Xenia’s boyfriend John came over to visit yesterday afternoon.  Xenia and her John were looking at stuff on the computer and didn’t seem to be needing any of my attention so I laid down to take a short nap.  I awoke to find the my legs on the edge of the couch separating the dogs, who were on the floor, from a half grown cat I had never seen before on the couch.  The dogs were extremely interested in the cat bug weren’t big enough to jump over my legs onto the couch to make contact with the cat.  The cat seemed content with this arrangement.  My thought was, “This must be the cat Xenia’s John said he was going to get for his sister.  Okay, I’ll be the ‘castle wall’ for the cat.  I need to be careful not to crush it by moving my legs quickly.”  Xenia and her John were on the other side of the room talking in whispers and I didn’t pay them any attention as I tried to go back to sleep.  Xenia then told me in a normal voice, “I updated my Live Journal”.  “Okay”, I said, “I’ll look at it later when I get up.”  After a minute or two Xenia asked, “Do you like the cat?”  “Sure, it seems to be a nice cat.”  What did it matter to me?  I probably would never see it again after her John gave it to his sister.  A few more minutes passed.  “Can she stay?  Her name is Zandra.”  “No.”, was my immediate reply.  Why would she ask that?  This cat is for her John’s sister.  Probably 30 minutes later I got up and went downstairs to my computer.  I found this Live Journal posting from Xenia.  Zandra was a birthday present to Xenia from her John.

To make a long story short Barb and I ended up giving her three choices:

1. She could keep her cat or she could keep her John (only mentioned to get her attention of how serious we were).
2. We would call her John’s parents and explain that John had not asked US about Xenia getting another cat.  They would be asked to come and get the cat.
3. She could take trigonometry next year and do really good job and not complain about hating math (she dropped it on the second day of class this year).

She chose option 3 amid apologies and tears.  We weren’t and aren’t upset with Xenia but her John really stepped into it.  That was a major blunder on his part.

She is a nice cat.  She is laying on my lap purring as I type this…

Update: It turns out Xenia asked her John to not ask us if she could have the cat.  It appears John wasn’t the “bad guy” here.  More consultation with Barb is needed before we partake on a final course of action.  Xenia got herself into trouble on this one.

Xenia renamed the cat “Zanitia”.  I’m thinking perhaps it should be “Xenia’s Folly”, or perhaps “Albatross”.