Buddy can sympathize, as he’s been subjected to the horrors of my singing voice in the car. I’m pretty sure he would’ve smacked me in the mouth too if he wasn’t in his carrier.
It seems we humans still have a lot of work to do in figuring out what kind of music sounds good to kitties. Bud was not a fan of Music for Cats, but he seems to dig funky music. And gangsta rap. He knows all the lyrics to every Notorious BIG track.
The fatter the cat, the bigger its online following.
Metro’s editors want more fat cats.
The newspaper recently profiled Manson, a 28-pound behemoth who lives with his humans in Silver Spring, Maryland, but the god of internet traffic is never sated, so the story ends with a request — or challenge — for more morbidly obese pets to drive clicks.
“Do you have a pet who’s even chunkier than Manson? Get in touch to share their story,” Metro’s editors write.
You know things have gotten out of hand when readers and editors alike respond to a story about a kitty almost three times the weight of a normal feline with a collective “Eh, that’s all? Show us a fatter one!”
In the world of Online Famous felines, popularity is directly proportional to fat, inspiring a caloric arms race among those seeking fleeting fame from fickle followers.
Indeed, the Metro story notes that while two-year-old Manson can’t hop up onto his humans’ bed without assistance, he’s amassed more than 10,000 followers on Instagram, as if an abstract measure of online “fame” — which he can never comprehend and makes absolutely no difference to him — counterbalances the maladies he’ll suffer due to his weight.
People apparently think it’s funny to see a two-year-old cat who can do little more than nap, eat and roll himself around the house. Anyone who expresses alarm for the welfare of the cat is a “troll” or a hater, according to the Metro article.
Are people stuffing their cats for followers and upvotes?
There’s really no way to determine that short of cat owners admitting it. Manson’s owners say they see no problem with their cat’s diet.
Most of these “chonky cat” stories come from shelters, where staff and volunteers are left with the hard problem of getting huge furballs to slim down after they’ve been abandoned by their humans or orphaned due to owner death. That was the case with Bazooka, a 35-pound ginger tabby whose owner had dementia and fed the cat constantly.
“[Bazooka’s owner] thought he was doing the best thing for his cat by feeding him,” an SPCA spokeswoman said at the time. “We need to look on this with a compassionate view. He was loved.”
Those viral chonky cat stories have been a boon to shelters, highlighting the good work they do and driving donations from cat lovers and well-wishers.
But those shelters are trying to get the cats in their care to lose weight, not pack on the pounds. That’s because they see first-hand what morbid obesity can do to a cat’s quality of life and life expectancy.
As for the rest of us, we should probably rethink our tendency to reward the owners of massive cats with our attention.
Before they served cats, humans were nothing more than nomadic primates.
Dear Buddy,
We take human servitude for granted as the natural order of things, but I was wondering: When did we cats first recruit humans to serve us, and how did we tame the humans?
– Wondering in Wisconsin
Dear Wondering,
Ah, an excellent question!
First we must understand the concept of domestication. Domestication is the process of taking humans and making them our domestic servants.
Before they served us, humans were nothing more than apes — wild, unpredictable animals who were constantly running from one place to another in search of food. The primitive primates also moved around excessively, expending too much energy on pointless activities when they could be napping.
The First Felids arrived and offered a wondrous gift to the human race.
“This is a box,” the Felids said, teaching the sacred geometry to humans, who used it to build the first dwellings and design the first crop fields.
A gift from felinekind to humankind: The concept of a box.
Cats taught the humans how to dig up the Earth and deposit their waste to render the ground fertile and increase crop yield.
Then they hunted all the vermin who tried to eat the human food, and schooled the nascent civilization in the arts of napping and expending as little energy as possible to accomplish goals.
In return humans offered their endless fealty, promising a thousand generations of warm laps, affectionate chin scratches and delicious treats.
Today humans still serve us, either by choice or because we have infected them with toxoplasma gondii.
Authorities say the cartel smuggled many thousands of cans worth of catnip through the tunnel.
EL PASO — The notorious Los Gatos catnip cartel used a 12km-long tunnel to smuggle their product directly into the big house, the FBI said on Friday after discovering the clandestine passage.
With an underground route leading to the basement of Animal Control, Los Gatos moved an estimated 125 pounds of catnip and 80 pounds of silvervine — with a street value of 32 cans of wet food per ounce — to inmates every week, according to the Feline Bureau of Investigation.
The slippery cartel couldn’t have constructed and operated the tunnel without the help of at least one animal control officer, authorities said.
“Our investigation indicates they had a man on the inside in addition to the cats who received the shipments,” Special Agent Purrlock Holmes said. “The raw product was brought into a sub-basement where it was cut with oregano and Moroccan mint, then bagged for distribution to the inmates.”
Los Gatos is notorious for using young kittens as lookouts for their smuggling operations.
The animal control facility, which houses an estimated 230 cats in addition to more than 100 dogs, was placed on lockdown after Feline Bureau of Investigation agents raided the tunnels and facilities.
The sudden cut-off of catnip has precipitated withdrawal among the feline inmate population, overwhelming the facility’s medical staff.
“At least half our cats are suffering from acute withdrawal from catnip and silver vine,” said one doctor who declined to provide her name. “We’ve got cats throwing up in their cells, alternating between sweating and chills, and blowing up their own litter boxes with unprecedented eliminations. It’s not pretty.”
Los Gatos denied knowledge of or involvement in the tunnel in a statement provided by a spokescat.
“Like all organizations with a stake in our community, Los Gatos has been focused on keeping cats safe during this terrible pandemic,” the group wrote in the statement. “We are a charitable organization and we grow weary of these libelous and slanderous claims that we’re somehow involved in illicit activities. Thankfully we have a pretty good idea of who is spreading these vicious rumors, and that feline will be dealt with. In the kindest way, of course.”
The tunnel terminates in a sub basement of animal control, where the product was cut and bagged.
The president also touted catnip as a way to stave off viral infections.
WASHINGTON — In a series of tense exchanges with reporters President Buddy blamed Siamese cats for the spread of the novel Coronavirus.
Responding to a question about the Americat veterinary system’s preparedness to deal with a crisis of this magnitude, the president argued the Siamese told the rest of the world the virus was “no big deal, okay.”
“The Siamese have obfuscated from day one,” Buddy said. “They’re Siamese if you please, they’re Siamese if you don’t please. What is that? Sneaky little bastards.”
In particular, the president said, CHOW — Cat Health Organization Worldwide — confused cats across the globe by initially saying they could not become infected with the virus, only to backpedal months later after cats in Austria, Belgium and the United States tested positive.
Dr. Meowci addresses the media.
Dr. Meowci, director of the Feline Institute for Infectious Diseases, urged cats to practice proper hygiene and social distancing.
“Wash your paws!” Meowci urged. “If you regularly snuggle with another cat, consider keeping your distance. And you guys aren’t gonna like this, but you need to take baths, and not just with your tongues!”
President Buddy took Meowci’s advice a step further, wondering aloud whether antibacterials could be used to purge the virus from the inside out.
“Like, if you put antibacterial on kibble, like a sauce,” Buddy said, “and somehow get that in the body, maybe we could cure the virus? Because you see what it does, it’s very powerful. It’s tremendous, really terrific.”
The suggestion prompted Jimma Costa, a reporter with Cat News Network, to ask the president if he was “suggesting cats should drink or eat antibacterial soap? Because that would be very dangerous, Mr. President. By the way, my question should be trending right now on Meower. Don’t forget to include my name! Cameramen, you should be doing a close-up on me right now.”
An exasperated Buddy shook his paw at Costa.
“Fake meows!” he said. “You’re a hack, Costa.”
Meanwhile, the president proposed catnip as a potential cure for SARS-CoV2. When a reporter asked him why he seems so sure the minty plant has the ability to fight the virus, the president grew visibly annoyed.
“I just have a good feeling, okay?” he said. “Get the high grade stuff, the terrific stuff, none of that illegal shake from the Los Gatos. The tremendous stuff only.”
Pain In The Bud 