Once upon a time there was a little kitten. She was black and her name was Desdemona. She lived in an old farmhouse in the country and her life was full of mice and birds and other cats to play with.

One day, Desdemona saw her mistress getting ready for company. Her mistress, not thinking Desdemona could help, put her outside while she cleaned. Desdemona didn’t want to be outside. She was tired of mice and birds and playing with other cats. Desdemona wasn’t such a little kitten anymore. She was a big kitten now! She wanted to help!

She decided she should break in through a window by pushing the screen down at the top then climbing over the curtain rod and down the drape, knocking it all to the floor in the process.

Then she said to herself, “Now that I’ve let more light into the house, what else can I do to help?” She thought and thought about what she was good at. She was good at catching butterflies. She was good at scratching people’s arms and legs. She was even good at growling at the dog. But no, that doesn’t sound like it would help her mistress get ready for company.

Then she came up with the perfect thing! She went straight to the bathroom and said to herself, “Here is what I do best.”

And she promptly peed all over the floor.

Anyone want a kitten?

Mama Fuzzball with her last kitten, Desdemona.

We call her That Darn Fuzzball because she poops all over the house, making herself a most unwelcome guest, and it’s only her continued nursing of Desdemona not to mention the hole in the screen door that explains her presence at all anymore. I really didn’t think she could do anything to earn my admiration at this point, until–

Several days ago, we found a tiny stray kitten, only a few weeks old, too young to be motherless, and Weston has been taking care of her. Yesterday we decided she didn’t seem quite right so we loaded up to take her to the vet. Weston was supposed to hold her. She’s so tiny, you can hold her in one hand. Only he didn’t. He let go. And next thing we knew, she’d crawled up inside the dash of my car.

It was 91 degrees and a kitten was stuck in my dash. For SIX HOURS. She wouldn’t come out. We went back home. Two teenagers went to work trying to figure out how to get into the dash. We flagged a man on the road to help us. We called over a neighbor to help us. My cousin finally came home. We got nowhere and pieces of my dash were hanging out all over the place but we couldn’t reach her. We tried leaving her alone, we tried food, we tried everything. It started raining. It got dark. We’re facing a really terrible situation. Either the kitten was going to die in my dash and make my car smell REALLY NICE or we were going to open the windows, let it rain all over the inside of my car in hopes the kitten would run out sometime during the night–and we’d never see it again, never be able to take it to the vet. It might die anyway….. Weston–my big football player–sat down beside the car and cried. Then we had an idea. Last ditch effort–Fuzzball. A mother cat, not her mother cat, but still a mother cat who sounds and smells LIKE a mother cat.

I got Fuzzball, shut her up in the car.

SIX HOURS we’d tried to get that kitten out of the dash. Fuzzball got her out in five minutes.

She can poop wherever she wants today.