Friday, May 29, 2026 - 10:15 PM

Fucking. Hell.

I...might have had him today. I might've had Gray IN MY ARMS today. Did he escape? Did he scramble out?

NO. I PUT HIM DOWN, BECAUSE I WASN'T SURE.

Violet and I were walking the neighborhood this afternoon. Vi caught sight of a kitty around a corner, and we stopped. He was just chilling in one of our neighbors' shaded driveway, hanging out and bold. We stared at the grey cat, he stared at us. I pulled my phone out, and played our kitties' lunch and dinnertime ringtone.

The cat ran right to us. We knelt, he was wary, but let us pet him, and rubbed his cheeks on my hand.

I scooped him up and stood. He was a grey cat. About the right size. Smaller than Gray was when last I saw him Monday, but in a "Maybe he lost weight" way, not in a "This cat's skeleton is smaller than mine's". His eyes were right. His face looked a bit short.

His ears.

His ears were the right shape and size, but I saw two blue dots inside each that looked like tattoos.

Now, I've looked inside Gray's ears for tattoos, and never seen anything. His history before his last owner before us is mysterious enough that I expected him to be marked as a neutered stray. Most of the TNR cats in Santa Clara County have a notched ear, and his ears are intact. But there's always other ways to mark a neutered cat, and ear tattoos is one of them.

Disappointed, I put the cat, who'd been very willing, and then begun to squirm, down. He trotted a few feet from us while we discussed, and I saw that he was a neutered boy, and that his backside looked a lot like my Gray's. He ducked under a car, and we talked ourselves back around to, "Maybe he IS our cat." But by that point, the cat had slipped off.

I'm so frustrated. That MIGHT'VE BEEN HIM. I MIGHT'VE HELD MY CAT TODAY. And I just set him down and let him go.

There're enough all-grey cats around that the only way we're really gonna be sure it's him is by getting his microchip scanned. But I'm kicking myself that I let go of that cat.

We're planning on bringing Gray to the vet when we get him back either way, to get him looked at, fluids as needed, deworm him, the whole deal. His vaccinations are fortunately very up to date.

But yeah. We ordered a pet microchip scanner that's to arrive tomorrow. Because I can't not know again. And like, Because it's not gonna be a super high end scanner, no result won't rule it being our boy out. But reading his microchip number WILL rule him IN.