The Oliver Kitty Chronicles

I haven't had a kitten in the house in 17 years.

17 years without destruction of property and frayed nerves.

I thought I was prepared for this. I was wrong.

Oliver is rambunctious, obnoxious and needs to be taught manners. The lovable, adorable kitten we adopted from the shelter has been transformed into Devil Kitty.

He can squeeze into tiny spaces, which he does quite frequently. Here he is under our coffee table. I've discovered that his beautiful sky blue eyes make him look possessed in photos taken with a flash.

Our first couple of days with Oliver were as I expected. The original plan was to keep him separated in my son's bedroom until Flower, the resident Queen Kitty, got used to him being around. He escaped on the first day and all hell broke loose. She hissed, screeched, swatted and pounced. He hid under my bed. We got him back in his safe room and Flower took up residence outside the gate.

We called it Kitty TV. This picture was taken on the morning of day three. We actually started letting Oliver explore the house on day two while Flower was napping. On day three I took the gate down and let him loose. I haven't used the gate since. After the initial cat fight they seemed to be doing okay. There was still a lot of hissing and swatting but they need to work it out.

Oliver is a bundle of energy. When he's awake he never stops moving. We spend as much time as possible playing with him. He's also a biter so we need to teach him how to behave. He tried to use our speakers as a scratching post (I've turned them around so they now face the wall). I forgot what it's like to have a kitten!

He's adorable when he's doing this.

Seriously, he's adorable all the time but he is a handful. We've affectionately nicknamed him Spaz. Last night (day five) his behavior was horrible. He wouldn't leave Flower alone. He chased her around the house for a couple of hours. She was so stressed out she hid in the basement. My daughter and I tried to give her a break by playing ball with him. He didn't finally settle down for good until after 10:00 pm.  I started to regret adopting him. And that made me feel guilty. It's not like I rushed into this. I did a lot of thinking before I made the decision to adopt again. I just forgot what it's like to have a kitten. I went to bed with a heavy heart thinking that maybe we'd made a mistake.

Day Six: Today he's being nice. 

He kept me company while I got ready in the bathroom this morning. He batted around the Q-tip I threw on the floor to keep him occupied. Flower seemed to tolerate him this morning too. When I got home from running my errands I was surprised to see this.

Relaxed kitties - no stress, no swatting, no hissing. Flower is dozing on her blanket. Oliver is only a foot away and he's behaving himself. He pawed at her a few times but she didn't seem to care. He wants to be her friend. She doesn't want an obnoxious male kitten constantly following her around. Shortly after this pic was taken, he came and settled onto my lap while I was at the computer. He's trying to redeem himself.

How can I not love this little face? I wonder what's up with the one closed eye. Maybe he's thinking of new ways to torment us.