On December 15th, Meow Parlour (in the Lower East Side at 46 Hester Street) will be open for business. It'll be offering rentable half hour slots to scratch, pet, and play with some (I'd assume only adorable) cats whilst having some sort of hot beverage. Pretty sure the cats will be adoptable, too. Visitors can secure their spots ahead of time online, if they so wish.

You can get half hour slots for $4 with the option to stay up to five hours, making use of their wifi and baked goods. The idea of eating food and being surrounded by cats seems to contort my face a bit, but I looked into and it says that "you can bring food into the cat area but not vice versa" so I suppose that's something.

Gimmicky as it may sound, places likes this are a pretty sweet opportunity for shelter cats to be surrounded by people who want to pet them a ton before they're (hopefully) adopted by cafe patrons. These cats come courtesy of KittyKind, a nonprofit rescue group, just one of many organizations dedicated to helping homeless kitties. All the more reason to help fund NYC's other potential cat cafe, which hopes to open next spring.