Saturday, October 14, 2006

Cat fancy ...




Ah, kittens. Lovable, adorable little balls of fluff. Even those who are allergic to them, who may even hate the grown-up versions, usually manage to find a soft spot for the cuddly critters.

Wade Pilloud, a school principal in the small Minnesota town of Indus, says he loves kittens too. Has even raised them for a living, and owns two cats himself, he also says. That's why he shot two kittens on the property of the school he works at.

Or, rather, worked at. Pilloud resigned after word got out of his shooting spree, and he may face firearm charges for what he said was a humane act. Seems that the young kittens' mommy had been killed by an animal trap. The babies, he says, were starving.

For the parents of some of the school's students, that rationale wasn't good enough. They raised safety concerns, and the fact that some of the kids heard the gunshots probably didn't help either. So Pilloud is out of a job and maybe, eventually, his freedom.

I have a question. Did it ever go through Pilloud's mind that the best remedy for hungry kittens may not have been a bullet between the eyes, but rather - and I'm just wondering out loud - SOME MILK???!

Some people should not be allowed around our children. Or our cats.

Note: None of the kittens in these pictures were shot or otherwise harmed. At least, not that I know of.

1 comment:

Beth said...

I dunno, Dave. That cat on the right in the last picture looks like it might be seeing a firearm.

What a crazy story. I'm sure the possibility didn't exist that he could put the kittens in a box with a little blankie inside, and write "Free kittens" on the box, and someone could have taken them home and cared for them. Nope, the only possible solution to the problem was execution.

Good grief.