Adopting A 23-Pound Cat: A Nevin Barich Blog Experience

OK, so I know I promised that this week I would begin my two-part series about my amazing Christmas gift from my wife Ramona, which involved both first-class travel to Chicago and TICKETS TO SEE THE GREEN BAY PACKERS AT LAMBEAU FIELD!!!! And I promise that such blogs will be coming very, very soon.

However, this week has found Ramona and I to make a big decision regarding our household. It's something we've talked about for a while now, having been married for nearly 2 1/2 years. Having a household all to ourselves has been nice, but we both agreed that at times the house seems a bit empty and that maybe the time is right to add a new member to our family.

So this week, we took the leap...

...and adopted a cat.

:-)

But not just any cat. As I write this blog, the newest member of the Barich household, Beans, is currently hiding in the back of my closet, a little timid of her new parents and surroundings. We expected this, and we expect her to leave the closet at some point.

But when she does, it may take her a while...

...because Beans weighs 23 pounds.

Twenty-three pounds. Yep, our new cat is fat. A fat cat. She don't move very fast, and in truth she hasn't moved much since we met her this morning. And if I'm being totally honest, hearing about how big she was initially raised my eyebrows. But then I found out more about Beans: About how her previous owner has passed away. About she's been at the shelter for six months, longer than any other cat. About how other potential owners -- maybe of them elderly -- decided not to adopt her because...well, they just couldn't lift her!

All of this made me and Ramona sad. So while there were other cats out there -- younger, thinner felines -- we decide to adopt the 5-year-old fat one.

I've been a cat owner for approximately 87 minutes. But so far, so good. I have all of her essentials set up -- food, water, litter box, toys -- I didn't drop her while she was in the carrying case, and I even didn't freak out when she got cat hair all over my pants!

Yep, I think this is gonna work out OK. :-)

Ramona, meanwhile, is ecstatic. She's the cat lover in the relationship. She's wanted a cat for a while now and for some reason fell in love with the idea of adopting a big old fatty (not sure why, but to each their own). So for me, it's win-win. I have a happy wife and a cat that I rescued from the glue factory (do they send cats to the glue factory?).

Now technically, we're not Beans' official parents yet. We're just "foster parents" until we decide officially that we want to keep her. But in our minds, there's no debate. Beans is a keeper. And once she ventures out of the closet, I think she's going to like her new home.

Besides...

...Beans' colors are silver and black.

Raiders colors.

That's a good omen.

:-)

And now for this week's:

SIGN OF THE APOCALYPSE

Snooki is becoming a boxing promoter.

Perhaps the Mayans were right about 2012...