I loves me some cats, as the saying goes. My family always had dogs growing up, but I thought cats were cooler even before I had one.

Here are some pics of the cats who've lived with us over the past 20 years.
Asuka was our first cat, and she adopted me as her person. A guy who worked for me found Asuka's mom and several kittens under his garage, and another guy who worked for me took them in and found homes for them all. She was all black with a single white whisker, but in some light she looked sable brown.
Asuka was pretty vocal about her likes & dislikes. She usually got what she wanted.
She was with us for 14 years. Her kidneys failed eventually, and when she was no longer able to eat, we took her to the vet for her last time. She taught me a lot, and I'm glad she was with us as long as she was.
One thing asuka didn't get was her wish to be an only cat. Our neighbors had a cat who looked like one of Debbie's childhood pets. One day, returning from a walk, we saw them driving off. They stopped and said they were moving out, and had to take the cat to the animal shelter because they couldn't keep her. They passed her to us through the car window, and when Asuka came to meet us after our walk, she freaked out when she saw the new addition. We named her Suzuko.
Suzuko was almost the exact opposite of Asuka. She was mellow and friendly to everyone. Her meow always went up in pitch, as if it were a question. Asuka like being near us, but Suzy wanted to be on us. She was with us constantly, and even attempted to befriend Asuka.

She lived about a year longer than Asuka, a long time for a cat. In the end, the vet found a tumor in her stomach that took her from us. She died shortly after surgery to remove it.
About a week after we lost Asuka, we went looking for another cat. We found Lan at the Local PetSmart. She was different from both of our other cats; quiet and shy. Though she loved attention, she would rarely come to us for it. Her previous home may not have been a good experience.
She was the last of our cats named after Rumiko Takahashi characters. Lan is Japanese for chaos, but she's been very unlike her name. She was a bit of a picky eater, and liked to have her food stirred several times in the morning.

This picture and the next are two of her frequent poses. She'd sit facing where she wanted you to go, then look back over her shoulder at you. You can also see some uneven spots in her fur here. Her coat was so thick that it occasionally picked up mats that were hard to comb out. She loved to be brushed, but hated when the comb would pull her fur, so sometimes I just gave up and clipped off some of the tougher tangles.

In August of 2006 I noticed one of her teats was swollen and dark red. The vet examined her and found it was a pretty aggressive form of cancer. He removed a big chunk of her mid-section, but warned us the cancer could come back. She took a month to fully recover from the surgery, and seemed to be fine, but we later felt several lumps in the same area. Since the vet told us there really wasn't much more he could do for her, we decided to make her comfortable and happy for as long as we could.
And here's how I remember her best: working the cute poses. After a very quick decline over a three week period, we knew it was time to let her go. She was only with us seven years, but she meant a lot to us during that time.
I called my boss, who lives two blocks away, to let him know I was going to take a snow day off. He said fine, but he also mentioned that there was a small kitten under his car, and that he was worried his dog was going to get hold of it. We offered to see what we could do, so his wife and daughter walked the snowy little beastie down to us. And that's how Harley, the lighter colored cat at right, joined the family. She came in, we dried her off, gave her some food, and she slept on Debbie's lap for a few hours. She still sleeps there when Debbie watches teevee.
Harley's outdoor life might have stunted her growth, because she still looks and sounds like a kitten. She's playful like one too.

We waited quite a while after losing Suzy before we looked for another cat. Lan and Harley were pretty quiet cats, so when we spotted Gracie at a local shelter, we were drawn to her because she talked non-stop. She'll carry on a conversation with us all day, and has gone from a gangly kitten to a large, muscular cat who needs to be the center of attention at all times.
These pictures of her with Harley were not Harley's idea. This is actually Gracie trying to nudge the other cat out of a spot she wants. She does the same with us; if we're in a chair she wants to herself, she'll climb up on us and get in our face trying to nudge us out too.
Lan never went for the nudging thing, so this is a pretty rare shot.