Library Mews: Vitamin

Name: Vitamin

Age: 13

Coloration / Breed:

Domestic shorthair (gray & white)

Place of Origin:

A snowbank in St. Paul, MN

Adopted by:

Patrick Wallace, Digital Projects & Archives Librarian

Favorite Toy:

Prisms

Special Talents:

He will aggressively try to steal food from humans, but only if they are eating Jell-o. He once ate more than half an 8x8 baking pan of Berry Blue that was left unattended on the counter.

Fun facts:

Vitamin has expended at least two of his lives. The first during late-kittenhood, when he was found wandering outside during a winter storm. Air temps had lingered below -30 degrees for consecutive days, and Vitamin was severely frostbitten on his face and paw pads, but recovered quickly once Patrick decided to adopt him. Some months later, he swallowed over two dozen 1” foam discs, resulting in multiple, inoperable digestive blockages. Patrick took over two weeks off of work to nurse him, helping him drink with a syringe when he could no longer walk or lift his head. When all hope seemed lost, Vitamin suddenly jumped to his feet and miraculously (if messily) expunged the near-fatal meal, again making a complete recovery.

When he discovered the freezing kitten, Patrick had just returned from a Kraftwerk concert and was still humming one of the band’s new singles, “Vitamin”. Vitamin also answers to several nicknames and variations, including “Buzzer”, “Vitamizzle”, “Mizzle”, and “Captain Buzz McVitafluzzer”.

In 2015, Vitamin entered comfortable retirement at his kittenhood home in Minnesota, after several years of exploring the world with his keeper.

If he had a library card…

Vitamin would use interlibrary loan to borrow Opticks: or, a Treatise of the Reflections, Refractions, Inflections and Colours of Light by Isaac Newton. After his sole encounter with a laser pointer, Vitamin developed an interest in the science of light. Long study led him to the discovery that shadows are caused by objects partially blocking a light source, and - later on - that any number of objects (and the people holding them) could be manipulated to produce chase-able reflections and shadows.

Follow the series

Each month we’ll feature a new staff cat. To keep up with this series, use the link go/librarymews/. If you were hoping to find library news, please visit go/librarynews/.