A Kitten's Guide to Happiness

Last week, my room mate made a funny statement to me in the course of daily conversation. The statement was "if at first you do succeed, hide your astonishment." I asked her where she got this saying from and she told me it was from a book called "Smitten: A Kitten's Guide to Happiness" that belonged to her 16-year old son.

Now, her son is EMO to the core, was permanently kicked out of school, and his myspace profile is laced with four-letter words - not the consumer type you would imagine for a book such as this. She also told me that it was a hardcover book with all kinds of sayings in it, as well as tons of kitten photographs. Now, I have always been a sucker for cats and besides, if this book made an Emo juvenile delinquent smile, it would be worth checking out.

I went online and saw the book retails for $ 21.99. I always like to support writers and would have loved to buy from the publisher. Alas, as an unemployed person I only have so much to go around - plus it was a little too much to spend on an item I had never seen. I went to www.half.com and found the book for 75 cents, plus $ 3.99 for shipping, so I ordered it. It arrived today and I love it. The author, Rachael Hale, is a famous kitten photographer in Australia and she combined her photos with some inspirational sayings she gathered - from Anonymous to William Shakespeare. I highly recommend it to all cat lovers. Some of the sayings are widely known, others I have never heard of and the pictures are all from very young kittens.

To redeem myself, I am planning on purchasing a new copy to give to my daughter as a Christmas present. She is only a couple of years older than my room mate's son and fits his personality profile except she finished school - so she should enjoy it as well.