The internal happiness that left me with the passing of Boney Girl and Xena has been mostly restored. After nearly 9 catless months, we got a refill. A local shelter was offering $10 adoptions. I have never taken a shelter cat before. I would be happy with any of them, but could not myself choose one over another. Seemed like all my friends were drowning and I only had room on my small raft to rescue one. So I had my wife select. We brought home a 3 year old tortie that had been surrendered by previous owner. Stated reason for surrender is house soil. There must have been some other problem because here she found her litter box by herself and uses it. Ziva (I call her Zee) is affectionate, curious, playful and does not have a tortitude. She has a wonderful tortinality. She is beautifully marked with lots of lighter color on her underside. Not sure how you measure a tail. Hers is longer than a 12 inch ruler. It is so nice to have paws in our house again.