Willow the cat, newly reunited with her family, set to star in her own book

By Kelsey Whipple Mon., Sep. 26 2011 at 2:41 PM

Categories: Follow That Story, Strange but True, Television & Film

Willow the cat.

At long last -- and on national television -- Willow the cat was reunited with her family last week. The Today Show clip below finds Willow being lovingly caressed by family matriarch Jamie Squires while Matt Lauer asks predictable questions and she is confronted by Lola, a daughter who did not yet exist when Willow indulged her hipster phase and moved to Brooklyn five years ago. Watch the charming but strange family reunion below.

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To recap, let's take a look at the things that are amazing about this video:

During the montage of the family's story, the background music is "Memories" from Andrew Lloyd Weber's much-lauded, much-laughed-at musical CATS. Who knew the production crew had such a refined sense of humor?

Willow has nicer green eyes than most supermodels.

New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg used Willow as a boon to the city in a public speech. (I guess this officially makes her the cat's meow.)

Whoever was in charge of the photo montages is an artistic genius -- and a tasteful one, at that. At the 2:30 mark, Willow is legitimately PhotoShopped onto a motorcycle speeding in the desert.

Associated Press

Willow is reunited with her former family. (Note the beginning of the public fondling.)

In general, Willow's Today Show fondling rates pretty darn high, though still lower than the fondling she received the previous week from Anderson Cooper. This isn't to say that it's not touching, however. Willow looks just as dapper as she did nearly five years ago, and her family appears just as excited to belong to such an awesome feline specimen. Near the end, while the laughably strange video works its way through several bizarrely conceptual montages, Lauer channels his audience's curiosity to ask Mom Squires what she thinks Willow was up to on her stay-cation in New York.

"I don't think anyone's ever really going to know the truth of what actually happened to her," said Jamie Squires. "It's better for us to think she's been off on some great adventure." This, accompanied by a sound effect form Law & Order, completes the newsgathering section of the interview, as if curiosity has the power to kill more than just Willow's kind.

In other news, Jamie Squires has let the cat out of the bag for her plan to write a children's book about Willow. We're picturing something like, Cat Me If You Can: The Story of Willow Squires And What She Dragged In, but that sounds a little world-weary for the pre-tween crowd. If you have any title ideas of your own, leave them in the comments section below.