thebigbuddy

Adoption Ad Warns Cat Will ‘Own You, Your House, Everything You Hold Dear’

Quinn the cat has “the uncanny ability to make people feel unwelcome in her presence!”

Quinn the cat lives separate from feline genpop, she doesn’t suffer fools and she’s got a well-documented habit of smacking people, cats and dogs.

The infamously disagreeable feline is up for adoption and the shelter where she lives has been up front about her unique personality, saying she might do well with a misanthrope who would appreciate Quinn’s dislike of any visitors and intolerance for anyone who doesn’t directly serve her.

“Tired of visitors coming to your house? Adopt Quinn! She has an uncanny ability to make people feel unwelcome in her presence!” shelter staff wrote in Quinn’s adoption post.

She’ll tolerate her caretaker, but just barely, staff at the Washington County Humane Society in Maryland joked.

Yet they’re confident there’s a home for Quinn, insisting that “surely there’s someone out there who would appreciate her icy stare and her sudden smacks!”

Of course Quinn could blossom into a happy, sweet cat once she’s living in her forever home and she realizes she’s not going back to the shelter or the streets. Most cats do poorly in shelters where fear and stress overwrite their usual personalities. Even the most outgoing, sweet cat can appear depressed and antisocial when locked in a cage most of the time, without people to love them, play with them and make them feel safe.

Quinn’s direct adoption page (scroll down to adoptable cats) says she’s three years old and wasn’t claimed by her owner, so who knows what kind of traumas she may have endured in her short life?

Quinn currently lives in the shelter’s office where she “rules with an iron paw.” Anyone interested in adopting her should ask for her by name, the shelter said. Contact the shelter at the link above or by calling 301-733-2060.

Cat: ‘No Study Time For You, Human!’

When cats demand attention they can be relentless!

I’m sure the behavior in this video, of a cat absolutely determined not to let her human get a second of studying in, is familiar to everyone who has the privilege of serving a feline:

@talelindblom

my studybuddy 🥹 part 2 #exam #catsoftiktok #fyp #nursingstudent

♬ original sound – TALE LINDBLOM

The cat grabs at the pen, tries to chew on it, covers the book with her body, nibbles on the pages and plays pretty much every trick in the feline book to get her human to stop what she’s doing and engage in some good old Cat Time.

Or more bluntly, she’s saying: “NO STUDY, HUMAN! PAY ATTENTION TO ME!”

I never gave much thought to how students fare with cats but I know writing by hand is pretty much out of the question for me. Bud just won’t let me do it. Either he’s trying to bite the pen or he’s swatting at it with his paws, making my normally neat handwriting look like that of a deranged person demanding ransom or the work of someone stupidly drunk.

I’ve got a tradition of sketching scenes on birthday cards and other things I send to my nieces by snail mail, and Bud must be secured in another room before I can even attempt it.

Same deal with music, unfortunately. If I’ve got a guitar in my hands, little dude tries to cut in with a blazing, discordant solo of his own. Cat claws and guitar strings do not mix. If I’m using my synthesizer, Bud decides we’re going to do a duet by walking across the keyboard and yowling.

I’ve actually sat hunched at my computer for hours trying to stitch together guitar solos from several different takes because they were going swimmingly until Mr. Bud cut in with a paw and a claw, and trying to fix rhythm tracks that were perfect until Buddy the Destroyer decided 4/4 should become 5/8 or a particular chord progression should be interrupted with an accidental bit of guitar dubstep. Thank God for non-destructive digital editing in modern music production! Musicians in the days of analog multitracks must have had to put their felines under lock and key before attempting to record anything.

Do your cats stop you from doing stuff? What are their methods?

Cat Domestication Was The Start Of A Beautiful Friendship

Domestication’s real goal: to make cats cuddly as well as great mousers.

Cats have been doing things their way since the very beginning.

Unlike literally every other domesticated animal, cats were not domesticated by humans. They did it to themselves.

As if that didn’t make them unique enough, they lay claim to another major distinction: they’re the only species of obligate carnivores to undergo domestication in the entire history of human existence.

That explains why cats, more than any other animal that depends on humans, so closely resemble the wild animals they were before signing up for the good life of naps, warmth, endless rodents to hunt and free food from their new human friends.

In a new essay for The Conversation, evolutionary biologist Jonathan Losos, author of The Age of Cats: From the Savanna to Your Sofa, notes new DNA analysis settles the question of where cats came from once and for all.

Domestic cats are descended from North African wildcats, specifically the species felis sylvestris lybica. Unlike dogs, who underwent telltale physical transformations when they evolved from wolves, house cats “appear basically indistinguishable from wildcats.”

“In fact,” Losos writes, “only 13 genes have been changed by natural selection during the domestication process. By contrast, almost three times as many genes changed during the descent of dogs from wolves.”

While the change in genetics that happen with domestication left cats pretty much as they were physically, the process made dramatic changes in the feline brain, reducing regions governing fear and expanding those related to social behavior. The result? The major difference between house cats and their wildcat ancestors is disposition.

In other words, domestication made cats cuddly.

Notably, felis sylvestris lybica had to be pretty friendly in the first place, as well as bold and driven by the now-legendary feline curiosity to risk padding into human settlements with their bright lights, strange smells, open flames and the two-legged giants striding around them.

They didn’t have a way of negotiating or signaling their intent. They couldn’t say: “Hey guys, we’re here to kill and eat the tasty rodents who have been giving you problems by chowing down on your yums, but we don’t want your yums for ourselves. Plants are disgusting!”

So they had to demonstrate their usefulness, prove their worth, and enjoy the fruits of it by curling up in front of warm fires or on human laps.

That explains why it was the African wildcat that became a human companion species and not European wildcats, whom Losos notes are often “hellaciously mean” in interactions with people, even if they’re raised around humans when they’re young. It was also a matter of being in the right place at the right time, as nascent human civilization took root in the Fertile Crescent.

But ultimately, just like cats decided to domesticate themselves and didn’t really bother to consult us about it, so too do they bend us to their will with an entire repertoire of manipulative behavior, from solicitation purrs to incessant meowing and having a talent for looking their cutest when they want something.

While we may think we set the rules and parameters of our relationship with the furry little ones, as Losos notes, “cats usually train us more than we train them.”

Read the whole thing here:

Feline evolution: How house cats and humans domesticated each other

Buddy To Appear In Upcoming Episode of HGTV’s Box Hunters

Buddy the Cat tours a trio of elegant box homes in the new season of HGTV’s popular series Box Hunters.

NEW YORK — Will he go with the “modest” 32-room castle, the manor with elegant cardboard balconies or the minimalist keep with high walls and strong fortifications?

Viewers of HGTV’s hit show, Box Hunters, will have to tune in on Wednesday, Dec. 13 to find out!

The episode will air on fHGTV, (Feline HGTV), the network’s cat-centric sister station, and will follow Buddy the Cat as his box estate agent shows him three unique properties.

“Buddy the Cat is a young professional whose hobbies include taking over the world, gorging on turkey and getting high on catnip,” the narrator says in the episode’s opening sequence. “He’s looking for a property that will fit in his living room, can accommodate a nuclear bunker and serve as a headquarters for planning world domination, all while providing pleasant spaces to entertain guests. Can he find a box house that will fit his criteria? Find out in this episode of Box Hunters!”

Like many cats who are featured on the show, Buddy has a predetermined list of features he considers absolutely necessary, including a complete lack of doors, no baths, and quiet napping chambers.

“It has to have a certain je ne sais quoi as a dwelling meant for me and not just some regular cat, of course,” Buddy said. “But it needn’t be unnecessarily elaborate.”

Patches, the box estate agent, told Buddy they’d “start with something modest” while leading him to a towering box castle with a grand staircase and wide front entrance.

Buddy's Box Castles — A modest box castle design toured by Buddy the Cat.

“I like the understated design of this one,” Buddy said. “The ground floor entrance leads directly into the Grand Napping Chamber with smaller, more private napping accommodations accessible from the main chamber.”

Patches nodded.

“And you can see here, the litter box room is filled with all the modern amenities, including a pad that catches stray litter and a cardboard floor designed to look like marble,” she said. “Stepping out into the grand foyer, we have ample storage space in the adjoining closets for all your toys, your catnip stash and your weapons. It’s even got a Roomba garage!”

A second design, which Patches labeled “more of a classically styled castle,” features a pair of ground-level entrances, several balconies, and “ample space for walking the upper parapets.”

“The wrought cardboard filigrees are fabulous,” Buddy said, running a paw along a faux window where dozens of holes had been punched through to create a screen effect.

Finally they toured a minimalist keep that filled most of Buddy’s requirements but didn’t have all the bells and whistles.

“The good news is, it’s significantly less than your budget of 50 cans of wet food,” Patches said. “You’ll have cans left over for renovations and to customize the space. And moving along here past the master naproom, this doorway leads out to the central courtyard. This is a really nice space for entertaining, especially in the summer months when it’s warm out and you and your friends might want to dine outside on kibble, turkey, mouse or whatever your preference may be.”

Catch the full episode on Wednesday, Dec. 13 at 7:30 p.m.!

Buddy’s Cat Café Offers Cat Lovers A Chance To Pet And Feed Buddy

Buddy the Cat’s latest scheme makes him the main — and only — attraction at a new cat cafe, where customers fuss over him and feed him all day.

NEW YORK — The Big Apple’s newest cat cafe is doing a brisk business, offering cat lovers a new twist on the relaxing feline-and-coffee combo.

Instead of a typical cat cafe which could feature a dozen or more adoptable cats to interact with, Buddy’s Café and Catnip Lounge features one cat: Buddy, its proprietor.

For just $5 customers can come inside, enjoy a cup of coffee and spend their time petting and feeding Buddy. A separate menu offers a range of treats and catnip products which they can purchase to lavish on the gray tabby cat.

“It’s not easy being a one-cat operation, but I’m dedicated to my customers by making sure they can feed me and pet me as much as they want,” Buddy said as the cafe began to fill up.

buddyhiphop — Buddy posing with regulars for Freestyle Fridays at Buddy’s Cat Cafe. Many young musicians come to Buddy for advice, as well as to pet and feed him.

By late afternoon several groups were seated at tables situated around a dais where Buddy stretched and yawned on a Roman-style chaise longue.

“Please, ladies, there’s enough of me to go around,” Buddy told a pair of customers who were arguing over which one of them was petting the feline first. “Sandra, why don’t you scratch behind my ears? Ah, that’s wonderful! Kim, my chin is free for scritches. Yes. You see? We can all get along.”

buddycatcafecrowd — Buddy with students from Mrs. Nakamura’s fourth-grade class. The students come to Buddy’s Cat Cafe once a month to visit, feed and fawn over their feline friend.

Buddy was able to prevent another argument when he announced he needed to use his litter box and four customers volunteered to carry him there. He gestured toward a gilded palanquin in the corner of the room which was carved with elaborate feline motifs.

“You can each take a corner and carry me,” he said, settling himself down on the palanquin’s cushion. “You are all privileged today, my human servants.”

Buddy’s Cat Café even offers a VIP-tier membership package, the Frequent Feeder Program. Frequent Feeders are given priority seating closest to Buddy and are the first permitted to feed him snacks and give him massages during the afternoon rush.

“Buddy so kawaii!” said one admirer, Hideshi Igawa. “I like to read shinbun and admire Budditsu.”

Not everything always runs smoothly at the cafe, however. Earlier this week a man entered claiming to be “Buddy’s human” and demanded the beloved feline “stop this ridiculousness and come home.” Buddy looked skeptically at the man and pretended not to know him.

“Sir, you’re going to have to buy a cup of coffee like everyone else and wait your turn,” said 27-year-old Kelly Hogan, a regular at the cafe. “Buddy, do you know this man?”

Buddy looked at his Big Buddy and pretended not to recognize him.

“I don’t,” he said. “Security, toss this troublemaker out! He’s trying to cut the line, and I won’t have my regular customers disturbed!”

Big Buddy screamed at his cat as two burly men dragged him out.

“I’ll get you for this, you little $#!+!” he yelled as the men tossed him out the front door. “No bed, no snuggles, no TURKEY!”

Buddy turned back toward his customers and cleared his throat.

“Where were we? Ah, yes. Little Jeffrey here was scratching my back, his mother was feeding me crunchy treats, and Mrs. Novello was next up with a bag of catnip. Let’s get back into it, shall we? People are waiting patiently!”