(my new “Freudian Sips” mug, ha!)

A good chunk of my readers probably saw what happened this week if they know me on Facebook. For the rest of the group, it has been cat-drama-central here in April!

So remember back when I said Jojo needed to go back to the Cat Cafe because he was really aggressive toward our cats? Well, that same day, we decided to give him another week’s trial. With no improvement, we took him back to the Cafe on April 2nd, the day after Atticus came home with us. I saw him again on the 3rd when I went to do Yoga With Cats. He was cuddly but eventually bit my wrist to tell me he was done with me, and went to play with the other kitties for the rest of the night. That’s the devil I’d come to know and love, heh. I thought he was adjusting well, and despite still feeling guilty and heartbroken about our decision, I was okay. Until a week later.

Last Tuesday, I suddenly received a bunch of cancellation notices for former yoga classes at the Cafe. Then my friend Stephanie, who goes to yoga with me, said that all classes were off the calendar until July. She wrote them on Facebook to see what was up, but didn’t get an answer that day. I started doing research around lunchtime that day, and saw that oddly, there were a bunch of negative reviews up on their FB page all of a sudden. They were all from former employees, making allegations about the Cafe. Some of the allegations I know to be true, others appeared to be exaggerations and didn’t tally with what I had experienced firsthand, and still others hinted at a possible Animal Care Services investigation with seizure of the cats.

(Jojo and Atticus)

This sent me into a panic. Jojo had only been back at the Cafe for a week, and I worried that we’d sent him back into an unsuitable environment, plus if he went to ACS he could very well be euthanized if not adopted in 30 days. Extremely distressing! Jason felt equally distressed, and he suggested we go pick him up from the Cafe and take him home again, just to get him away from all the mess, no matter how true or untrue everything was. He wrote to the owner and asked if we could pick him up, and she readily agreed. I went right then and there, spoke with the owner a bit (who told me her side of the story, allegations against former employees that had some truth and some exaggeration, as one might expect from both sides of a problem), and brought Jojo home.

The Cat Cafe is currently closed for the next month, and they have that time to get themselves in order. They’re under investigation and have several citations for code and health violations, plus they need to thin out their cat population and get the cats healthy before they can open their doors again. Frankly, I’m not sure I’m going to go there anymore, even if they can get themselves in order. Jojo came home with an upper respiratory infection and having lost over half a pound in the week he was there. We’re having to nurse him back to health all over again. As much as I loved the idea of the Cafe and grew to love the kitties there, I think I need to pull my support over to a different no-kill shelter that has better resources, management, and ability to care for rescue-cats.

In the meantime, Jojo is back home again, at least temporarily. We don’t know how it will work out long term, and we might be looking for a different home for him. We’re taking it one day at a time, focusing right now on getting him healthy again. Sigh.