I'm reading a blog right now about two cats raising thirteen kittens, and potential adopters are apparently picking out kittens without ever meeting them, just saying "I want a black one" or "I want the tuxedo girl." Now, I used to understand why people pick out cats and kittens purely based on coloring and markings. I wanted a calico when I was little. But after having foster kittens, I would never pick out a kitten based on coloring alone anymore. Their personalities are so different. You have to find one whose personality works for you--then they will seem beautiful, no matter what they look like.

I think all these kittens are gorgeous. Albus, of course, has the wonderful lynx-point markings and haunting ice-blue eyes. Barnaby is sleek and mostly black, with a teardrop-shaped patch of white on the left side of his face that gives him a great rakish look. And Simon, the grey tabby, might seem average-looking at first, but he has a couple of secrets. If you look at him from the back, you see he has a hidden white stripe running up the back of his tail. And my favorite thing is that he has both black and white whiskers. I've never seen that on a cat before, just white ones.

My point is you can find something beautiful in every cat, especially if you know and love them. Oliver was a pretty common tabby-and-white, but he was the sweetest thing ever and I would have kept him in a heartbeat no matter what he looked like.

I took the cats to the vet yesterday. We still don't know what's wrong with Albus that he's got blood in his urine. The vet gave me permission to cut his medication by half because I think it's what's causing his diarrhea, so we'll see how that goes. The other two are having runny eyes, so I got eye drops for them, which of course they hate. And they're all on a new antibiotic to see if it works better against their colds.

Barnaby cracks me up--every time I get out the medication, he runs over to see what's going on. Then I grab him and medicate him and he hates it, and I'm like "well you shouldn't have been so curious!" (Of course I love that he's so curious.) The kittens also got weighed yesterday, and Barnaby is nearly a FULL POUND heavier than Albus. He's an Albus and a half! Simon is somewhere in-between, which always makes me smile because gray is between black and white. They really do look like an illustration of HTML color values when they're all in a row.

I had a migraine (STILL HAVE IT) and I couldn't take sleeping on the couch last night, so I slept in my room with the kittens. They make little squeaky noises in their sleep! So adorable. Also, I didn't have to deal with the guilty feeling I get when I close the door on them for the night and they're all looking at me like Y U LEAVING??

These kittens are all so nice. They have minimal problems with biting and scratching, probably because they have each other to play with. They all want petting-and-purring time to various degrees, which leads to some dilemmas since there are three kittens and I only have two hands. But it's nice to have such sweet kitties.

Pictures for your enjoyment:

Barnaby and Albus, chilling on their first day back:


[Image description: a tuxedo (black-and-white) kitten and a Siamese kitten, lying down next to a pair of knees wearing jeans.]

Simon sleepin':


[Image description: a gray kitten sleeping on a jeans-clad leg. Sunlight is shining from the window in back of the kitten, giving him a glowy look.]

Albus's wonderful eyes:


[Image description: closeup of a Siamese kitten's face, showing his pale blue eyes.]

As always, more at the flickr set.