Of course what we ought to have done is simply gone home from the Animal Shelter and perhaps put a wanted notice up on the notice-board in the supermarket for a kitten...
After all, I'm not totally ga-ga and the smell was enough to make you run for the hills, never mind the confusion of seriously scraggy cats roaming about...
The red flags really should have flown in my face the minute we emerged from the car...horror struck by the dilapidated shed from which dogs were frantically barking and alarmed by the sheer number of filthy tin plates, encrusted with days of food, littering the steps and the yard.
All the sick cats with their runny noses and dirty bottoms ought to be kept totally separate from those who appear to still have a fighting chance...
I did see it all...Himself is still talking about it now over a week later...
But I shut my eyes to the shitty floor in the main room...to the over-flowing litter trays...to the skinny cats yowling...the heaps of newspapers and the general disorder...
I had set my heart on having two kittens and two kittens I was going to bring home...
Little Murphy was the only kitten who looked healthy...there was a white one who seemed reasonable until I picked him up and saw his ears were infested with mites and a flea jumped from him onto my hand...and he was sneezing.
The Vet...whose name is Susie...asked where did we get Murphy from and when I told her, her face said it all...
She reeled off the number of people who'd had either an adult cat or a kitten from there...and had to have them put to sleep because they were suffering from practically every cat disease...the ones who survived were few and far between and cost their rescuers large sums of money in getting them bright eyed and bushy tailed again...
Himself is all for reporting the shelter to the council...even though he acknowledges that it's doubtful they'd take any action...they'd have to re-house all the animals that are currently living there...there are five ponies, never mind however many dogs. It's easier for the council and other such official bodies to turn a blind eye...
Did Murphy really come from Dublin? Susie thinks it doubtful...has he really had his first vaccination? There again Susie thinks that highly unlikely when she put his age at about eight weeks rather than the eleven weeks we were told he was...
Our little kitten is in safe hands...if Susie can prevent him from deteriorating any further then she will...but he ought never to have been in contact with sick cats...
I let my heart rule my head...I should have made it no further than the front door...Himself...who has never been terribly keen on cats...is worried about little Murphy...he encouraged him to sit on his shoulder and liked it when he purred and kneaded with little sharp claws...
Susie said to 'phone in the morning...
Cat rescue? What could possibly go wrong?
Quick Update About Murphy...
