For Bridget 2: Maggie the Village des Valeurs Kitten

For Bridget  2
The Story of Maggie the Village des Valeurs Kitten

As I mentioned yesterday, my girlfriend Bridget used to have a male Siamese Tonkinese cat called Sasha. After a long illness, she had to have him put down.

She recently saw a Siamese kitten in a pet store and was thinking of buying him. Like an idiot, I was guilty of being an unsupportive boyfriend. Granted, I probably had logic on my side, but I wasn't really considering the emotional side of it, how much Bridget missed Sasha. Long story short, by the time that Bridget had done her due diligence and was ready to buy the kitten and take her home, the kitten had already been sold.

Immediately, I felt terrible. Valentine's Day was coming up, so I asked Rusty Shackles to do a piece for me similar to what I had asked Mike Holmes to do. After some haggling, Rusty agreed although I sensed he was less than enthusiastic about drawing a blue rose.

At the same time, I was scouring the internet for Siamese or Tonkinese kittens or young cats that needed to be rescued near Montreal. (Logic be damned!) Bridget and I were talking about visiting some pet shelters.

Then Maggie came into our lives.

This is Maggie.

Bridget is a Production Supervisor in a Village des Valeurs, the thrift store chain better known as Value Village or Savers. A couple walked into her store with a cage, walked into the furniture section, looked around furtively and abandoned the cage with a long-haired gray female kitten inside. The cage was dirty and stunk of cigarette smoke and the kitten was thin but friendly.

Bridget took the kitten to her vet and had her checked out. The vet pronounced her a healthy but under-nourished five month old kitten, so Bridget took her home and named her Maggie. She was kept isolated from the other animals for a few weeks until she could be neutered and some final medical procedures and tests could be performed. That was done on Valentine's Day and Maggie is now roaming around Bridget's house getting on the nerves of the other cats and delighting Luka.

As soon as Bridget told me about Maggie, I asked Rusty to include her in the drawing which he was delighted to do. In part I suspect, because it allowed him to jettison the blue rose from the picture.

Maggie pouncing on an unsuspecting Tyson

Again, not a bad likeness of Tyson, given that Rusty has never seen him, but it is startling how close Rusty got to drawing Maggie (including her yellow eyes) when my only description of her was a long-haired gray kitten.

Maggie!!

Mucho thanks to Rusty Shackles for the drawing (visit his site!) and maybe Friday, I will show you the pencil stage of the drawing and the ink stage (and next week maybe I will write about what I sent to Rusty to thank him for the drawing.)