It was during San Francisco's Summer of Love that he first showed up in our Backyard. (Don't you just hate it when you have an unannounced visitor?)

Well, anyway, there we were having breakfast one Saturday morning—we looked out—and there he was!

Since we had some eggs left over, my wife being the waste not - want not kind of girl decided we should see if he was hungry.

"You know... He's kinda cute for such a little guy," she said. Those whiskers really make him look sort of debonair."

"Yeah, well he needs a shave," I said, peeved that the Love of my life was paying a bit too much attention to him.

"Aw... ," she laughed. "My hubby's jealous... ?"

"You know... , with all those hippies roaming around—we could end up with a whole backyard full of them," I warned.

"Honey, you're just being hostile!" she accused, with a disarming little smile.

Coming back up from having done her good deed for the day, she happily filled me in.

"Honey... ," she said sadly, "He spent last night sleeping underneath the Stairway overhang."

"Well, I hope you told him not to get too comfortable," I whined. "I know charity begins at home; but even thinking of letting him stick around is ridiculous."

"Why don't we go down, spend some time with him?" my wife suggested. "It might be kind of nice to have some company around for a couple of days."

(About now - I'm not liking the sound of that!)

"Well, I went down and met him... tried to talk to him. Never did figure out what language he was speaking. Besides, he was a first class low talker.

"Okay... , Buddy," I finally said out of exasperation. "We're just going to call you Mr. Whiskers. That okay with you?"

He looked up. Made an unintelligible sound... Hell... , I have no idea what he said; or whether he even agreed or not. At that point, we decided to let Mr. Whiskers stick around for maybe a couple of days until he could find other quarters.

"Just for a couple of days," I warned him.

He made some weird sound. I'll bet he just called me a bad name, I thought.

"Damn!!" I thought, I'm old-fashioned. All I can speak is English with a few words in Chinese, Japanese. I'm pretty sure he isn't speaking any of those.

My wife - the Outfitter

Next morning my sweet wife has an idea.

"You know Hon... , all he has is what he was wearing when he showed up here. How about loaning him a pair of your Corduroys?"

Okay, I'll admit it. About now, I'm getting used to having Mr. Whiskers around. He really was not a bad sort. Besides, I'm starting to feel generous or something...

I checked in on him a day or so later and darned if he hadn't ruined my nice Cords. Had one pants leg shredded from the knee up and was diligently working on the other one.

What the heck has he been doing, I said to myself. However, I ask you—how can you be mad at Someone you've come to enjoy.

Mr. Bob to the Rescue

Mr. Bob, our good neighbor living next door to us was retired and living alone. The day he met Mr. Whiskers, they both realized they had identified a kindred spirit.

Besides, with Mr. Whiskers living over at Mr. Bob's, he would have a special room indoors. A match made in heaven, my wife and I decided.

Not that there was any deciding for us to do. Mr. Bob and Mr. Whiskers had already made that decision without once checking with us. Don't you know... about then, we were starting to feel so unnecessary!

It's great when two guys hit it off, and those two fellows did. Oft times when we walked by Mr. Bob's big picture window; there the two of them would be. I think Mr. Whiskers felt like he had found a home. He seemed to like to nap a lot.