Pets

Congratulations to us, my wife and I got a kitten. Rollie is a now 12 week old demestic short haired cat. He is gray and light gray stripped. The poor little shit was deceptively sick when we got him from the Humane Society. He had: fleas, tapeworm, fungal infection and an upper respiratory infection. Well lots of drugs shot down its throat and he is acting like a kitten. Rollie is either all over the place investigating with his claws or fast asleep on my jacket on the chair in the corner. I have found that once people find out about our cat, they are no longer interested in us, they first ask about the cat. "How is your baby?" they ask. Now that Rollie is feeling better I ususally tell them the same thing, "We don't have one."
I am ususally perplexed by this question because it is well known that we have no children. Come to think about it, we HAVE been getting asked this question quite a bit more since we got the cat. Maybe the cat is our baby and not our pet. Maybe I have been treating my own as an animal! Oh my God, we have been feeding Rollie by just leaving food out in a dish on the floor. We must be terrible parents. Wait a minute, I just thought about something, we have been leaving Rollie home alone for hours at a time and he is only 3 months old! I have not even mentioned how we make him poop in a tray of litter! What kind of monsters are we? We have been treating our baby like, like, like... an ANIMAL!
We have spent about $450 on the cat since we have gotten him and we are looking at another $130 next week for the follow up vet visit. I would do it again if given the option but I get to bitch about it, I mean you get a cat from the Humane Society with the understanding that the basic health needs have been taken care of. The most common thing I hear is, "What if it was your child?" The answer is that I should go to jail for the above confessions.
The cat is our pet and we are keeping him if he costs us another $600 next month because he is fun, and playful and I like playing with him. But he is our pet. We own the animal in the same way we own the computer I am typing on, my car and our single plant. You own your pet in the same manner no matter how much you want to call it, "My baby!" Don't believe me? If you can show me a receipt for your pet, this means you have "adopted it." Show me a receipt for your baby and I will show you an obsesive compulsive black market accountant.