Name: Toester

Age: 3. He was born in March of 2004, under Chris’ old bedroom window in the bushes.

Breed: Gray tabby

Nicknames: Toesty, Toes, Toast, Little Guy, Big Guy, Toestest with the Mostest

Adoption Story: Toester was in Mama’s last (viable) litter, and he was one of two surviving kitties. We took him in, along with Mama Bear and Vincent, in the summer of 2004.

Issues: Crazed howling, weaning issues (sucks toes and fingers), Oedipal complex

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As the only cat that we’ve actually known since he was born, Toester holds a privileged spot as the ‘kitten’ of the bunch.

Toester was born in March of 2004, in the bushes under Chris’ bedroom window. Toester had two sisters– we originally adopted one of them (who we named Velveeta Nescafe), but she escaped and was happily adopted by a neighbor’s babysitter; the other, a little black kitty and the runt of the litter, was a sweetheart who ‘disappeared,’ likely eaten by a raccoon or other predator.

Toester is Vincent’s son. At least, we think so. You see, shortly after we officially took in The Family, I took Vincent and Toester to get neutered. The morning of their de-balling, the vet did an exam. He felt up Toester, no problem. He starts poking and prodding Vince and announces to me, “This cat has already been neutered.”

“Impossible!” I cried. “He’s Toester’s dad. They look exactly alike.” The vet went so far as to shave Vince’s nether regions and confirm that Vince had the scar of a neutered cat.

We refuse to believe that Toester isn’t related to Vince, so, for all intents and purposes, we’ll call them father and son. Seriously, look at this picture. They’re mirror images, and they are absolutely inseparable.

Anyhow, when it came time to name this kitty, it was easy to characterize him by his four white feet. But ‘Mittens,’ ‘Socks,’ ‘Boots,’ and the like seemed too easy. So, out of the blue, I came up with Toester. It was my one moment of genius for the decade.

Having lived the first 6 months of his life outside with very little human interaction, Toester is the most skittish of the bunch. He’s very easily scared, especially when he senses that something about our routine is out of whack. When Toester gets scared, he howls. There’s no other way to describe it. It’s a deep, long, pitiful howling. Then he runs and hides on top of the kitchen cabinets. If Chris and I are packing for a trip, Toester howls. If there are strangers in the house, especially in the morning, he howls. When we get in the pool, Toester howls and howls and hides in the corner.

Toester has several modes of communication, in fact. The deep howling is reserved for extreme fear. He also has a morning caterwauling he’s particularly fond of, especially at 6 or 7 in the morning. He bounces around the patio and runs from ghosts as he cries and caterwauls for all of our neighbors to enjoy. When Toester’s in ‘baby mode’ and wants to be petted, he has a squeaky, high-pitched, girly ‘mew’ that he repeats incessantly until he is sufficiently loved upon.

He’s partial to Chris’ affection, I think because Chris is more aggressive with his petting and I think that makes Toester feel safe. When Chris rolls Toester onto his back to pet his stomach and manhandle him, Toester becomes completely frozen, with his tail curled up against his stomach– just like a kitten does when the mama cat carries it by the scruff of the neck.

Indeed, Toester has a bit of a kitten complex. He was weaned too early, so he has a tendency to suck on people’s toes and fingers as though it were a nipple. Also, since he doesn’t seem to realize that Mama Bear is his mother, he chases her and tries to mount her sometimes, hence the Oedipal complex. Gross.

Toester’s our baby kitten and we’re so happy we were able to give him a loving and safe home.