We went to visit our friends Dave and Amy last weekend. They had three cats and they were a lot of fun.

We’ve been thinking about getting a companion for Pixel for a while, hopefully to keep him entertained while we’re away and maybe get him used to other cats so he doesn’t freak out and attack us when another cat enters our yard.

Saturday we woke up and decided we would go see about a kitten. After running some errands, we went to the Humane Society Silicon Valley. At first all we saw was older cats, but then we went in the back and they had all kinds of cats including kittens. We looked around at a few in this cramped and smelly kennel and saw this cute little gray one sleeping in the back while his siblings were playing and meowing. He was ‘owner surrendered’ which was good (we didn’t want a stray that didn’t like humans) and he was only 2 months old. His name was Brazil. I have no idea why. We held him for a bit, went outside and decided to get him. That kennel was such a horrible place; I felt that we HAD to liberate at least one of those animals.

We admitted that our method of choosing a kitten was pretty arbitrary. The gray one looked nice. But how else can you really test-drive a cat? We were hoping he’d be a quiet one, which he seemed to be. We’ve had enough meowing from Pixel.

We filled out the short application and then we were told to wait. Problem was, no one told us how long we had to wait. They usually had six volunteers processing applications on a Saturday, but today they only had three.
While we were waiting, another ‘shipment’ of kittens came in. Apparently it’s kitten season and they get 100 CATS A DAY. We ended up waiting two hours before they called us.

The actual adoption process went smoothly and they handed him over quickly. He didn’t really enjoy the ride home in the box and meowed the whole time, but I can’t blame him for that.

The humane society advised us to follow this protocol for introducing the cat to his new home, so we brought him directly into the study after Pixel was safely locked in another room.

I expected the cat to refuse to come out of the box, or make break for the closet, but he carefully stepped out, sniffed around and started making little meowing noises. Soon after he was rubbing up against me and looking to be pet. He’s a couragous fellow. Pixel hid under the bathroom sink for a week when we got him.

He was equally affectionate with Anne and spent most of his time through weekend either sleeping in the chair, playing, or sleeping in our laps on the chair.

He’s very good. He scratches his scratching board, he eats his food, drinks his water, and uses his litter box. He even likes Pixel’s hand-me-down toys. He is very curious and is trying desperately to get out his room. When we leave, he meows at the door for a few minutes. Occasionally Pixel will hear this and hiss at the door, but otherwise, he seems oblivious to the fact that there’s another cat in the house. Well, at least he’ll be that way for another 7 days. Then it should get interesting.

He’s not as quiet as he advertised at the shelter. He meows pretty much continuously when you visit him. Thankfully, it’s not much of a meow right now, more like a scratchy ‘mow’. If this keeps up, we could have two very loud cats. The idea was to make one shut up, not have two mobile noisemakers!

We haven’t quite decided on a name yet. We thought of Signal, which is the name of the Geocaching mascot. The cat spent a lot of time walking across the keyboard this weekend, so I thought Qwerty might be a cute name.

I think our favorite right now might be ‘PC’. For one, it’s computer-related, just like Pixel. Second, there’s a comic strip called PC and Pixel. We didn’t know of it when we named Pixel. Though in the comic, PC is a human. We primarily got this cat to keep Pixel occupied, so it’s less our cat, and more Pixel’s. You could say he’s Pixel’s Companion. Look at that, a triple entendre. A little geeky, but meaningful.

Other suggestions for names?

The next few weeks should be interesting. Hopefully they won’t kill each other. I should say hopefully Pixel won’t kill the new one.

In any event, the cat is damn cute, as you can see from the pictures. He makes Pixel, who’s scrawny next to any other adult cat, look huge. He’s still a little smelly from the kennel, but I’m hoping that will wear off in a few days or maybe we’ll see if he’ll take to a bath. Maybe before I attempt that, I should invest in some very thick gloves. I’ve already got quite a few scratches. Ahh, the joy of kittens.