My baby kitty...all 24 furry pounds of him...turned thirteen today. Thirteen!
One Sunday afternoon, long before kids and houses and well-paying jobs, I took a look at the classifieds in the Ann Arbor, MI paper. Yep, this was back when people still placed printed ads, back when there was no Craigslist...or really much of the internet period (gasp). The ad for "kittens" jumped out at me. We already had a dog at that time, why not a cat too? I called the number and the man who answered described the kittens - there was one male left and 2 females. He said the male was the ringleader of the bunch, the kitten he had named "King Cruiser". This would later turn out to be such a perfect description of him :-) Scot had grown up with cats and preferred those of the male variety so I told him I was interested and that we'd try and stop by later after I talked to my husband. Husband Scot was at Guard that day, which in Michigan was an hour long drive, so I waited very impatiently for him to get home.
Luckily, Scot was on board with the plan when he got home, so we called the man back and went over to his house that evening. We fell in love with "King Cruiser" as soon as we saw him - he was more or less a ball of puff that fit easily into one hand. And he did seem like a confident little cat.
We took him home and immediately introduced him to our dog Guinness, a lab mix. Guinness excitedly started poking her nose at him and panting, jumping around with anticipation at this new little play toy we brought home for her. Without wasting any time, "King Cruiser" hissed and took a swat at Guinness. And from that moment on, he ruled the roost.
We changed his name to Sam. And he has been such a wonderful pet...to Scot and me. That's about it. He hates pretty much everyone else, except Scot's sister. Di and Gardy tried so hard to win him over and all he did was bite them. And it's a rare occasion when he'll let anyone else pet him. Which is too bad, because with Scot and me, he is extremely affectionate. He takes purring to a new level. His favorite time of day is at about 8pm, after the kids are in bed and I'm on the couch. That's when he gets me all to himself and he is up on my lap literally within seconds of me sitting down. At bedtime and all through the night, he nuzzles up to my head, with his back end facing Scot. (Scot's extra happy we recently made the move to a King size bed) Well, and I guess his other favorite place is in front of the food bowl.
I'm having trouble finding some of my hard copy pictures of Sam's early years (where is the fricking 1998 photo album?!) to scan in...but here are some good ones that I had on hand...
Baby Sam (1998)
Killer Sam (he brought this chipmunk to our screen door when we lived in an apartment in Plymouth - 2000)
Study Partner - Sam (& Rocky) faithfully lended their fuzzy support to Scot while he was in pilot training. Mississippi, 2002. Sidebar: Rocky joined our family in 2001 as a young kitten. Sam took on the responsibility of nursing Rocky. Yes, nursing. Well, he tried really, really hard. They both seemed to take comfort in it for a few weeks. I can't believe I don't have a picture.
"Fat Cat in a Little Coat" (2006)
Samta
Probably taken about 10 years ago, but really nothing has changed. HAPPY BIRTHDAY, SAM!
