All you need to know about Mo: a photo essay.

We asked our cat to hang on through Christmas. We’re now a few day away from the Fourth of July.

BK is increasingly fragile on her slow march toward the rainbow bridge. She has developed some new quirks, but the oddest is the way she drinks water. Like some guy in a Sheryl Crow sing, she doesn’t like to drink alone.

She stands by the water bowl and shrieks like a fire alarm until Mo sits next to her, putting her finger in the bowl while BK uses it to drink.

This is a problem when we try to sleep. The piercing yowl goes off periodically through the night in the next room. I work around it by pulling a pillow over my head, but Mo is a good mom.

So I was not surprised in the wee hours this morning to find them together in the living room. Mo was curled up on the floor, asleep on a lawn chair pad. The baby cat, by the soft glow of her new night light, was drinking contentedly next to her.

The true test of character is what you do when nobody’s watching, the old saying goes.

Or nobody but a happy cat.