“Oh, did the Earth shake? I hardly noticed?” Buddy remarked.
So apparently the crinkling of a paper bag is terrifying, but the Earth shaking is no big deal.
The New York area experienced a 4.8-magnitude earthquake today. For a fleeting moment I thought maybe some idiot had hit the building with a tractor trailer or something, but as the rumbles continued I realized it had to be natural. Only Mother Nature has that kind of power.
I looked over at Bud, expecting to hear a terrified whimper any second, but he was just laying on my bed with his head up, annoyed that he’d been woken up.
His eyes met mine and I got the sense he was asking me: “Are we good here? Do I have to get up and run around screaming, or is this merely a rude interruption of my nap?”
“Good boy,” I said, trying to show him I wasn’t scared either.
In truth I was, just a bit. I suppose there must have been earthquakes around here in my childhood, but I can’t remember them. Even though this one was on the lower range of the Richter scale, as I’d later learn, when you’re not accustomed to earthquakes there’s a moment of surprise and understanding when you realize, for all our tech and the leaps we’ve taken as a species, we are ultimately powerless against forces like this.
It’s a feeling you’ll never get from seeing an earthquake on TV. You have to feel the ground shake to appreciate your own powerlessness.
In any case, this was definitely Bud’s first earthquake and I’m proud of the little guy. If you’d asked me before today how he’d likely respond, I would not have guessed he would be stoic.
It’s that time of year when Buddy sprouts huge rabbit ears and becomes a cabbit– a hybrid cat-rabbit — for exactly 24 hours.
“I’m a rabbit?!? And a cat?!?! I’m the Easter Buddy!”
Although he’s preoccupied with thoughts that he probably tastes delicious, the Easter Buddy would like to wish all of you a Happy Easter!
The Budster and I would like to thank all of PITB’s readers, and we hope you’re getting to spend some time with your family if you celebrate Easter.
You can’t have a jaguar pet and you can’t have Buddy the Cat, but what if you could have a breed that combines the best features of both? You’d pay a lot for that, wouldn’t you? Good, ’cause they start at $10k!
SATIRE/CAT HUMOR
Inspired by the exclusive Ashera cat, we proudly present to you the Buddinese Jaguar, the pinnacle in feline luxury.
Why settle for a pedestrian Bengal or Savannah when you could own the ultimate in feline status symbols?
Our Buddinese Jaguars feature royal lineage, the finest genetic modifications, and they’re extremely handsome!
– Ultra exclusive luxury cat
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– Eye colors available in Neon Emerald, Viridescent Beryl, Azure Sky, Amber Glow, Flecked Gold, Elvis Pink Cadillac, Crystal Cobalt and Electric Sapphire
– Optional moon roof
– Easy to use Quiet Mode™ technology guarantees your Buddinese Jaguar will shut up when you want it to
– Extended 5-year warranty
Each Buddinese Jaguar comes with a rapid USB 3.0 charger, a V8 engine that provides plenty of power for HyperZooms, and an Apple AirTag-enabled collar.
From kittenhood until adulthood, Buddinese Jaguars are exemplars of handsomeness.
In addition to guaranteed software updates for at least five years, your Buddinese Jaguar is equipped with onboard analog algorithms ensuring it downloads exclusively in its litter box and nowhere else.
Base models start at only $9,950! Hypoallergenic models with patented Fel-d-1 Guard™ technology available starting at $12,495.
We are an officially authorized retailer accredited by the Buddinese Jaguar Association and the Buddinese Authorized Distributor Association Service Standards (BADASS), awarded only to retailers who maintain the highest breed standards.
Like its jaguarundi forebears, the Buddinese Jaguar is an apex predator and is awesome at stalking the jungle.
About the breed:
The Buddinese Jaguar was developed by Buddesian Labs. Lead scientist Buddy the Cat tirelessly and selflessly engaged in coitus with 217 jaguarundi females, producing the magnificent offspring that would comprise the first generation of these extremely handsome cats. Using pioneering techniques in CRISPR gene-editing, Buddy did the impossible and improved upon perfection by eliminating allergens and adding even more meowscle mass.
Note: Buddy the Cat himself is not available for purchase, although he will entertain offers for his human.
Chief scientist Buddy recovers after selflessly and heroically engaging in coitus with 217 jaguarundi females in the name of science.
Cats have exceptional hearing abilities and can detect sounds in frequencies well beyond what the human ear is capable of hearing, but can they appreciate music?
The question of whether cats appreciate music is an interesting one, and we still don’t have definitive answers despite attempts to make music for our furry friends and study the way they respond to sound.
We’ve mentioned the ongoing efforts to make tunes for felines on this blog before, and previously experimented by playing composer David Teie‘s “Music for Cats“ for our brave volunteer, Buddy.
Excited by the possibility of music specifically designed for cats, and a study in the Journal of Feline Medicine and Surgery that found it had a calming effect on the species, we queued up a track and watched the Budster’s reaction:
“Using Buddy as my test subject, I went to Youtube, selected the track Cozmo’s Air from “Music for Cats” and sat back, expecting Bud to start nodding his furry head at any moment.
Instead his ears pricked up, did their radar-dish swivel toward the speakers, and his eyes went wide. As the song gained volume and intensity, Bud’s ears and whiskers snapped back and he let out a clearly anxious “yerrrrrrrrrrppp!” I tried to calm him down, to no avail, and a second track didn’t improve things.
He wasn’t having it.”
Over at Catster, Christopher Bays writes about his cat, Olga, and her relationship with music.
Olga “has listened to classic rock, jazz, blues, classical, heavy metal, punk (or new wave?), and accordion tunes from Hungary, and it all sounds the same to her,” Bays concludes.
“Spinning the megamix, bro.”/PITB
Noting that our tastes change as we age, Bays said he’s thankful Olga wasn’t around during his teenage punk and metal phase (ditto), and notes she’s not particularly interested in any sounds coming from electronic devices, with the exception of the roaring MGM lion. (Fun fact: The famous “lion’s roar” is actually a recording of a tiger played over footage of a lion yawning. The creators apparently felt lions don’t sound sufficiently badass enough.)
Bays points out our cats don’t exactly have control over what we play, and while that’s true, if you’re a genre-hopper like me, you’ve probably observed your furry friend’s reaction to various types of music.
Given the fact that the small amount of research done so far indicates cats do respond to tunes — and the existence of music-loving animals like Kiki and Snowball — I think felines probably are capable of enjoying the organized, rhythmic arrangements of sounds we call music.
I can’t say whether a favorite track can unleash a wave of emotion, nostalgia or energy the way it can for us humans, but I’ve played a lot of music around Bud and even played music for him on my guitar and keyboard.
He seems very comfortable with old jazz, soul and funk, he comfortably loafs when I’m in the mood for classic 90s hip hop, and he seems to tolerate the prog rock of Coheed and Cambria well enough. More recently he’s been on a 90s nostalgia trip with me: Blues Traveler, the Spin Doctors, Nirvana, Oasis, Better Than Ezra, Letters to Cleo, Ash, Weezer, Blur, The Roots.
And he seems especially chill in the sonic presence of synthwave, also called retrowave, an EDM-inflected genre that evokes nostalgia for an era that never really existed outside of 80s retrofuturism. It’s highly rhythmic, with steady 4/4 beats and vintage synthesizers cranking out arpeggios that rise and fall like waves, which may be a source of comfort to a species that likes things just the way they are without any big surprises.
Have you noticed your cats responding to music? What’s your kitty’s favorite genre or song? Is there anything they clearly don’t like?
Incidents like Sunday’s attempted cat robbery are happening more often in recent years, a forensic investigator specializing in animal-related crimes says.
Pet theft is a low-risk, high-reward way for the criminally-minded to make a quick buck, which is one reason why such crimes have become much more common since the pandemic, a forensics professor told the New Haven Register.
But first we’d like to draw your attention to an announcement we made back in February of 2021. At the time pet theft was in the headlines after robbers shot a man walking Lady Gaga’s breed dogs, while across the country in Portland a man stole a van full of daycare-bound pups.
Here’s what we wrote at the time:
“Buddy would like everyone to know he does not actually live in New York, and that his true location is a secret.
“I could be living in Rome,” the troublemaking tabby cat said. “I could be Luxembourgish. Maybe I live in Königreich Romkerhall or the Principality of Sealand. You just don’t know.”
“The one thing you can be certain of is I definitely don’t live in New York.”
We would like to make clear that we continue to blog from Not New York.
On a more serious note, financial woes brought on by the pandemic, painful inflation and a generally difficult economy have attracted the criminally inclined to the petnapping trade, and as Maxwell pointed out to the Register, few people are held accountable for animal-related crimes. That includes darker endeavors like dog fighting and puppy/kitten mills.
“Sadly, animal cruelty in general is under-prosecuted, and very, very few actually end up resulting in jail time,” Maxwell said.
A cat stays above the fray and surveys her surroundings from an elevated perch. Credit: cottonbro studio/Pexels
Sometimes pet thieves are opportunists who see a cat or dog who catches their fancy, or they believe might be worth money. Those cases often include people luring well-loved animals off porches and property with food.
Most, however, are people who intentionally target breeds that command high prices and are primarily responsible for what Maxwell says is a 40 percent spike in petnappings since early 2020. For felines that means Bengals, Savannahs, Ragdolls, Maine Coons, Norwegian Forest Cats and other breeds that can net the thief a solid payday for minimal effort.
“They’re going to steal your pedigree cat, your pedigree dog that’s worth thousands” and immediately flip the animal, Maxwell told the newspaper.
Social media, it turns out, is a double-edged sword.
While cops and animal welfare organizations warn people against showing off valuable pets online — and urge people to disable features like location tagging — the same platforms are often invaluable for retrieving stolen cats and dogs. Groups on sites like Reddit and Facebook help people find their well-loved four-legged family members and warn others when they identify resellers.
