I Like Ike

Well, Hurricane Ike came and went, and while the title of this post seems ironic, believe it or not, there were some reasons to like Ike.

Extreme weather events, such as hurricanes, tend to bring out the best in the best people and the worst in the worst ones. I was privileged to witness the best.

And the days preceding Ike brought Charlie to us. Following the heartbreak associated with little Barack (see "Keep Your Feline Babies Indoors," August 30, in the "Older Posts" of this blog), little Charlie turned up in our backyard. This feline baby - another male - was obviously abandoned. He had no home except our backyard.

Little Charlie probably would not have survived through Ike. He was eight weeks old and weighed 2.2 pounds when my significant other managed to lure him into a cat carrier and took him to the vet. He had fleas, ear mites, and a parasite, but he was healthy - no feline AIDS like little Barack had, thank God. He has what appeared to be a little black mustache, reminding me of Charlie Chaplin, hence his name.

Charlie has a good home. We plan to spoil him in every way possible. He is well on his way to becoming royally spoiled. That's our job, and we plan to excel at it. He's as sweet and loving as a little kitten can possibly be.

In a future post, I will write more about little Charlie - and his 10-year-old sister, Jewel, who is going to be incredibly annoyed when she finds out the real truth about him (he's quarantined in our guest bedroom now, and the two have not yet been formally introduced).

Today, we just got power back on following Hurricane Ike's relentless march through the Texas and Louisiana coastal areas. Actually, it was yesterday, because midnight just came and went while I'm writing this post.

It has been a long day. It has been a long five-days-plus since Ike made landfall on Saturday. Little Charlie is asleep. And soon I will join him.