One time, Mary and I saw a stray cat walking around the neighborhood, took her in, and later discovered that our new arrival was pregnant. Judy, a brown-pointed tabby, had five kittens: a gray tabby, an orange tabby, a tortoiseshell, and two medium haired calicos: Tuffy, a muted calico, and Li’l Linda, a bright-colored calico.

(Sadly, I can’t seem to find pictures of them, so you’ll just have to take my word for it.)

The care of a long- or medium-hair cat requires that the cat be brushed at least once a day, sometimes more, or their hair gets matted and tangled and, if it gets very bad, needs to be shaved off. Which is fine, if you can get the cat to sit still long enough to be brushed. Which, unfortunately, we weren’t able to do with Tuffy and Linda. They were born apparently believing that humans…