Little Elmer likely wouldn’t have survived more than a few hours if a Good Samaritan hadn’t found him and brought him to the Humane Society.
Leah Owens and Elmer the kitten have had a rough time of it lately, but now that circumstances have brought them together, both their lives have improved.
Owens, 72, lost her husband to blood cancer late last year and has been feeling lonely. She has three cats, but they’re independent little rascals.
Then Elmer came along.
The gray tabby kitten, who has a very Buddesian look about him, was rushed to the North Texas Humane Society about two weeks ago by a Good Samaritan who found the little guy submerged in a bucket of industrial glue.
Elmer when he was covered in glue, left, and looking healthy and happy now, right. Credit: Humane Society of North Texas
After dish soap and several other substances failed to get the glue out of Elmer’s fur, Owens stepped in and gave the kitten a bath in canola oil.
Removing the super sticky substance required round-the-clock care, with Owens returning Elmer to his oil bath and massaging the glue out of his fur by hand.
Elmer was so relieved, he now considers massages a several times daily requirement and nudges Owens to give him the spa treatment.
Staff at the Humane Society say they’re not sure if Elmer fell into the glue bucket or if someone tossed him into it. He’s about two months old.
Elmer resembles a certain gray tabby and even has a similar tuft of white fur on his chest. Credit: North Texas Humane Society
As stories like this always do, Elmer’s plight pulled on the heartstrings of potential adopters, but Elmer and Owens have grown quite fond of each other.
Now it’s official: Owens’ home is Elmer’s forever home, and she’s his caretaker/masseuse for life.
Great job, Leah Owens! And watch out, gray tabbies can be quite demanding, but they also have big hearts.
Buddy becomes increasingly agitated as kittens and cats write in to praise him for voicing the beloved Sesame Street character, Elmo.
Dear Little Buddy,
You’re a humble dude, you know that? All this time we’ve gotten to know you through your blog, with your human sharing stories about your many exploits and adventures, and not once did anyone bother to mention you’re the voice of Elmo.
Of course it makes perfect sense. Who better to play a fluffy, adorable character than a fluffy, adorable kitty?
So now the cat’s out of the bag, tell us: what’s it like voicing Elmo? Are you a method actor, and if so, do you take on the personality of Elmo even when the camera isn’t rolling? Is it hot in that costume? Are you friends with Big Bird? Is Oscar really a grouch off camera?
Your fan,
Cornelius the Kitten
Dear Cornelius,
I am NOT Elmo! I don’t play Elmo, I definitely don’t sound like Elmo, and I don’t even like Elmo!
I don’t know where this slander originated, but clearly someone is jealous of me for being an apex predator with huge meowscles, so they spread these hurtful Elmorian rumors.
Buddy the Tiger
Dear Buddy,
I get it! You’re not Elmo just like Bruce Wayne isn’t Batman. Your identity is safe with me! (But good job playing the character, wink wink!)
Your friend,
Cornelius the Kitten
Dear Buddy,
The kitten is right, you sound exactly like Elmo. When you try to roar it sounds like an extremely constipated Elmo a day after eating PF Chang’s. Your trills sound like Elmo using DuoLingo to learn Spanish.
Go to Youtube, search “tiger roaring” and try to keep a straight face while insisting you sound like a tiger instead of Elmo.
Okay, Elmo?
Grover Fan in Gainesville
Grover Fan,
FAKE NEWS!
Buddy
Dear Elmo,
Can I have your autograph? It’s okay, I know you’re really a cat, you can sign it with your paw.
The surprised home inspector made a phone call from inside the owner’s living room, reporting “an intimidatingly large cat.”
Home camera footage shows a housing inspector who enters a family’s living room and stops dead in his tracks because he sees…a Maine Coon?!
The inspector was concerned enough that he phoned back to the office to report an “intimidatingly large cat.”
“I’m doing a home inspection now and, like, there’s this cat here, and it’s a very large size cat,” he tells the person on the other end of the line. “You know how you see a cat and they have a cute face? This cat is like… I might eat you later.”
Of course we get this sort of thing all the time here at Casa de Buddy. Oftentimes people will hear Little Buddy’s terrifying roar and cast an uncertain glance my way.
“Dude, you got Elmo locked in a room or something?”
Followed inevitably by Bud’s indignant reply.
“I do NOT sound like Elmo! I’m a tiger, I just haven’t hit my growth spurt yet.”
So there you have it. Weird things can happen when you have a huge cat in your home…or one who sounds like Elmo.
This weekend marks 12 years since I took home an energetic, bold, curious, talkative gray tabby kitten.
In some ways it feels like it can’t possibly be 12 years since I adopted the Budster, but it also feels like the little dude has been around forever. He’s such an outsize presence with a huge personality, and he never lets you forget he’s around.
As we celebrate the loudmouthed, opinionated, turkey-loving little guy, here are some of his adventures as chronicled here on PITB:
The time he broke into the tiger enclosure at the Bronx Zoo to hang with his “homies” and was claimed as a cub by a tigress who gave him big, sloppy tongue baths.
The time he traveled to the Amazon to hang out with jaguars and was oddly accepted by them after he shared turkey and showed them how to make more comfortable beds.
The time Sir David Attenborough made a documentary about “the silver-furred Buddy” in “his native habitat, the living room.”
The time he issued his little red book filled with his wisdom, like this nugget: “Observe the human, and its wretched species, always in thrall to an invented concept called time. The time is what you say it is. I say it’s time for a snack.”
Bud must have been born some time in February of 2014, but since I don’t know the day, his adoptiversary is his de facto birthday.
We’ve got a long weekend ahead of us, including a party, a dance contest, a cocktail hour with Bud’s jaguar friends, and of course the grand fireworks display on Sunday night. There will be catnip and turkey for all.
Credited to an “activist investor,” one airline has redoubled efforts to squeeze money out of travelers — and people traveling with pets could be next.
Travelers are calling it a “fat tax.”
The anecdotes, which have been popping up all over social media platforms this week, are similar: flyers show up to the airport, a counter person looks them up and down, then declares the flyer will have to purchase a second seat or give up their spot on the plane.
That this is happening on Southwest Airlines, long praised as the most considerate toward “passengers of size,” is even more surprising. SF Gate attributes the dramatic shift in policy, which is apparently just one of many, to an “activist investor.”
It doesn’t say who that “activist investor” is, but it’s difficult to imagine a person wealthy enough to own a significant portion of an airline developing a personal vendetta after bad experiences in crowded coach. This is something different, driven by the desire to extract more money from travelers with rent-seeking behavior. That sort of thing, an “activist investor” certainly would do. Boosting profits without creating any value has become the calling card of America’s financial ruling class.
Which is why it’s likely this problem was created by the airlines in the first place, and why pet caretakers should be wary. (And no, not because felines like my Bud are a little too fond of the yums.)
Airlines are always looking for ways to add new seats, and every year brings new “innovations” to reclaim space centimeter by centimeter so the airlines can sell extra tickets.
Credit: Anthony Baratier/Wikimedia Commons
We’ve long since become cattle. I’m 5’10” and I’ve been on flights in which my knees barely fit between the seat in front of me and my own. I always wonder: what would I do if I were taller? How the heck does someone, say, 6’2″ sit in one of these seats?
The effort to squeeze more money from travelers isn’t limited to the new “fat tax” either. From “premium economy” upsells that don’t yield more space to ever-shrinking carry-on limits, airlines continue to find new routes into our wallets, making us pay more for the same product.
And that’s why those of us with pets should be worried. It’s a short leap from a “fat tax” to a “cat tax.”
“You’ll be in coach while I take my place in first class, human.”
Most airlines treat people traveling with pets as a nuisance to begin with, and if they haven’t already, Southwest’s “activist investor” is likely to find new ways to squeeze people traveling with cats and dogs. (In my head, I imagine this “activist investor” as a vaguely Stephen Milleresque figure, with twitchy eyes betraying the rage bubbling below a calm exterior. “Let them sit elbow to elbow as they cradle their animals,” he laughs from his first-class seat. “Muahahaha!”)
The fact that this “fat tax” is arbitrary should scare all of us. If the whim of a counter clerk is what determines whether someone has to buy an extra seat, then who’s to say the same clerks won’t look at a cat, declare “He looks like a pain in the ass,” and demand some additional, ludicrously-titled fee?
“That comes to an additional $276.13 with your companion animal convenience surcharge. Thank you for flying with us!”
It just keeps getting better and better, doesn’t it?
![Home Inspector Freaked Out By Large Maine Coon [VIDEO]](https://littlebuddythecat.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/05/budmirror.jpg?w=850)
