So a while ago, down in Alabama, Kate's mother found a teeny, skin-and-bones scrap of a kitten in her bushes.
She took him in, and nursed him back to health, and she really fell in love with him.
Unfortunately, she's 84 and not in very good health herself (though she's still living alone and needing not a lot of help). And kittens have pointy things attached, which they're liable to deploy, as often as not accidentally, and she just couldn't deal with him.
(Also there was a mockingbird that had staked out her back yard as his territory, and he particularly didn't want cats in it - especially cats that probably didn't weigh much more than he did. So the kitten would only go out to play in the back yard if there was a human watching over him...)
So we went down for her birthday (2 July), and, when we came home Thursday, Chip (named for the black mark on his nose) came home with us.
He's a tiny little rascal, quite friendly. He and Rocket are off to a somewhat uncertain start... There has been a bit of hissing and witch-cat posing.
(Personally, i'd have named him "Charlie".)