Flashback photos from the spring of 2020 when most cats were wondering why their people were huddling at home and only venturing out cautiously with masks and gloves.
Taken during the spring of 2020 during the height of the quarantine, which Bud was blissfully oblivious to!
Is the human a bad influence on the cat, is the cat a bad influence on the human, or are they both just crazy?
NEW YORK — Big Buddy and Little Buddy experienced an awkward moment while watching a cat documentary which claimed feline personalities eventually come to resemble the dispositions of their humans.
The human and tabby were sitting on their couch, eating popcorn and laughing at their own farts when Holly Sikes, a cat behaviorist interviewed in the documentary, broke down the way people and their furry pals mirror each other.
“So, for example, if the cat is a lazy, egotistical jerk who’s always coming up with hare-brained schemes, he obviously learned that from someone,” the behaviorist said. “And that someone is the primary caretaker, the one with whom the cat spends most of his or her time.”
The Buddies looked at each other, shrugging.
“I once had a client whose cat, Quintus Lentilus Batiatus, was an absolute lunatic,” Sikes continued in the documentary. “And it turned out the owner was a LARPer who belonged to a group of wannabe Roman legionaries, which explained why little Quintus had declared war on the German family next door, labeling them ‘barbarians and savages who must be civilized under the banner of the Sacred Eagle.’ I’ve heard of cats styling themselves as Mongol conquerors, Spartan warriors and even kings of Joseon.”
Little Buddy stopped chewing, and with a mouth full of popcorn, turned to his Big Buddy.
“I’m, uh, not feeling this documentary, dude,” he said. “Let’s find something else to watch.”
“Agreed,” Big Buddy said.
The behaviorist continued to elaborate as Big Buddy searched for the remote.
“…and delusions of grandeur, particularly when it comes to fantasies about conquering the world, being famous, or even establishing ties with big cats like jaguars and tigers…”
Little Buddy’s voice was urgent.
“Where’s the remote, dude? Come on! Find it!”
“I’m trying! Where the heck is it?”
“…and we find that in cases where human and feline are closely bonded, they serve as enablers, with each convincing the other that their schemes are brilliant even when they’re gobsmackingly inane…”
Big Buddy grunted triumphantly.
“Found it!” he said.
Human and cat breathed a sigh of relief as the stream stopped.
“So what do you wanna watch next, Bud?” Big Buddy asked.
Little Buddy sat up and stretched.
“Actually, I was thinking of taking another nap and then working on my brilliant plan to intercept catnip shipments bound for pet stores.”
Big Buddy whistled.
“That is a brilliant plan, little guy,” he said.
“It is, isn’t it?” Little Buddy said proudly.
“Good call on the nap too. I’ll set my alarm for 90 minutes. Gotta get that beauty sleep…”
As of press time, the Buddies had settled on a scheme to intercept catnip and turkey bound for pet stores, which they both agreed was brilliantly conceived and guaranteed to work.
Arabian leopards are among the most rare of all cats, with only about 120 left living in the wild. Trump was taken with them on a recent visit to Saudi Arabia.
I can practically hear Donald Trump bragging about the new pair of extremely rare Arabian leopards the Saudis will send stateside as a deal-sweetener between the countries.
“They’re tremendous cats, just terrific,” he’ll say. “The most ferocious cats you’ve ever seen, believe me. It’s incredible. A lot of people are saying — and by the way, did you know leopards eat up to 40 pounds of meat a day? They’re tremendously powerful animals, very powerful.”
As the New York Times notes, Trump is just as beguiled by dangerous apex predators as he is with dangerous “strong men” tyrants:
Mr. Trump does not own pets and, unlike his sons, he does not hunt big game. But he has shown a particular fascination for animals at the top of the food chain. Last year, he talked constantly on the campaign trail about shark attacks. While campaigning in 2015, he was nearly mauled by a bald eagle he posed with in Trump Tower for a Time magazine photo shoot. (“This bird is seriously dangerous but beautiful!” he chirped after the raptor lunged at his head.)
During his first term, Mr. Trump asked aides about dropping snakes and alligators into a hypothetical moat he wanted built on America’s southern border. He also reportedly became fixated on the viciousness of badgers, badgering his former chief of staff Reince Priebus, who is from the Badger State, as Wisconsin is known, about whether badgers were mean or friendly, according to “Sinking in the Swamp,” a book about the first Trump administration. (Mr. Priebus did not respond to multiple requests for comment.)
Trump viewed the leopards and spoke to a zookeeper while he was in Saudi Arabia to complete a recent arms deal. (The U.S. will sell $142 billion in high tech weapons to Saudi Arabia so the kingdom can more effectively slaughter Yemeni civilians in its ongoing proxy war with Iran.) The American president wanted to know all about the big cats, including how big they are and what they eat. The zookeeper, who routinely handles those sorts of questions from visiting classes of elementary school children, happily indulged his interest.
Arabian leopards are fierce, but they’re somewhat smaller than their Asian counterparts. Panthera pardus nimr, as the species is known, generally has a lighter, tan-colored coat that provides more camouflage in desert and arid environments.
The Times also quotes Joe Maldonado, aka Joe Exotic, who spoke to a reporter from prison, where he’s serving a 21-year sentence for trying to have Big Cat Rescue’s Carole Baskin murdered. Maldonado is keenly aware of Trump’s recent streak of handing out pardons to reality TV grifters, like Todd and Julie Chrisley, who stole almost $40 million, as well as less famous scammers like convicted crypto bros. (The Chrisleys, who were convicted of bank fraud and tax evasion, declared bankruptcy to avoid paying back their victims, and will now launch a new reality TV show detailing their post-prison lives. ‘Merica!)
Now Maldonado sees an opportunity.
The former “Tiger King” says Trump should have leopards and other big cats prowling the grounds of the White House, which is the kind of thing dictators like Vladimir Putin and Saddam Hussein have been known for.
“I think it would be absolutely amazing if he would put some endangered cats like that around the White House,” Maldonado said. “I’ve never been there. I don’t know how big the Rose Garden is, but I would imagine you could build a pretty nice size complex.”
Perhaps Trump can threaten to feed congressmen and senators to his new leopards if they defy him and don’t vote for legislation like the “big, beautiful bill” he’s been pushing.
Maldonado admitted that even he’s never seen an Arabian leopard, an animal so rare that only an estimated 120 of them remain in the wild. Still, he thinks he can handle them for Trump.
“Let me out,” Maldonado said, “and I’ll come take care of ’em!”
A jungle in the heart of our nation’s capital.
The United States Botanic Garden is in the heart of Washington, D.C., on the grounds of the Capitol. Admission is free, like almost every museum and public exhibit in the city, and the botanists and designers offer new flora with novel themes every season. These photos were taken in April with my Canon and an 18-55mm lens.
“Oh my God, this is my job every day!” Charlie Shaw says of his position as a big cat keeper at one of America’s most well-known and well-funded zoos.
If you’ve ever wondered what it’s like to work with big cats, WTOP has a new interview with Charlie Shaw, a big cat keeper at the Smithsonian National Zoo.
Hint: it involves a lot of meat, physical enrichment, olfactory enrichment, and checking on the felids to make sure they’re healthy.
Shaw starts his day by feeding the hungry apex predators, including Damai, a 16-year-old tiger who wants all the snacks, and Vostok, a fast-growing young Amur tiger who doesn’t know a genetically-compatible mate is arriving in short order, and he’ll get to be a dad if things go well.
The genetic matches are carefully made to avoid inbreeding and give the species the best chance to recover.
“Tigers are critically endangered,” Shaw told WTOP. “What we want to do is make sure the gene pool itself is still very diverse.”
Shaw says he’s working his dream job.
“You walk in and the tigers all chuff at you, or the lions roar. And you’re like, ‘Oh, my God, this is my job every day!’”
I’m aware of it, and I think every person concerned about the welfare of cats should at least know it’s happening.
But it’s also extremely distressing. I actually had nightmares the night after I read it. So I’m offering a strong warning here: think about it before you click the story. The report is by CNN, so there are no gory images and the reporters aren’t trying to make anyone uncomfortable, but the reality of it is bad enough.
For everyone who doesn’t want to know the more upsetting details, the essence of it is that there’s a network of people making “content” of themselves torturing and killing cats, and a rapidly growing audience of people who pay thousands of dollars to “sponsor” the horrific content.
They have “menus” set up where people can select the cat they want to see tortured and specify the ways in which the cat should be hurt and killed. CNN, citing a group of vigilantes trying to dismantle the networks, says people pay up to $1,300 for the “service.” Collectively, the torturers and their audience refer to themselves as “cat lovers.”
The Chinese government, to no one’s surprise, does not care. There are no criminal penalties for what the content producers are doing, and the government hasn’t responded to complaints from concerned people or media networks.
I might address it in the future, but for now I don’t even know what to say. I was away when I read it, and it made me really want to hug Bud and make sure he’s never out of my care. Ever.
Pain In The Bud 