A rare moment of (literal) fluff.

Hello, my loves, and apologies for my prolonged silence; my husband and I were out of town for a short vacation last week, and, unsurprisingly, my blogging has suffered.

In other news:

This is Rufus. Rufus is one of a pair of abandoned cats my husband and I adopted from the Northeast Animal Shelter in Salem, MA this weekend. Rufus is also the fattest cat I have ever met. He weighs 26 pounds. I did not intentionally seek out this gigantic cat, but rather we chose him and his sister for their easygoing personalities and overall friendliness (the simpler to introduce them to the remaining Lord Cat of our household, a 13-year-old Maine Coon mix). In fact, I didn’t even realize how very fat Rufus really was until we got him home. He waddles. He’s sort of bowlegged. He has trouble cleaning himself properly. Rufus is going to need some additional help, particularly in the grooming arena. It’s very strange how assumptions about weight even bleed through to our relationships with animals (some other interesting thoughts on the subject can be found here); I have no idea how Rufus got so fat, and I have no idea whether a regular diet (the same as the other cats get) and increased activity (the same as they other cats get) he’ll get any smaller. Currently, he’s a bit like a watermelon with legs. I may very well have signed myself up for regular cat-butt-wiping duty for the next eight years or so.

(Some of you are recoiling in horror right now, I know. Meanwhile, those of you with cats are nodding sagely, because you understand.)

And I’m okay with that. Because he’s just the sweetest, most love-hungry cat I’ve ever met.

Whew. I made a whole post without getting into anything heavy. This is a first. Share your fat-cat pictures and stories in comments, if you’ve got ‘em.

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