Here’s something new I learned today. In case you’ve ever wondered …

Did you know that one cat can produce 420,000 descendents in a seven-year period? I just happened to read that statistic on the wall of the mobile vet we visited today. We took our last cat to be spayed this morning, thus ending our saga, “The Tale of Three Kittens.”

Two years ago, a friend let us adopt her three kittens, a male and two female siblings. We thought it would be fun to let our kids enjoy one litter of kittens. HA! Well, that’s an understatement. We had several litters, and it got to be a full-time job for me finding homes for these kittens. They were cute and fluffy — but the situation got a little out of control.

When I was trying to find homes for our litter last summer, one lady who was interested in a new kitten called me to chat. Within a few minutes, it was clear that she was grieving. Her family pet had recently died, and she wanted to tell me all her favorite stories of the amazing things her cat did.

I’m not much of a phone talker at this stage in life — unless it involves what child needs to be picked up at what time where. Listening to a stranger tell me stories about her cat was too much. At the time I was trying to cook dinner with five children screaming in the background.

It’s interesting where all these little kittens live now — we gave many away to family and friends. One of my cousins sends me snapshots of her two — as if I were their grandmother. Now there’s a thought.

So I just finished giving our calico cat (named “Calla” of course) her antibiotics, as she recovers from surgery. Did I tell you I’ve gotten pretty good at administering medicine to cats? Our two mama cats both got mastitis this summer, poor things. They needed antibiotics for a week. It’s actually much easier to squirt pink stuff down a cat’s throat than to entice a toddler with pink “yukky” medicine on a spoon. Don’t you think?

I’m tired. I just got back last night from a looooong trip to Maryland. I wanted to blog, but I didn’t want to think — so there you have my 420,000 cats post. Maybe that’s something you can share at your next dinner party.