Someone New Pipes Up!

Meet Piper! She's got a lot to say!

 

You all remember that my mom lost her Sir Moose-a-lot Goodyear Roadkill Thunderbottom not long ago? Well, she was ready for a new furry friend and I decided that I would find one for her as a Mother's day present.

I had no idea it would be so hard to find her a kitty! It's not like she was super specific about the kind of kitty she wanted.. Just had to be a big headed, white faced, tiger and white or tux, short haired, large male, super friendly, maybe dog friendly, kitty. Easy peasy, right? I'll wait for the laughter to stop.. ;)

Of course the first place I looked was Winnie's Wish! (do you know me?? hello!) But the only one who fit the bill, sort of, has to go with his brother and he doesn't fit the 'super friendly' or even really large. The super friendly Wisher is Sunspot, who really really really needs a home! But there's no way I could pass her off as a white faced large tuxie seeing as she's a lovely tabby with patches of copper in her gray tabby fur. Seriously, how is she still waiting?? So pretty!
(speaking of the brothers Binks and Blue, come on, someone out there must want an adorable pair of sweethearts who, while they may take a while to adjust, will give years of joy to whoever adopts them!)

I checked out kitties in local places, but no one seemed to fit the bill. I only found thirteen thousand that I wanted to take home, but none for my mom. (no, we're not looking for more kitties, three in our little house is enough!)

Meanwhile, I had a surgery consultation coming up in Columbus. Hey! I thought, I know someone who works with kitties in Columbus!! You all know her too, I'm sure, as the mom of the Random Felines, Jeanne! She fosters for Colony Cats, so I thought maybe they might have the special kitty we are looking for. I wrote to Jeanne and told her my tail, er, tale of woe in trying to find a big headed, white faced, tiger and white or tux, super friendly, maybe dog friendly, large male kitty. She wrote back right away with two quick suggestions and said there were probably more. The two she sent were adorable! But if you noticed, I forgot a key piece of the perfect kitty description.. These boys were both long haired. Mom wants short hair. Poo.

I got the link to their Petfinder page and oh boy! Lots of kitties that might fit the bill! Mom and I looked and I put all the possibles into a list for her. A few days passed and I said, hey, did you pick a kitty? She gave me a list of four (out of I think 16) that she liked. Between looking at them and picking them, three had been adopted! Poo again.

That leaves one, right? So we had our kitty? Guess again, there were a few new ones! Or at least a few we hadn't noticed before. More lists, more narrowing it down. We were getting down to the nitty gritty! My appointment was Tuesday and I needed to let Jeanne know as soon as possible so if it was in a foster home she could get it to the shelter for us to see!

Finally, I think it was Saturday night or Sunday when she finally said, "Piper." I looked her up to make sure she hadn't been adopted and.. "Um, mom. Did you know Piper was a girl?" "Oh? Well, that's ok." She was one of the only kitties listed as "large". So I let Jeanne know and we made plans to meet after my appointment!

Fast forward to Tuesday, we got out of my appointment very late and pretty much (with one quick stop at a specialty nut company) headed over to Colony Cats to meet Jeanne and Piper! Jeanne was waiting outside. Have you met her? What a really nice sweet lady! And it's not just her kitty tattoos that let you know she's a cat lady for sure!

We did the paperwork outside (busy inside even though they had just opened! Hope they had lots of adoptions!) and finally I couldn't take it, I had to get in there and get my hands on some fur! A mostly black little tuxie obliged and let me pet her as she sat next to me, so cute!

Piper was not one of Jeanne's fosters, so she didn't know her on sight, but knew where she was sleeping. Unfortunately just before we went in, a little boy ran into her cat tree and she moved. As I looked around at all of the tuxies, I realized that one persons idea of large and medium and another's idea can be vastly different! LOTS of the tuxies and tiger and whites that had been listed as medium were certainly large enough kitties to satisfy my mom's want of a big boy! But Piper had been chosen, she's the one we'd be leaving with. They listed her as 'large'. Me? I would have listed her as Extra Large! But adorable with it! Lots to love! Jeanne found her by the fish tank, that's where we took the picture I shared above.

"You like fishies, Piper?" I asked her, "Well, you're going to love the turtle tank where you're going!" Jeanne lugged, I mean, carried Piper over to me and I tried to hold her, but she much preferred to move to the tree right next to me where she enjoyed letting me pet her. She especially liked having her back right at the tail base rubbed. I've had big kitties before, that's the hardest spot for the round ones to get at, so scritches there probably feel great. (Shh, I didn't tell mom this, but I got too aggressive with the rump rubs and she put her teeth on my hand, "that's enough of that, lady!" but it wasn't really a bite, just letting me know to cool it!)

Time to load up and head for home! And that's when we found out what a talker she was! The second Jeanne put her in the carrier (let me pause here to say that Jeanne is an expert getting a kitty into a carrier! just, pop, and she was in! I'd still be there struggling I'm sure!) and girlfriend started up with a litany of complaints mixed with the song of her people! We paid for the kitty, and she sang. We walked out with her, and she sang. We loaded her into the van, and she sang. We said goodbye to Jeanne, and she sang. We loaded up, and she sang. We pulled out, and she sang. Continuously. But not loudly, because she has this adorable, tiny little sweet peeping kind of voice!

Piper sang for at least ten full, consistent minutes. Then she settled down, thank heavens! Though she peeped every so often all the way home, she was done with the long song. She was a good girl on a stop we made to see Greg's sister and her family who live in Columbus, met everyone through the carrier door and sat quietly while we visited for half an hour. Finally, it was time to get on the long road home. It was about a three hour drive to my mom's house and Piper traveled like a champ.

My mom called several times while we were on our way home, Piper even peeped into the phone for her! She called so many times that my phone battery went dead! I had to use Greg's phone then and I put the hurts to his battery too. Mom said this was even better than Christmas! We had to get her present home so she could open it!

We finally arrived, and the sky opened up and it began to pour with rain! Gotta love the timing, right? But we were there and Piper was home! I had mom sit on the couch, we put the carrier next to her and opened it. She didn't hesitate, Piper walked out and into her first hug with her new mommy.

Welcome home Piper! And welcome to the family! Happy belated Mother's day to my mom!

Since this has gotten WAY longer than I intended, I'll tell you how Piper is doing in her forever home next time! (I heard those groans!)