My cat Claude had just died suddenly at age 9 from an aneurysm and I was searching petfinder.com daily for a cat of similar breed since Claude had such a sweet "purrsonality." I found a cat named Ira in Columbus, Indiana that was so beautiful and his description said he was very sweet too. I knew this was the cat for me. My husband at the time could not believe I wanted to drive over five hours to adopt a cat, but I insisted and we went to meet Ira. When they brought him out of his cage he climbed on my shoulder, started "talking" to me and even gave me a smooch. They told us that when they found him he was not neutered, flea infested, and had ear mites (not to mention it was January and extrememly cold). When we got him home we took him to our veterinarian who discovered he also had a wound on his leg that he believed was an animal bite that had become abcessed. By the time we got him all healed up we figured that including the trip to get him, adoption fees, and vet bills, he cost around $500.00. I knew that I could have bought a purebred cat for that money but Smoochie (we changed his name) is one-of-a-kind and definitely worth every penny.

Joanna Baron
Benwood, WV