human servants – Page 3 – Pain In The Bud

Point-Counterpoint: ‘Don’t Stop! Scritch Me More, Yeah!’ vs ‘Don’t You Humans Know When Enough Is Enough?’

Buddy the Cat wants his human to keep scratching his head, while Buddy the Cat has had enough!

“Don’t Stop! Scritch Me More, Yeah!”

No! No, no, no, no, no! Do not stop! Bring those magic fingers back over here, right above my ears and…yeah!

That’s the good stuff!

Oh man. Down a little. Right there. That hits the spot! In fact, I bet it’ll feel even better when I help you out and lean into the scratches. Oh. I was right, that does feel good!

Hey, where are you…HEY! Who told you we’re done here?

Sheesh, you’d think I nip at you if you pet me too long or something.

You didn’t spend an adequate enough time on my chin yet, and you know I like it when you swing back around for a sort of “greatest hits” and go through the whole rotation again. Now I’m going to assume you don’t need additional instruction, so I’ll just close my eyes and purr away. Don’t stop until the precise moment you should. That’s a good human.

“Don’t You Humans Know When Enough Is Enough?”

All right already, sheesh! The petting was good for like 3.275 seconds, but it got really played out after that, and you just kept going!

Well whose fault is it that I delivered a warning bite? Me, or the person who couldn’t tell when it was clearly time to stop rubbing my head?

What is it with you humans, huh? Learn to read the room. If I want more scritches, I’ll ask for them.

But no. When I was tired of it, you allowed another two tenths of a second to elapse before ceasing all massaging activities. TWO TENTHS OF A SECOND! I should have you flogged for your insolence!

You’ve had years to improve at this, human. That’s thousands of scritches and massages delivered to my chin, my cheeks, the top of my head and behind the ears. What can account for your complete failure to anticipate the exact millisecond the petting should stop?

You disappoint me.

Point-Counterpoint presents two essays taking opposing positions on a topic. Join us again next week, when Buddy the Cat will debate Buddy the Cat on another important topic.

Top image credit: Pexels

How Cats See The World

Cats see the world differently, in objective physical terms as well as psychologically.

Have you ever wondered what the world looks like to your cat?

Veterinarians, animal ophthalmologists and researchers from the University of Pennsylvania’s ophthalmology group provided insight for this article and the accompanying images, which show how scenes look to us humans and to our feline friends.

The images are striking and show the relative strengths and weaknesses of feline vision. While cats see the world in muted colors and in less acuity than typical humans, they make up for it with their astounding night vision and their ability to instantly detect motion within their visual fields.

This image shows feline night vision at work thanks to the tapetum lucidum, a layer of tissue that acts as a retroreflector, increasing the amount of light that makes it to the photoreceptors in cats’ eyes. The tapetum lucidum is best known as the reflective “lens” that makes cat eyes appear to glow in the dark:

This image shows the trade-off compared to human vision. Cat eyes have a wider field of view, seen below, but they don’t pick up reds or greens, and their overall vision is blurry compared to average human eyesight, represented in the top image:

Night vision and extreme visual sensitivity to movement are important to cats as crepuscular hunters, allowing them to spot prey in low light conditions and to negate advantages from natural camouflage, as motion gives away the presence of prey animals.

Cats have a slightly wider visual field than people do, at approximately 200 degrees compared to the human 180 degrees, while most cats have between 20/100 and 20/200 vision. (That’s much better than Big Buddy sans glasses, whose 20/600 vision enables him to see blurry, colorful shapes and not much else. No wonder Little Buddy likes to torture his human by swiping his glasses.)

Of course, these images do not entirely account for how cats see the world, which is why I’ve created my own image. Behold a Buddy’s Eye View, showing how the world — and humans — look to him:

Downton Buddy — From Buddy the Cat’s perspective, humans are all servants, constantly standing by to attend to him.

Buddy The Cat Furious After Can Opening Turns Out To Be Corn

Cats are deeply traumatized when they hear the distinct sound of a food package opening and discover it’s not for them.

NEW YORK — Buddy the Cat was enraged Friday night when he was woken from a deep sleep by the sound of an aluminum can being opened, then bolted upright, jumped off the bed and ran to the kitchen only to find his human with a freshly-opened can of corn in his hands.

Calling such incidents “cruel teases” and “deeply unfair” to him and other felines, the silver tabby demanded the food industry develop alternate methods of packaging human food.

“We’ve all heard the plasticky rustle of a bag and come running, just drooling with anticipation for the Temps only to skid to a halt as we catch that first putrid whiff of sour cream and onion potato chips or tortilla chips,” Buddy told reporters at a press conference later Friday evening. “I’m not judging, by the way, but human food is disgusting. I mean, you literally eat leaves and call it ‘salad’ so you forget you’re eating leaves. Give me a mound of chicken in a paste-like consistency any day.”

Cats don't like salad! — Torture: Cats are offended by the very presence of salad. How can humans consume such disgusting food?

Joining him at the podium, four-year-old Siamese Burton recalled his disappointment at hearing the crinkle of an aluminum package and scurrying to the kitchen to witness his servant, Olivia, scattering 4C breadcrumbs onto a vegetarian casserole bound for the oven.

“I almost puked,” Burton said, shuddering from the trauma as Buddy placed a supportive paw on his shoulder. “Vegetarian casserole! Vegetables! How do you people eat this stuff? It’s madness!”

If humans were genuinely considerate of their feline friends, Buddy insisted, they’d make some of their own food palatable to cats.

“I’m not just talking about cooking a nice steak without any spices or sauces,” Buddy said. “Why not make beef pate flavor potato chips or apples that taste like salmon? Has anyone ever thought of tuna-flavored ice cream? I bet you wouldn’t even be able to keep it in stock, that’s how popular it would be.”

Cat chips — Salmon-flavored potato chips would be a hot seller, President Buddy insists. Credit: Reddit

The former president of the Americats said his bad experiences with food have even prompted ideas about opening up his own restaurant for cats.

“Not one of those lousy casual dining places either,” he said. “I’m talkin’ about a nice type of joint where the waiters wear bow ties and open the cans right in front of you at the table. The kind of place that has you check your collar at the entrance, where you could take a lady friend.”

Reached after his feline’s hastily-arranged press conference, human Big Buddy said he wasn’t aware his cat was campaigning for alternative forms of food packaging.

“That’s tragic,” he said, “because I’ve got a big bag of pistachio nuts I’m planning on opening later. Maybe I’ll wait to do that until Bud’s fast asleep. You know, for entertainment purposes.”

Report: Buddy The Cat Remains Extremely Handsome

An important new study provides insight into Buddy’s magnetism and good looks.

NEW YORK — Buddy the Cat remains extraordinarily good looking, according to a new report from The Buddy Institute for Buddinese Studies.

The paper, which was also published to the open-access journal PLOS One, looked at 32 factors of aesthetic consideration, including facial symmetry, coat silkiness, awesomeness of tabby markings and eye color.

The research also focused on non-physical traits that contribute to the silver tabby cat’s universal appeal.

“This study confirms what scientists have long suspected, that Buddy the Cat is not just devastatingly handsome, but also remarkably charming and clever,” said the paper’s lead author, Sigmund Furreud. “In addition, he has the physique of a Catdonis. He’s super ripped.”

Buddy Calvin Klein — Buddy is an in-demand model in the feline fashion world.

For the subjective portion of the study, researchers also distributed questionnaires to 500 cats and 500 humans. The feline responses were weighted twice as heavily compared to the human responses, since felines are smarter and their opinions more relevant, but the research team saw similar levels of Buddesian popularity among both groups.

“Feline respondents used words like ‘amazing,’ ‘paw-inspiring’ and ‘meowgnificent’ to describe Buddy, and more than half of the cats surveyed said they had posters of Buddy on their walls when they were kittens,” said Meowhammad Saeed al-Sahaf, information minister for The Buddy Institute for Buddesian Studies.

The human responses were equally glowing.

“What we’re hearing from humans, especially cat lovers, is that they would jump at the opportunity to be Buddy’s servant,” al-Sahaf said. “This suggests there is a deep pool of talented potential servants from which to choose in the event, say, that Buddy’s current human disappoints him with subpar treat selections, half-assed petting or late meals. If that makes Buddy’s human nervous, well, it should. He needs to step up the overall level of service.”

Mr. Fluffy Wuffy, one of the felines surveyed for the report, said PITB should take the results to heart and devote more stories to its titular cat.

“No one wants to read about boring stuff that doesn’t have anything to do with Buddy,” the kitten said. “We want all Buddy, all the time. Make it happen, humans!”

Buddy on the runway — Buddy the Cat walks the runway ahead of German model Leon Dame during 2019 Fashion Week in Paris.

Cat On The Street: How Can Humans Better Serve Their Feline Overlords?

How can homo sapiens improve in their capacity as honored servants to felinekind?

Humans have proved their species’ worth over the years by serving us faithfully and completely, but there’s always room for improvement!

How can humans better serve us?

“Why not hire a bard to write and sing glorious songs celebrating my conquests and my many meowgnificent qualities?” – Lord Fluffybutt 1, Warden of the West

“They can bend the knee! No, I mean like actually bend the knee. The lack of bowing and scraping around here is appalling.” – King Komet, 9, magnanimous ruler

“YOU SEE HOW MY HUMAN’S TOES MOCK ME? SEE HOW THEY WIGGLE AS THE HUMAN SNORES? I WILL NOT REST UNTIL I DEFEAT THE FEET!” – Count Clawmore, 7 months, kitten lord

“All I want is a catio, a new condo, free access to catnip, massages on demand and meals when I meow for them. Is that too much to ask?” – Duke Davy, 14, senior statescat

“It would be helpful if my human never left the house, so she’s always around to serve me. What do humans need to go outside for anyway?” – Queen Arya, 6, dynastic monarch

“Sleeping on my servant is very comfy, but I don’t like how his chest rises and falls while he’s breathing. He needs to stop doing that, it’s annoying.” – Caesar the Imperator, 10, conqueror