Guinevere 
It seems horribly unfair to you, dear reader, that I should write nothing for long months at a time, only to come back and dump another pet's obituary in your lap. I apologize for that, but writing about it makes me feel better. A year before we married, The Love of My Life and I visited the local animal shelter to find a companion for my cat, King Arthur. There, we found a room-sized cage with a few dozen kittens inside. We sat down, and waited to see who would introduce themselves. One cat approached boldly. He climbed up onto my shoulders and declared himself King of the Mountain, hissing at any other kitten who dared approach. "This is the one!" I said. Happily, my wife-to-be was (and is) much wiser than I. She gently pointed out that I needed a cat who could get along with other cats, and this one didn't seem likely to play nice. So we sent that cat packing, and looked for other possibilities. A tiny kitten shyly approached. She was gray, with a stubby little tail to match her small frame. But she was friendly, and seemed to get along with the other kittens. So we chose her, and I named her Guinevere. The shelter workers estimated she was only six weeks old. They told us she had been abandoned outside their door a couple weeks prior. In the lobby, I placed Guinevere gently on the counter so I could sign her adoption papers. She promptly walked off the edge and fell to the floor. She wasn't injured, but I had an inkling that she might not be the smartest cat I've ever met. What Guinevere lacked in brains, she made up for in beauty. Much to our surprise, she grew to be a longhaired cat with a magnificent tail. She also had a voluptuous figure and a strut that would have done Mae West proud. As she grew, it became clear that she had a great deal of Maine Coon in her genes. Guinevere was a dedicated lap cat. She would curl up, purr loudly, and suckle on her leg. The vet said she did that because she was separated from her mother too soon. He also said she would grow out of it. 17 years later, she was still suckling on that same leg. Maybe if she had lived longer, she would have given it up. Probably not. When my wife and I moved in together, we combined our cat families. I had two, she had four. Guinevere was the youngest of those original six, and the last of them. As tends to happen to older cats, she suffered from kidney failure. Today, we took her to the vet for the last time. | 
