So, what do you think?
Lucky it was a big black and white tux softy?
PLEASE don’t scruff adult cats (they’re not little lightweight kittens – and it’s apparently scary for big cats).
Apparently, the cat’s on Twitter, and was seen to tweet, “Meh – I’ll kill her later”.
I have to confess, I was initially worried about the cat (thoughts of her saying “PSPSPSPSPSPS… Come here kitty, come home with me, you look so yummy I could eat you”), then spotted the creepy duck and friends behind, eyeballing them both!
Don’t know about anybody else these days, but the Chinese jokes are wearing a bit thin.
For example, I truly regret referring to ‘Chineseum’ a year or two ago (but just the once) when I bought a specialised type of lock pick. By reputation, regardless of supplier, these were terrible. On the other hand, their cost was only a few pounds, and about 8% of the price of a genuine one. Unfortunately, although I had bought it with the intention of modifying it (which I would not do to the genuine item), the example I got was so poorly made it broke in the mail. Worse still, it was a tiny weld, so small I couldn’t fix it, and no other fixing method would be strong enough for the small lever.
But the real problem today seems to be EVERY YouTube ‘Expert’ – regardless of what the item is, and whether it has been tested, failed, or works, it seems to be necessary to mock it, and refer to it as ‘Chinese Junk’, or Chineseum. I don’t think they realise how stupid or repetitive they have become over time, and even respectable YouTubers have fallen into this nasty habit.
I’m not just rambling, there is a point.
Whenever cats and dogs are mentioned in relation to Asian countries, and China, it’s often assumed that many there eat cats and dogs,
However, having had reason to look into this a while ago, it seems that this practice has all but ended, and like all old habits/traditions, largely lives on only in those old diehards who were brought up to the custom, and cannot see any reason not to partake in their favourite delicacy.
In general, the young, and more open-minded, have taken on board how this custom is regarded by the rest o the world, and now see cats and dogs as pets, rather than dinner.
With that in mind, I was intrigued to see a lady cross the view of a camera I was watching, and couldn’t help but notice the cat firmly clamped to her shoulder.
With the blurry image, I can’t be sure, but that does look quite like a pedigree cat (no, I’m not going to try naming it).
Chinese Cat Lady
Least someone suggest I’m ignoring another issue, I don’t want to digress in what is really meant as a light-hearted post, but will mention that the decline and hopefully demise of the custom of eating cats and dogs has led to another, which also needs education, and perhaps legislation.
Breeders may not be filling cages with cats and dogs for the table, but it’s probably fair to say the same people are filling the same cages with puppies and kittens to sell to their new target group of pet owners, and animal welfare isn’t going to be high on their agenda. But they’re still going to be after the money, so it’s not going to be in their interest to have their cages filled with sick or unhealthy stock. Nobody’s going to buy a pet that looks ill or is injured (yes, I know, THAT’s yet another problem).
Apparently you can identify these traders fairly easily.
The animals in their cages will be fat if they have bred to be eaten!
On the other hand, if they’re cute and fluffy, as opposed to being fat – they’re pets.
And before, of course.
Came across the pic below, which led back to its source, and that turned out to be a treasure trove of… Long-forgotten pictures capture escape and discovery in the city’s parks.
Scenes Unseen: The Summer of ’78
Click for bigger.
New York Park 1978 Crazy Cat Lady And Cats
NYT1109
D. Gorton
Tender Vittles, Cats on Parade, Central Park??, #1109, September 1978, D. Gorton
Six months ago, a conservancy official cleaning out an office came across two cardboard boxes that had been sitting around for decades.
Inside were 2,924 color slides, pictures made in parks across New York City’s five boroughs late in the summer of 1978. No one had looked at them for 40 years.
Until now, none of these images have ever been displayed or published. A selection of them are here and in a special print section. More will be on view from May 3 through June 14 at the Arsenal Gallery in Central Park, 830 Fifth Avenue, near 64th Street.
These images were the work of eight staff photographers whose pictures normally ran in The New York Times, but who were idled for nearly three months in 1978 by a strike at the city’s newspapers.
Not long after the strike began that August, a contingent of the photographers — Neal Boenzi, Joyce Dopkeen, D. Gorton, Eddie Hausner, Paul Hosefros, Bob Klein, Larry Morris, and Gary Settle — met with Gordon J. Davis, the city parks commissioner.
They proposed to wander the city and make pictures of the parks and the people in them.
“I was skeptical,” Mr. Davis said, “but what they came back with made me cry.”
The city was a financial ruin and stuff was busted and it seemed it would be that way forever.
No one is sure, any more, how long the photographers worked or how much they were paid. Probably not long and not much.
Mr. Davis, then less than a year into his job as commissioner, remembered the emotional jolt of reviewing a few sample frames. “Then they all disappeared,” he said.
I couldn’t resist a clip from the source.
Sleepy
Can you imagine the same thing ever happening in a Glasgow park?
Somebody trailering four cats around a park, or even taking them there in such a way.
Be nice if they did though, I’d make the trip just for a look every now and then 🙂
Closest I’ve seen to anything like that in Glasgow was a young woman on a bike fitted with trailer, and carrying a couple of toddlers/babies behind.
I was amazed at the sight as this was near Kelvingrove – not the quietest traffic area to be found in Glasgow, but I was still having the life scared out of me by foolishly listening to ‘cycling activists’ at the time, and their biased nonsense.
Now I know every cycle path and segregated route around Kelvingrove, and now know she wasn’t as crazy as I thought when I first saw her.
However, I’m still not convinced at the wisdom of carrying such a precious cargo behind, completely out of sight, should something go amiss.
“No problem, just head for Victoria’s, and you’ll see it on a wall”.
Remind me NEVER to go looking for something without at least a cursory check on its location.
Glasgow grew a new cat mural last week, but weather and other commitments meant I couldn’t whizz into Sauchiehall Street for a quick pic.
And the “Head’s up” I got to its existence with friendly directions…
First, Victoria’s was a nightclub destroyed by a fairly major fire some time ago (almost taking Glasgow’s famous Pavilion Theatre with it). Victoria’s is no longer there, nor is the building, which was totally removed and became a gap site.
Second, since I don’t frequent nightclubs, those directions weren’t really great.
Third, turns out the new mural is not on a wall as such, but on a wooden fence placed in front of the gap site, presumably to stop the locals falling off Sauchiehall Street and into the gap (as they suck on their Buckie bottles).
There’s a fourth – turns out that the damned thing is currently almost hidden/lost behind some temporary fencing surrounding works in the middle of that particular part of Sauchiehall Street.
I went flying past it when I arrived there, and didn’t even spot in broad daylight.
Consequently, I spent the next two hours tramping along Sauchiehall Street, from end to end, and up and down all the side streets looking for it.
Back at Victoria’s gap site, I was about to give up and go home (it was getting dark, we’d reach around 17:00) when I turned around and looked through the blue netting strung around that temporary fencing in the middle of that part of Sauchiehall Street.
There were playful kittens looking back at me through it!
Yup, I was standing across the road from the new cat mural, and hadn’t even seen it.
The fencing made it impossible to get a clear view and a decent pic (not to mention the folk who stopped to take a pic of a tiny little bit of it with the phones), and when I suggested it was long above, I really meant it – this is one loooooooooooooooong mural.
I had to resort to a few tricks to get pics, in the fading light, so hope they’re not too bad.
These pics can all be clicked to expand them.
Long cat/kitten mural is… long.
Sauchiehall Cat Mural Wide
The cats on the left, complete with Crazy Cat Lady’s fetching ankles and cat slippers.
Sauchiehall Cat Mural Left Detail
And the ones on the right.
Sauchiehall Cat Mural Right Detail
I tried a shot through the fence, but couldn’t even get in front of the cats thanks to cabins standing in the enclosed area, blocking the view.
Sauchiehall Cat Mural Fenced
Did you spot the Grumpy Cat Wallpaper?
Well THAT was inevitable 🙂
Secret Scotland 