks, "is that a cat sitting on our wall?" We go outside an sure enough there is a tiny brown kitten caught in the three layered (yes three! Spikes, barbed wire and electrical) security fence on top of our outer wall. The kitten is pathetically suspended with one paw in the air like a string puppet. So I quickly go over and start untangling the kitten. Fortunately the kitten was mostly caught up in the electrical fence, and even more fortunately we had the fence turned off that morning. As soon as I approached the kitten started hissing and squirming in terror. I get it untangled without too much trouble and it immediately jumps out of my hands and runs for into the bushes in our yard.
Ok, What now? Here I am dressed for a day at the Embassy (nice shirt,tie, pants and shoes) and I have a tiny terrified kitten in my yard in Botswana. Where the heck does a little kitten come from in Botswana anyway? The Botswana are not big on pets, other than big guard dogs and they are not pets, but we have seen a few stray cats here and there. Kristin quickly catches me up on the story of the kitten she almost hit in the road directly behind the wall the cat had been stuck on. Obviously it was the same cat and obviously it was having a bad day.
Now, an older cat even a young adolescent cat I would have said "heck its a stray and stray cats know how to survive on their own , but this was not a cat this was a kitten and a kitten so small I was almost surprised it had it's eyes open. Ok, if we leave it alone I might as well run it over with the car or throw it to the dogs next door because it's not going to make it out there.
But, man... we really do not need a cat!
"Ok, lets get it inside and then we can figure it out" if it climbs over the wall it's a dead cat. Ok, so in my embassy clothes I head for the bushes to catch this thing.
A word about Botswana plants, Botswana is in the Kalahari desert so, you guessed it, lots of cactus, and anything not a cactus has huge thorns on it anyway.
As I approach the cat hides in the thickest thorniest spot in the garden... joy. I try to maneuver my way around, behind and between the cacti hoping to flush the cat into the open (getting stuck a few times in the process). Hey it works! Out runs the kitten, but now I'm semi-stuck in the cacti, and Kristin has gone inside (huh?) and the kitten starts to climb the concrete wall (quite impressively in fact).
Just as I am getting loose from the cacti, out comes Kristin. I tell her to grab the kitten before it gets over the wall. She goes after the kitten, and the kitten jumps off the wall and runs back into the cacti. $%#$^!!!... I of course do the rational thing and begin to lecture Kristin on how she should have gone about catching a little kitten. (I was just trying to be helpful...really!) (Stupidkitten 1 - Lance 0)
Ok, back into the cacti, only this time the kitten isn't going to get flushed out quite so easily. The brush (I mean thorns) were just too thick to actually grab the kitten so Kristin hands me the pool net and I use the reverse pole end to coerce the kitten out of its hidy hole. Out goes the kitten and Kristin commences chasing the kitten around the pool area (A bit more methodically as I had instructed her, though why she listened to me I have no idea). Ok, I get out of the thorns and lo and behold Kristin has the kitten cornered in the bar area (yes we have a pool bar in deepest darkest Africa) In goes Lance, and out goes the kitten and back goes the kitten into the cacti. (Stupidkitten 2 -Lance 0 - Kristin 1)
Ok, back Lance goes into the cacti, out comes the kitten, out comes Lance (a little too fast this time, ouch!) around the side of the house goes Kristin and the kitten. Around the side of the house goes Lance and once again Kristin has the kitten cornered (this time in a cubby holed storage area. This is great! (way to listen to me again Kristin!) Its a one foot square two foot deep cubby with only one entrance. How much easier can it get? In goes Lance out comes the kitten and off it goes around the corner in the direction of, yes the cacti.
(Stupidkitten 3 - Lance 0 - Kristin 2)
Alright! The kitten decided to try going around the other side of the house and forgo the cacti, and that is a dead end! In goes the kitten, in goes Lance, out comes Lance... with the kitten! (now that's how you catch a one and a half pound kitten!)
(Stupidkitten 3 - Lance 7 (extra style points) - Kristin 2)
Ok, lets get this squirmy thing into the house. we go into the house. Kristin closes the door. I drop the kitten on the sofa. The kitten hides behind the couch. Kristin reminds me that we need to get the kitten into the guest bathroom.
(Stupidkitten 4- Lance 0 (that fumble at the goal line really hurt) - Kristin 3)
We pull out the couch, and in goes Lance. I successfully grab the kitten (see I'm getting good at this) and hurry from behind the couch to get the wiggling thing into the guest bath. rip!!! Ok. for those who missed earlier posts, the furniture the Army provided us is not the nicest stuff around, (as Kristin likes to say "the FAO furnature is muy feo!") Apparently the couch has this jagged piece of metal that sicks out from the back left corner and now my pants are torn all the way across one leg and the seam ripped down another 4 inches.
(stupidkitten 5-Lance 0 - Kristin 3) (Game, Set and Match!)
I guess it's time for me to contribute to this Blog (and Kristin refused to post this story anyway)
Monday morning we had a very unexpected house guest. Kristin was on her way to a cooking class with a very grandmotherly Muslim lady, who was introducing her to the group, when they almost hit a little brown kitten which was curled up in fear in the middle of the busy road behind our house. They wanted to stop and get the kitten but there was just too much traffic to even consider it.
Fast forward three hours...
I just returned from French class (bien sur) when Kristin gets home. She is excitedly talking about her morning with a whole group of grandmotherly Muslim ladies (talk about an interesting cultural experience!) When she suddenly stops mid sentence and asks, "is that a cat sitting on our wall?" We go outside an sure enough there is a tiny brown kitten caught in the three layered (yes three! Spikes, barbed wire and electrical) security fence on top of our outer wall. The kitten is pathetically suspended with one paw in the air like a string puppet. So I quickly go over and start untangling the kitten. Fortunately the kitten was mostly caught up in the electrical fence, and even more fortunately we had the fence turned off that morning. As soon as I approached the kitten started hissing and squirming in terror. I get it untangled without too much trouble and it immediately jumps out of my hands and runs for into the bushes in our yard.
Ok, What now? Here I am dressed for a day at the Embassy (nice shirt,tie, pants and shoes) and I have a tiny terrified kitten in my yard in Botswana. Where the heck does a little kitten come from in Botswana anyway? The Botswana are not big on pets, other than big guard dogs and they are not pets, but we have seen a few stray cats here and there. Kristin quickly catches me up on the story of the kitten she almost hit in the road directly behind the wall the cat had been stuck on. Obviously it was the same cat and obviously it was having a bad day.
Now, an older cat even a young adolescent cat I would have said "heck its a stray and stray cats know how to survive on their own , but this was not a cat this was a kitten and a kitten so small I was almost surprised it had it's eyes open. Ok, if we leave it alone I might as well run it over with the car or throw it to the dogs next door because it's not going to make it out there.
But, man... we really do not need a cat!
"Ok, lets get it inside and then we can figure it out" if it climbs over the wall it's a dead cat. Ok, so in my embassy clothes I head for the bushes to catch this thing.
A word about Botswana plants, Botswana is in the Kalahari desert so, you guessed it, lots of cactus, and anything not a cactus has huge thorns on it anyway.
As I approach the cat hides in the thickest thorniest spot in the garden... joy. I try to maneuver my way around, behind and between the cacti hoping to flush the cat into the open (getting stuck a few times in the process). Hey it works! Out runs the kitten, but now I'm semi-stuck in the cacti, and Kristin has gone inside (huh?) and the kitten starts to climb the concrete wall (quite impressively in fact).
Just as I am getting loose from the cacti, out comes Kristin. I tell her to grab the kitten before it gets over the wall. She goes after the kitten, and the kitten jumps off the wall and runs back into the cacti. $%#$^!!!... I of course do the rational thing and begin to lecture Kristin on how she should have gone about catching a little kitten. (I was just trying to be helpful...really!) (Stupidkitten 1 - Lance 0)
Ok, back into the cacti, only this time the kitten isn't going to get flushed out quite so easily. The brush (I mean thorns) were just too thick to actually grab the kitten so Kristin hands me the pool net and I use the reverse pole end to coerce the kitten out of its hidy hole. Out goes the kitten and Kristin commences chasing the kitten around the pool area (A bit more methodically as I had instructed her, though why she listened to me I have no idea). Ok, I get out of the thorns and lo and behold Kristin has the kitten cornered in the bar area (yes we have a pool bar in deepest darkest Africa) In goes Lance, and out goes the kitten and back goes the kitten into the cacti. (Stupidkitten 2 -Lance 0 - Kristin 1)
Ok, back Lance goes into the cacti, out comes the kitten, out comes Lance (a little too fast this time, ouch!) around the side of the house goes Kristin and the kitten. Around the side of the house goes Lance and once again Kristin has the kitten cornered (this time in a cubby holed storage area. This is great! (way to listen to me again Kristin!) Its a one foot square two foot deep cubby with only one entrance. How much easier can it get? In goes Lance out comes the kitten and off it goes around the corner in the direction of, yes the cacti.
(Stupidkitten 3 - Lance 0 - Kristin 2)
Alright! The kitten decided to try going around the other side of the house and forgo the cacti, and that is a dead end! In goes the kitten, in goes Lance, out comes Lance... with the kitten! (now that's how you catch a one and a half pound kitten!)
(Stupidkitten 3 - Lance 7 (extra style points) - Kristin 2)
Ok, lets get this squirmy thing into the house. we go into the house. Kristin closes the door. I drop the kitten on the sofa. The kitten hides behind the couch. Kristin reminds me that we need to get the kitten into the guest bathroom.
(Stupidkitten 4- Lance 0 (that fumble at the goal line really hurt) - Kristin 3)
We pull out the couch, and in goes Lance. I successfully grab the kitten (see I'm getting good at this) and hurry from behind the couch to get the wiggling thing into the guest bath. rip!!! Ok. for those who missed earlier posts, the furniture the Army provided us is not the nicest stuff around, (as Kristin likes to say "the FAO furnature is muy feo!") Apparently the couch has this jagged piece of metal that sicks out from the back left corner and now my pants are torn all the way across one leg and the seam ripped down another 4 inches.
(stupidkitten 5-Lance 0 - Kristin 3) (Game, Set and Match!)
I put the kitten into the guest bath and go upstairs to change my pants and go back to work at the Embassy.
Ok now we have an 8 week old one and a half pound kitten who very quickly figured out that this was a much better deal than she had before. She is cute, snuggly, surprisingly healthy according to the vet, and currently purring contentedly on my lap.
We have guests coming in less than two weeks, we will be travelling to Angola and Mozambique in less than three and will pretty much spend the rest of our time in Africa travelling. The vet said that the animal shelter won't take kittens because 50-70% of them are dying from respiratory diseases. The locals apparently don't like cats, and the GS officer at the embassy has been trying to get rid of his litter of kittens for weeks.
We really do not need a cat!
So Kristin is trying as hard as she can to not become attached to it (I gave up the ghost immediately) and we have refused to name it. (it is currently called "stupidkitten" spoken under your breath as one word) So far we haven't found and takers for the kitten and we need to figure out who will take care of it while we are traveling.
We really do not need a cat, but its actually a really really nice cat.
Ok now we have an 8 week old one and a half pound kitten who very quickly figured out that this was a much better deal than she had before. She is cute, snuggly, surprisingly healthy according to the vet, and currently purring contentedly on my lap.
We have guests coming in less than two weeks, we will be travelling to Angola and Mozambique in less than three and will pretty much spend the rest of our time in Africa travelling. The vet said that the animal shelter won't take kittens because 50-70% of them are dying from respiratory diseases. The locals apparently don't like cats, and the GS officer at the embassy has been trying to get rid of his litter of kittens for weeks.
We really do not need a cat!
So Kristin is trying as hard as she can to not become attached to it (I gave up the ghost immediately) and we have refused to name it. (it is currently called "stupidkitten" spoken under your breath as one word) So far we haven't found and takers for the kitten and we need to figure out who will take care of it while we are traveling.
We really do not need a cat, but its actually a really really nice cat.
No comments:
Post a Comment