A Cat's Eye View

Hello, Baxter here. I understand from my Female Human that my first effort at blogging was warmly received, and that my fans are now clamoring for additional words of wisdom from yours truly. Well, that isn't very surprising, I guess; it is to be expected once the wisdom of a Cat has been disseminated to the masses.

So from now on I'm going to be posting here on Mondays to round up some news stories I think are important, and, of course, including my very own, extremely pertinent, commentary on them.

First of all, you will be surprised to know that Cats actually follow what you people call "Politics." Why, you may ask?

Well, what is more important to a Cat than having food in the dish, a warm box to use, and plenty of heat in the house? That's right, nothing! Nothing is more important than that. And whether or not my Humans have jobs and are happy matters a lot to me, because otherwise the cat food might run out, or the heat may have to be turned down.

From what I understand from what my Humans say when I'm lying around on their laps with one ear turned to their conversation, there has been a major Doofus in the office they call "President" for seven years now, and as a result the economy isn't doing so well. The price of that stuff that heats the house has gone way up and my Humans keep talking about turning down the Thermostat.

I don't know a lot about this type of thing, but when my Female Human gets cold she goes and pushes a button on this thing on the wall and it gets warmer again. I don't want them pushing the button to make it colder.

So as a Cat, I would like to point out that it is Time for a Change.

And speaking of change, this Human called Obama seems to be doing quite well in some other place called New Hampshire. My Female Human is excited about this, apparently, so I will probably be supporting this fellow myself. He says he's all about Change, and that makes him OK by me.

I shall now move on to other subjects.

I was shocked, shocked, I tell you, by the following story:

"Man kills, cooks and possibly eats girlfriend, police say"

"TYLER, Texas (AP) -- A man killed his girlfriend, then filleted and cooked parts of her body before calling police to tell them what he was doing, authorities said Sunday

...When authorities arrived at the home, they found Shearer's mutilated body, one ear boiling in a pot of water on the stove and a fork sticking out of some human flesh sitting on a plate on the kitchen table."

Now, that is just disgusting. It's not as if she were a mouse or something. That I could understand. But this is like me trying to eat another Cat. It's just not the thing to do. In my younger days, I may have had a fight or two with another Cat but I would never really harm one. And certainly I would not demean myself to eat one. My Female Human says that since it happened in Texas, this person is going to "fry." I'm not sure what she means by that but it doesn't sound as if his future is very bright.

Another interesting bit of news comes from this article. Apparently scientists have ascertained that Monkeys pay for Sex. The male monkeys groom the female of their choice first in order to receive her sexual favors. Now, personally, I have not experienced Sex. As I mentioned previously, I was "fixed" when I was a young cat and had never had the opportunity to make an intimate acquaintance with the lady of my choice. But I do know we Cats do not do That Sort of Thing. We Males just grab the lady by the scruff of the neck and proceed from there. I know, because I used to watch some of the local couples in the neighborhood before the Nice Person brought me into the house.

The interesting thing is, my Female Human says that Humans sometimes do this as well. Perhaps there is more of a connection between Monkeys and Humans than some people want to admit (Thank you, Crooks & Liars, for that link).

Now, what about this "Writer's Strike" the Humans keep talking about? I understand that when my Humans are watching that stupid box they keep in their bedroom late at night (when I'm patiently waiting for the Dog to fall asleep so I can get up on the bed) that they watch some shows called "The Daily Show" and "The Colbert Report." But because of this "Writer's Strike" they haven't been doing that lately and are getting very cranky about it.

But apparently tonight that is going to change, and the shows will be back on the air. Lord knows what they will be able to tell my Humans if they aren't supposed to write anything, but my Female Human says it will still be a vast improvement over the reruns of the past few months.

Of course, as a Cat, I don't see any reason to have Writers. We Cats are very good at improv and can always find the right words to say, so I really don't see what the fuss is about.

Now, to finish off my post, I'd like to talk a bit about my poor distant cousin, Tatiana, the tiger who was shot at the San Francisco Zoo after mauling a young Male Human to death. It is true she killed the Human but there are rumors that the young Humans were taunting her.

Now, everyone knows we Cats can jump. My Humans used to have a Cat who could jump from onto the top of the refrigerator from the kitchen counter with no difficulty whatsoever. In perusing the pictures of the moat and wall at the Zoo, it is obvious that any self-respecting Cat of that size could make the leap if she were goaded into it by young Humans without any Sense.

Now, apparently, it has come out that these Humans had been into the Catnip (or as they call it, pot and booze), and the surviving ones are not cooperating properly with the Authorities. So, it seems it was not all Tatiana's fault that this happened; however, it is important that the Zoo fix the height of that wall so that other Tigers don't end up meeting the same fate as poor Tatiana did.

That is it from where I sit today. I'll be gathering more news tidbits for next week's post on this thing called a "Blog." My Human is pleased not to have to blog on Mondays, as it is a hard day for her to get moving.

May your week be full of expensive food, Catnip and lots of naps.