Pussy in peril.
Note: Lacks LOLs and puns and is highly likely to be tl;dr

I had travelled to Cardiff for some meeting or other. When it had finished, it transpired that one of my colleagues – who I’d only met briefly once before – and I were going to be getting the same train back. Louise was going to Hereford, me to Crewe.

We got to the station platform just in time to see our train accelerating out of sight, leaving us with an hour to kill until the next one. As unappealing as station buffets are, it was better than standing on a windswept platform, so we went in for a coffee.

About twenty minutes into our wait, a large family bundled into the room, speaking loudly with Irish accents and looking like they’d just come from tarmacking over some lucky heather. One of the children was a little girl of about four years old who was carrying a tiny black and white kitten. I say “carrying” but she was actually holding the kitten up by gripping its front paws between her thumbs and forefingers and bouncing it up and down like you would when trying to make a doll ‘dance’.

I’m not normally squeamish, but watching this was turning my stomach so I suggested to Louise that we might be better waiting outside. I’d considered confrontation – very briefly – but given the belligerent vibes being given off by the adult members of the family, my fat yellow streak had taken over.

Of course, once we were outside, the mental image of the poor kitten wouldn’t leave me and nor, it would appear, Louise.

“How much money do you have on you?” she asked. Once the moths had flown out of the coin pocket of my wallet and the portrait of the Queen had stopped blinking at the bright light, I determined that I had five one pound coins.

“Right,” she said. “Give them to me, we’re going to buy that kitten.”

And with that she marched back into the buffet and started telling the matriarch of the family some bullshit story about the kitten being the spitting image of her recently-deceased and much-beloved moggie, and would they be prepared to sell the kitten?

“Ah well, it cost me fifty pounds,” announced the Pikey princess.

“I only have five,” countered Louise.

“Ah, go on then,” came the reply. I was happy to see that no spitting on and shaking of hands to seal the deal was required as the kitten was unceremoniously grabbed from the young girl and thrust into Louise’s hands.

Once we’d taken our leave and retreated outside, Louise turned to me and asked, “Do you want a cat? I have two dogs and they hate cats.”

And so it was that I found myself on a three hour train journey with a kitten that preferred to be held than kept in the makeshift carrier of an empty frozen chip box donated by the buffet manageress. At Crewe station my wife met me and we transferred the kitten to a proper cat carrier ready for a trip to the vet for a check-up.

Aside from being only about six weeks old and a bit under-nourished, probably from being separated too early from its mother, the only thing the vet could find wrong with the kitten was that her front shoulder joints were stiff, almost certainly from being put under strain by the ‘dancing’.

And then when we got the kitten home, it fell out with our cat, so we had to dump it on the in-laws, whose own cat had recently died.

Fifteen years later, Rosie the cat is still around. She can still jump on top of the kitchen cupboards but doesn’t really like going outside any more.

tl;dr – rescued kitten finds loving home.
( Snappyuk gets BIGGER with free sample., Thu 9 May 2013, 16:51, 7 replies)

Well done
but you should have named it Thelma.
( edjogs Collared doves are shit., Thu 9 May 2013, 17:01, closed)

Or dag.
( Je suis un vagabond is an unfunny, up your own arse middle class knob, Thu 9 May 2013, 17:03, closed)

I thought the term "pikey" had fallen out of favour.
A trip back to Kent swiftly disabused me of that notion, as "pikey cunt" still appears to be the epithet of choice, in my home town.
( monster munch person, man, woman... camera... TV?, Thu 9 May 2013, 17:18, closed)

That was good, and a good read too.

( fred zeppelin II: Electric Boogaloo, Thu 9 May 2013, 18:14, closed)

Thanks for sharing...

(Master_Slob UK minister for cultural appropriation., Thu 9 May 2013, 19:53, closed)

Ah!
Love a good kitteh saving story. Both my cats and my dog are rescue animals. When furry karma comes your way, you juts have to embrace it. Well done you.
(Woofie, Fri 10 May 2013, 15:50, closed)

You deprived a poor gypsy child of her lunch

( 2 Can Chunder Word to your mums, I came to prod bums, Fri 10 May 2013, 18:51, closed)