I travel frequently with my job as a meeting professional with ConferenceDirect. Last November brought me to the beautiful and historic city of Austin, TX for a three day conference. On night two, one of my fellow attendees tells me there is a little kitty crying in the bushes out in front of the hotel where we are staying, and asked if I had heard it as well. This particular hotel was located in a very busy area of the city with wide streets and plenty of traffic, which begged the question, "how on earth did a kitty manage to find its way into those bushes?"
That evening, our conference group had dinner and cocktails at a local honky-tonk, and a good time was had by all! Upon return to the hotel, my partner in crime and I decided to see if we could find the source of all that crying and meowing in the bushes. Unfortunately, the bushes were thick (and full of pickers), and that kitty was far more familiar with that underworld than we ever thought of being! The nice bellmen brought out a dish of milk (yes, I now know cats are lactose intolerant) and we gave up for the night.
Enter the last night of the conference, when the hotel served some lovely sea bass and a good wine to match! Now what kitty can resist an expertly prepared sea bass? Certainly not this one, and within minutes, she was in my arms.
Now what?
You see, our family already has three cats at home, and I figured a fourth wouldn't go over so well. A series of calls were made to the local shelters and animal rescue organizations, with no success. With so many wild cats in the city, the organizations would only take the kitty if it were injured. I suppose it could be said that this little bag of abandoned, starving, flea-bitten bones could be categorized as "injured", but I don't think that is what they meant. And there was no way that kitty was going back into the bushes. So....
A call was placed to the airline (thank you Delta) and arrangements were made. A trip to Target yielded everything a kitty would need for travel from Austin, TX to Minneapolis, MN. Early the next morning, our journey began. On the shuttle to the airport, this little kitty was given the name Austin. She was a perfect angel at the airport as we checked in, went through security, and settled into the gate area awaiting our flight home. I felt like a new mom taking an adopted child out of a foreign country, nervous that at any second something could go awry. But that was not to be, and little Austin took her very first flight, quietly sleeping under my feet in window seat 19D (or somewhere near there)!
When my son picked me up at the airport, and saw the cat carrier, his first words were "dad is going to kill you". Well, not literally. Now I've been married to this same man for almost 36 years, and he's a softy for animals despite his many protests. No worries.
Little Austin spent her first few days isolated from the three other kitties, awaiting her first visit to the vet to make sure she wasn't carrying anything home they might contract. She was very underweight at 1.2 pounds, was full of fleas, and ears that needed a good cleaning. Otherwise, she was a healthy little girl!
Now almost a year later, she's my princess, my pride and joy, and is terribly spoiled! This is her blog, along with "et al", aka Chip, Tiggy, and Monkey.
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| First Night Home - You can see the smile :) |
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