Clem came in the cat hole, looked around, liked what he saw. Warm, cushy couches. Plants to lurk behind. Food bowls! He tasted the food, not too hot, not too cold, just right. He decided he'd stay.
Clem has a will of iron. Once he has decided, he will not be deterred. I have returned him to his rightful family, many times. Some days he beats me home. He has decided. Eventually, we all gave up. Clem is now a Comden cat.
He is Larry's cat, likes Larry's lap -but only if it is his idea. If I put him on my lap he springs away. "Not my idea". I catch him harassing the other cats (they each want to be an only) and pick him up to toss him outside. He struggles and squirms, growling and hissing all the way to the door. "Not my idea". The vet wears leather gloves when she examines him. "He gets a little excited" she says.

Which brings me to the story of Billy the Dog, which was in all the local papers last week, with updates on the web. He was wandering around Millvale after the floods of last fall. A kind woman found him, dirty and hungry, and took him home and fed him. He adjusted well to her household, her other dogs. He clearly was a family dog that had lost his way. The woman worried that his original family missed him and so she took him to the Humane Society, thinking they could better reunite him with his family. If not, she would adopt him.

After 3 weeks she came to pick him up. "Sorry" she was told, "He failed his pinch test. He will be put to sleep."

He hasn't been put to sleep because of the hue and cry. Kind woman took his story to the papers and the dog lovers of W. Pa. have risen up in his defence. A fund was started so that Billy could be trained to accept the pinch test (the skin between his toes is pinched. If he growls, he fails).
And he has been moved to a no-kill shelter - Angel Ridge Resue in Washington County - where he will undergo his training. And the kind lady can visit him there. When he passes the pinch test, she can take him home.

Clem would never pass the pinch test. Nor the lap test, nor the carry test, nor the vet test.