Farm kitten

 

      Cute kitten, right?
      I try to have a point to these posts and columns, but can today's be simply that? A kitten that is cute. Do really need more?
      I suppose. There could be more. Cats are certainly having a good week. The first new cat species identified in more than a century, leopardus tilcayo — or the tilcayo tiger cat — was discovered in the Bolivian cloud forest.

     Admit it — just reading "cloud forest" gave you a certain thrill, did it not? Maybe there is something to this kitten business. The kitten above was one of five kittens crawling around a tractor at a farm I was visiting Friday. My first thought was to simply put out my hand and say, "I'll take this one," as my wife and I are currently catless, a condition underlined by minding, for the past month, Casper and Boo, the pair of troublemakers that belong to a certain peripatetic lad, his equally peripatetic wife and their surprisingly-peripatetic-for-a-4-month-old child  (sigh, peripatetic adj. traveling from place to place).

     But nobody offered me the kitten and I realized that the demands of caring for kittens, which might involved eyedroppers and expensive vet visits, were forgotten. Plus she (or he) might not be weaned. Plus I don't think we're ready for one, the departure of Natasha still being too fresh. My wife says she's just not ready for a new cat. 

     There was a moment when all five kittens and their mom were gathered in one spot, but I was slow on whipping out my phone for a shot and they scattered. Just as well. The concentrated cuteness might be overwhelming.