Stormy times

We've lost our younger cat. Stormy is a tortoiseshell (black/orange mix), and app. 3 years old. SHE chose my daughter, not the other way around! And Stormy often slept in Delainey's bed, though occasionally she'd sleep in my other daughter's bed, guess she didn't want Allie feeling left out! And occasionally, Stormy would get out later at night and either come home in the middle of the night and wake us with her meowing...or she'd come waltzing in the next day when someone opened the door to go out.
Stormy liked watching the hamsters, and enjoyed perching on the desks to watch them in the respective cages. She also snuck into the guinea pig cages, which are left open.
To boot, she liked to play with the dogs. Which was a novelty for us, since our 15 year old cat wants nothing to do with animals. Please note, I did not say *other* animals. I don't think Smudge realizes she's a cat.
Stormy is sadly missed, it's going to be hard to find a cat with a similar personality.

Now, the really sad part: on Sunday, we visited the Humane Society in nearby Windsor, on the off-chance that someone had turned her in as a stray. I know there are always a lot of cats, since spaying and neutering both seem to be foreign terms to a lot of cat owners. So does responsibility. But I was still surprised. There were three rooms of cats/kittens that were not yet available for adoption: I am assuming these are the more recent strays that were being held (again, the word 'off-chance') in case their owners were looking for them. Those rooms were so loud! Almost every cat/kitten came to the front of their little cage and meowed loudly to get out. It just about broke my heart. That, and reading the labels on each cage: the majority of cages, under the term 'gender altered' had NO.
The fourth room of cats was considerably quieter. Most cats just laid there, like we were nothing special--not that we thought we were! But I'm thinking those were the cats that had been there long enough in those little cages that they were giving up hope of getting out. Unfortunately, none of them was Stormy.

I wanted so badly to rescue even two of them...but am still holding onto the hope that Stormy will be returned to us. At least there won't be little Stormy's running around in a few months. We adopted Stormy KNOWING we would be paying to have her spayed. Sure, it would have been wonderful letting my children see the miracle of birth (and some people use this as an excuse to have a litter of kittens), but I explained to my girls that the kittens might not find good homes. It was more responsible to prevent that.
As for the miracle of birth: if you REALLY want your children to witness that, breed mice or rats. Pet stores that sell supplies for reptiles and snakes would most likely take them off your hand. Sound cruel? It's life. And to me, a lot less cruel than someone abandoning a litter of kittens, or drowning them because that person didn't bother to spay their animal.