This is how it starts. You hear the kitteh a few days ago. It is meowing outside one of your lounge room windows. It is meowing at whatever is under the house. When you go outside, and lie on the ground, feeling all of your years, you see a pair of eyes shining back at you once your eyes adjust to the dark ... no, two sets of eyes. Are these the parents of the kitteh? One of them is black. You wonder if it's the same one you see running across your yard several times a week.

But this little tacker, you haven't seen before. You're not much of a guesser of kitteh ages, having only ever owned one cat in your adult life. Your family had cats when you were younger, but you can't remember much about them. The most you remember is being forced to cohabit with a snobby snotty half-Persian who you did not like because she would not purr and snuggle and do puss-like things with you the way the other kittehs you had when you were a child did. But you would hazard this little puss is about 12 weeks old. Maybe even younger. It's a pritteh kitteh. Grey and white fur with blue eyes. Maybe it belongs to the houseful of kittehs that live about 5 doors down, and it's now forgotten its way home. You and Lester met the Mummy of those kittehs a week or so ago. She ran towards Lester flat stick and whatcked him across the nose with her paw as he approached. Just so he knew not to mess with her kittens, which were all lolling around the front yard, about six of them. He didn't learn anything from it, unfortunately. Indeed, last time you drove past the house he barked very loudly. Just so she knows he didn't take her attack on board.

Maybe this kitteh belongs there. You dont know. But it's the second day it's been hanging around. And so you feel sorry for it, you know? You leave it a couple of small pieces of shredded cheese on the front step. Not particurly good for cats, you know. So half an hour later you open the cupboard, open the tin of sardines, and put some of them in a plastic container and leave them out near the opening where you last saw the kitteh crawl out from under the house. They are gone the next time you look 10 minutes later.

Kitteh runs away every time you call it. It is curious though, and peeks inside when you leave the door open, walks right in for a few seconds but then bolts when it sees you lying on the couch. But again, an hour later, it does it again. You can see it wants to come to you but it can't override its instincts. Maybe you shouldn't feed the kitteh anymore. Maybe tonight was just to give it some chow in case it hasn't eaten for a few days and is hungry. Because you don't want to encourage it, even though you really want to encourage it. Because there is no problem indulging in this sort of behaviour when Lester is at Mark's, but Lester will at some point return.

Funny, you've been entertaining the notion over the past few months of getting a cat. You just haven't been able to work out a death-proof method to ascertain whether the meeting would be a mutually life enhancing one. How do you determine whether your dog would not eat your kitteh? Would not mistake it for an overgrown hairy mouse? Because God knows, when you had a mouse infestation when you lived in Footscray, he went nuts. Came into his own. You didn't believe he could move so fast, but some long dormant instincts of some doggish ancestry came to the fore and he hunted those poor mice down. Masterfully. But you don't like to think of those memories. It was gross.

So yes. Maybe that first meal needs to be how it stops.

Shame, though. It's real cute :)