The head shake...I am resetting myself after stress

Watch the head shake. What does it mean? Educating humans about cat body language is not easy but I am still trying to do so.

When we repeatedly shake our heads, there may be a veterinary reason - like ear mites or perhaps a grass seed has got into the ear. We will probably scratch at the ear too.

But a single small headshake is a way of expressing ourselves. It means we are trying to reset our emotions after something has stressed us. 

It is usually only a small head shake - and humans often don't even notice it. If they do, they probably don't understand its meaning. 

• For more cat body language videos, go to my Youtube channel (under Celia's name, alas) and press on Playlists. Choose Cat signals - what is my cat saying, - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCQMXNyTVlCTxbGCe1QLO9tw
  

Watch my head turn - what am I feeling?

Just a shelf and no way to escape staring humans - head turn

 Staring between us cats can be challenging or even threatening. So one way to lessen the tension is for one of us to turn his head away, breaking the mutual eye gaze.

Staring by humans can also make us uneasy or fearful. So we turn our head away, and break off the gaze. It shows we are uneasy, worried or even frightened.

Alas, in cat shelters we cats may be left with no way to hide or retreat from the staring humans. All we can do is turn our head away. There is video on Celia's Youtube channel here.

So, if we look frightened, stop staring at us. Turn your own eyes away or even turn you head and look sideways at us.

We will feel less worried.

Watch my tongue - what am I saying?

The tongue flick showing anxiety

 Humans don't know how to read cat language. We have to remember that they are dumb animals with no proper feline language - only an assorted number of meaningless vocalisations.

So watch my tongue, humans. It will give you a message to tell you how I am feeling.

If I flick my tongue upwards towards my nose, that signals that I am feeling slightly anxious. You can see it in a video that Celia has posted on her Youtube channel here. 

Toby is enjoying being petted but it is slightly too rough for him. So he gets slightly anxious. He flicks his tongue then he turns his head away to show he has had enough for the time being.

If your human wants to learn cat language, get her/him to watch the video.

Lessons for humans 6. Don't put up with groping.

 

                                        Video - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3JiIDD6O_9k
 

We cats are quite clear about body privacy. We know where we DON'T want to be touched. Backside, belly, tail end of back - these are often our private areas.

We also are clear when we want humans to stop touching.

So when some insensitive human gropes us, we nip, bite or scratch. We make it quite clear - Take your hands off me. 

Video - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6P5KysZq0FE

Humans could learn from us. Send a clear message if you don't want to be groped.

You can't bite most of the time. Your face is wrongly designed. You can't  scratch because you have pathetic nails not proper claws.

But you can shout, hit or slap. Humans, it is the twenty first century. You don't have to put up with groping. 

• For a video of lessons from cats go to Celia's Youtube channel - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uBIJyISl3rA&t=55s

Lessons for humans 5. Check the toilet bowl

Tommy inspects his urination. Full video -

https://youtu.be/ujWARbL9tws

 One of the weirdest things about humans is how they toilet. They sit on a ceramic seat, do their business and then pull a lever which flushes water down the same ceramic.

Odd. Very odd, indeed. I have spent time looking into the human toilet and I still don't understand....

There is something they often forget to do... to take a good look at their eliminations before washing them away.

We cats always do this, unless we are interrupted or when the litter tray is covered in a way which makes it too difficult to turn round.

Tommy inspects the human toilet

Yet if humans did this every single time, they would learn more about their state of health. Did dark urine show that they needed to drink more water? Was there blood in their stools? 

So, humans, take a lesson from cats. Take a good look in that ceramic bowl before flushing....

Lessons for Humans 4. Learn balance

 

You can see this on video here _ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oOkx5Ae5_1w 

Humans are clumsy animals with serious disabilities. As a result of having only two legs (bad) instead of four (good), their ability to balance is poor. 

So poor that some of the older humans try to add a  third leg by using a stick. It's pathetic to see them staggering along. Others go further and add four legs to their existing two by using a walking frame. That's verging on the weird.

In contrast we cats have excellent balance. It's not just that we have four legs. We are also superior in that we have a tail - a flexible tail that can wave from side to side and upwards and downwards. 

A dog has a tail but while it contributes to balance, it cannot help really difficult balancing actions. It is too stiff.

What can humans learn from us? Despite having no tail and only two legs, they can at least make an effort to improve their poor balance by occasionally using only one leg.

I suggest that all humans should spend five minutes standing on one leg, then on the other.  (Think flamingo!). If they do this conscientiously their balance will improve a little.

Of course, they will never achieve the graceful balance of us cats!

Lessons for Humans 3. Speak Your Gratitude.

Hear the purr at Celia's Youtube channel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mMH0Q-3hEcw

 

We show our pleasure and gratitude by purring or by snuggling up close. Or both. We do this when humans do something we like.

Gratitude works.... If we purr at them when we are eating specially nice food, they are more likely to give it to us again.  

So humans could learn from us. Humans are verbal beings. The poor things can't purr. But they can make a wide variety of vocalisations, which they call speech.

So humans, speak your gratitude. Remember to say thank you when other people do something you like.

And say a big thank you - with smiles and hugs where appropriate - when another human does you a favour.

Remember, gratitude spoken aloud often brings more favours! We cats don't purr for nothing!

 

Lessons for humans. 2. Avoid self pity.

 Humans don't deal with personal disasters as well as we cats do. We cats don't waste time feeling sorry for ourselves. We learn to have fun, even if we have major problems.

Take Tanni, for instance. She was only a kitten when she lost a front leg in a car accident. You might think that she would become some sort of invalid.

Not Tanni. Within 24 hours she was leaping around and playing with cat toys, determined to have fun again. She even chased a bit of fluff on the veterinary floor when she came to after the amputation. No languishing around in the cat bed. 

Later when she went to her forever home, she showed her humans how she could climb up trees with only three legs and catch mice with only a single paw. Anything that a cat with four legs could do, she did with only three.

Lessons for humans. Make sure you have fun, even if you have the bad luck to be disabled.

Lessons for humans. 1. Keep clean

I wish humans could learn to wash as often as I do - and to do a more thorough job. I clean every area of my body at least three or four times daily.

Indeed about 20% of my time is spent washing myself - my tail, my paws, my back, my belly and those intimate areas that I reach by pushing one leg in the air while balancing on my backside.

Humans can't do that.

Instead they wallow in water in a bath sometimes for hours, or what seems like hours. Too long I think.

Picked up as a stray, Caesar has a good wash

The impatient ones step into a shower and spend perhaps 10 minutes or so washing.  Not enough time, I think.

I could teach my human how to do a better job, just using her tongue. she could start with her toes and move upwards.... 

 

Don't forget the tail

Only she can't. She is just not flexible enough. And her tongue doesn't have those little hooks that mine does.

She has a pathetic tongue. It is sort of floppy and smooth on the surface. No good for washing fur and not much use even for the bald human skin.

Sad...

How to wake up your human

 

Chest kneading

Humans are lazy animals. Every now and again, they refuse to wake up on what they call "Sunday." (And, no, I don't know what that means.)

 It is necessary to wake them. Here are some methods contributed by various cats who have refined their individual technique.

• Heavy kneading on the human chest.
• The flying pounce.
• The loud purr in ear.
• The gentle ear nip.
• Walking up and down the body.
  
• Loud mewing.
• Jumping on and off the bed.
• Nipping toes protruding from the duvet.
• Face to face rubbing, with or without purr.
• Backing the butt close to the human nose.... yes, that works!
• Bringing a dead rat on to the bed.
  
  
  
  

But the ultimate wake up call is a living rat on pillow. That always works. And it works fast.

When forever isn't forever.

 Merlin, the beautiful grey cat in this photo, has had bad luck. He has had to move four times in the last 8 months. And he is a very lovable easy cat.

First he was handed into a UK rescue and adopted by a suitable woman. But she had just lost her previous cat and decided her decision had been too fast. She needed to mourn a little more.

So Merlin went as a foster cat to Celia, living in one room for about two months, before finding another home. This time with a charming young man who had just the right living quarters for him.

But then disaster struck. Merlin's third owner was given a new job in London, and could not afford to rent a home that was suitable for a cat.

So now Merlin needs yet another home. It will be his fourth, if you count the time he spend with Celia in her spare bedroom.

He's a beautiful grey cat, friendly, without any bad habits.

The cat in the stable....

FREDERICO BAROCCI

 Yes, of course, there was a cat in the Bethlehem stable. How else would the stable been safe for a baby, at that amazing moment in history.  

So, it's not in the Bible account.? Does that mean it wasn't there? That though there were oxen and a donkey, those were the only animals.

Not so. There would have been the pigeons or doves, roosting during the night up in the rafters. And, of course, there would have been mice and probably some rats, picking up any spare grain left by the oxen.

LEONARDO DA VINCI

There would have been the insects too. Probably some beetles, ants, moths and butterflies in hibernation. There might even have been some hibernating wall lizards that winter. 

It was an ordinary stable with ordinary creatures great and small. And in the centre of them all, a new born baby.

REMBRANDT

Of course there were cats. The great painters knew that. 

Christmas trees.. this year's disaster.

 Yes, she's done it again. My living room now has a rather unpleasant pine tree in it.

I used to enjoy the tree when I was younger. I climbed it. I pulled off the baubles. Sometimes I succeeded in pulling it down altogether.

She tried hanging it from the ceiling one year. That was a real challenge. I managed one of the best leaps of my life and clung on to it, while it swung wildly.

But it all ended badly with a trip to the vet, when I got a pine needle stuck in my paw. 

So this year I intended to ignore the tree.

Alas for good intentions. This tree smelled of DOG. To be exact, it smelled of dog pee.

So I had to overmark it. I backed up and sprayed on it.

That didn't end well, either.

• Get your human to buy this. Sales pay for my catfood!
  
  
  
  

It hurts, you stupid human!

 

Ouch.. why do humans do that? The vet was pulling my leg around so I doubled back and bit him.

Then my human apologized as if I had done something wrong. He had hurt me. He should have apologized to me.

What did he expect, handling me like that. His explanation (not to me but to her) was that he was palpating me! Palpating! Not so much palpating as punishing me with pain.

You just can't get through to them. As if it wasn't enough that I am getting stiff with arthritis in my old age! Of course that makes me grumpy. Oldies in pain always are. Not just cats but humans too.

It's that flooring in the kitchen that is to blame. I have to go there to eat and use the litter tray, but it's hard and slippery tiles. What I need is non-slip flooring or carpet.

The litter tray is getting difficult too. She should get me one with an easy entrance. It hurts when I have to lift my legs to get into it. 

One day I won't bother. I will just pee on the floor. And she will blame me, rather than the high sides of the litter tray.

I could do with a ramp on to the sofa, and on to the bed. Yet it has never occurred to her. Why doesn't the vet suggest this instead of pain-palpitating me! A fat lot of good that is.

I heard him say "weight loss." Food is almost the only pleasure I have left. Why didn't he say "Flooring."

Humans - dumb animals without any empathy for elderly cats! I 

Cats are smarter than babies.

That cats are more clever than babies is not news for us cats. It is obvious to any cat who has compared human babies with kittens.

Kittens can walk at the age of two weeks: babies are still unable to do this at that age. Kittens are litter trained by eight weeks: babies are not potty trained until about one to three years (depending on their mothers' skills).

Now scientists have tested how quickly cats can make an association of a word with a picture. They can do this more quickly than babies.

Is this surprising? Not in the least. Human babies are incredibly slow to develop physical and mental skills compared with kittens. 

Sad that scientists have to rediscover obvious truths. But that is how humans work...

We just get on with enjoying warmth and sunlight and good food and hunting. 

Wiser than dumb humans? Of course.

 

• Here is the original report - https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-024-74006-2 

"Elections?" No, cat shelters.

Stray cats in Idaho love US "elections", I have been told by feline friends. It is all because of the election signs humans put on their lawns.

These are useless rectangles with markings upon them that humans call writing. Some rectangles are blue. Some are red (though this colour is difficult for me to see.) Don't ask me why because I don't know.

Why they create these idiotic useless signs is beyond my understanding. Humans get excited about such odd things and do so many pointless things.

But there is a human in Idaho who makes these plastic rectangles into insulated cat shelter boxes, so that stray cats can keep warm in winter.  

So there is one sensible human who knows what really matters. And it isn't this so called "election." 

We cats dread Christmas....

 

My idiotic relative Percy likes Christmas

There may be some cats that enjoy Christmas, but I don't. And  almost all the cats I am acquainted with simply loathe it. Except for Percy on the left.

 The only good thing about Christmas is the turkey. There is usually a lot left over at the end of the day, so I might get some as a treat.

Otherwise it is a nightmare of humans - babies, toddlers (ugh!), harassed adults. Young children may even try to "dress" me.

Strangers invade the house. They ruin the family scent that I have carefully created by rubbing against my normal human and the furniture.

They smell wrong, wrong, wrong... Worse still, some of them smell of dog. And worst of all, sometimes they bring a dog into my home.

Some of the humans get drunk too. That makes them vocalise loudly and sometimes leads to a vocal fight among the relatives. It is a grim time.

What can a self-respecting cat do? Well I retire to the spare bedroom (if it is unoccupied) or loaf around on my human's bed. 

I suppose I should be grateful that I am not put into a cattery. Some of my feline friends languish in solitary confinement while their humans go for a holiday.

Christmas is coming.... and I dread it.

Phew, the danger is over... but another to come

 

This is the worst time of year for all cats, particularly black ones. Why? Because humans celebrate Halloween and then in the UK Guy Fawkes night (G.F. being the man who tried to blow up the House of Commons.)

In the USA Halloween (October 31) is particularly dangerous for black cats, because some yobs will chuck them on to bonfires. Worse still, cat-lovers will pick up stray black cats and deliver them to cat shelters.

What's wrong with that? Well, apart from no-kill shelters, black cats are often euthanised because they are more difficult to rehome. So these "rescued" black cats may get killed because by the shelter itself.

This Halloween danger is particularly bad in the US. In the UK, where fortunately almost all shelters are no-kill, black cats are not routinely euthanised. 

But bonfires and fireworks are still dangerous to cats whether at Halloween or Guy Fawkes night. Street yobs think it is funny to throw bangers at passing cats or, worse, tie them on a cat. 

That's one danger. Even if the cat isn't hurt, they may run off and get lost.

The other danger is bonfires. Not many humans are vile enough to throw a cat on a bonfire, but nonetheless some cats get burned in these fires.

A stray cat looking for shelter, may tunnel in to a bonfire before it is lit. (So may hedgehogs). Often a bonfire is built a few weeks before the celebration in order to collect enough material.

Then if nobody bothers to check before lighting it, any animals who took refuge there are burned to death.

So purrlease keep us safe this coming Firework Night in the UK.

 

*Want to know more about what it is like being rescued? Read this book for the inside story.

If cats designed catteries...

This cattery design looks modern but it gives the inmates no privacy from staring humans.

 If we cats designed catteries, the most important thing we would do is make sure every cattery has a hiding place. A proper one which gives complete privacy.

It's always scary going to a boarding cattery for the first time. It smells wrong. There are weird noises. And - worst of all - there are strange human beings STARING at us.

Staring is intimidating and stressful.

That's why we need a small area to which we can retreat, until we have got used to the pen and can spend some time rubbing around it to spread our scent so that it smells like home.

The worst cattery designs are those that just have a shelf and a blanket. If there is a high sided bed, that helps a little though not enough.

The other cattery designs we hate are those one where only glass separates us from the humans the other side.  We have to sit near the glass because that is the only heated area.

Nervous cats close their eyes and pretend to sleep - it's called feigned sleep and it is a sign of stress. Our bodies are tense, our back is humped up, and every now and again we turn our heads away from the staring humans.

Watch this video at  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gxnA1YL3KJw   and you will see what I mean.

OK, so you humans cannot afford to rebuild your cattery. We understand. But there is something you can do.

PLEASE give us a cardboard box (photo abovve)  to hide in. Or buy a Hide & Sleep (photo right) from Cats Protection which gives more protection.

 

The Prime Minister didn't adopt. He shopped.

 

KITTENS LIKE CONRAD NEED A HOME....

Humans will keep buying us. As if we were a packet of cereal from a supermarket. Then after buying us with money, they think they own us.

Indeed their stupid laws says we are a possession.

The UK prime minister is the latest idiot to buy a cat. He has acquired an expensive Maine coon kitten "for his children." That's a typical politician's excuse.

He could have adopted a kitten that needed a home. He could have been like American president Joe and his wife Jill Biden who always adopt rescue animals.

Our prime minster just flashed the cash. If it was his purrsonal cash. Maybe it wasn't. He doesn't buy his own glasses and his suits. They are donated by a friend.

He could have set a good example by getting a rescue cat. He could have done something for cat welfare. He might even have shown some love and sympathy for homeless cats.  He chose not to. 

I am glad I am a cat, not a politician. I think more clearly. I have proper pride. 

Cats in hats

Dressing up cats is one of the more disgusting habits of young humans, usually females. It's uncomfortable, and it goes against the dignity of any decent cat. It's feline humiliation at its worst.

Cats hate hats. 

Now adult scientists are doing it and I am not sure whether to give it my approval or not. They have started crocheting little hats for cats, so that they can measure brain activity.

Demeaning? Yes. Should be stopped? Purrhaps not. The aim is to measure feline brain activity so as to learn more about chronic pain. 

Many of us older cats have severe arthritis. Our dumb human companions often don't notice this. We hide our pain and do not complain. Unlike them... have you ever heard two oldie humans swapping stories about their health? Pathetic.

So the aim of these hats is to benefit cats, not humans -- for a change. And although the cats in the Youtube report (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jLyRnnprR-M) look very fed up with their hats, maybe their disgust is justified by the benefits that may result.

And, of course, this is non-invasive research. No cat is hurt in the process. Just made to feel very very undignified. What do other felines think?

How we domesticated humans

 This is a home for a cat circa 8,500 BC - one of the first that humans built when they became civilised and friendly to cats.

Before that time they wandered around the landscape without settling down in one spot. 

Once they settled, they had to store food. So house mice moved in.  So did sparrows. And so did we.... for the mice not the humans.

But the shelter from the weather suited some of us too. Admittedly building techniques in the so called Fertile Crescent were only mudbrick and the entrance door was in the roof... but better than a cold cave.

It was the beginning of the domestication of humans by cats. We moved in when we thought they had evolved enough.

• Photo shows early Neolithic mudbrick house, recreated at Asikli Hoyuk in Turkey.
  

Interventions for online addicts

Humans are strange creatures that get addicted to their computer screens. They are simply not present. Not here. Like drug users, they become more and more lost in their addiction.

We can help them get out of the online world and back into reality. But it takes tough love and a lot of purrsistence.

Luckily we cats have patience. We can wait at a mouse hole for hours and hours. This quality will be needed in our dealings with online addicts.

I recommend a sliding scale of action. Try these methods and then use the ones that work best.

• Mewing. Sound not scent is the best normal way to get your human's attention. They are scent blind but can be roused with noise.
• Purring loudly... you need to have jumped on the desk to make this rather charming intervention work. Purr as close to their face as possible. Lure them into looking at you not the screen.
  
• Desk roaming. Walk round the desk area, poking your paw at anything which might fall off the desk.
• Printer sitting. Sit on the printer and wait for the paper to come out. Treat this intervention as if you were waiting for a mouse to emerge from its mousehole. Printers are slightly warm to the butt, so this is quite an enjoyable intervention. 
• Printer take down. If the printer is a cheap one, your weight may stop printing altogether or even, if you are lucky, break the ridiculous item.
• 
  Keyboard paw work. Poking or sitting on the keyboard can produce a pleasing range of gobbledegook on the screen. Useful in vet's surgeries to prevent note taking.
  
• Screen blocking. Some cats do not bother with the above methods. They move straight to screen blocking. Blocking the screen makes online users unable to use. It is probably the best intervention going but comes with hazards if the online addict is likely to be violent.

 

Purrlease don't eat me....

 

It's been a worrying time for felines in Ohio, USA. An internet rumour suggested that some people there were eating cats and dogs. Then Donald Trump said this was really happening.

We cats want to put it on record that we taste absolutely horrible. We are appallingly difficult to digest too.

So if you suddenly go bonkers and decide to eat a dead cat, you will find it difficult to swallow even a single bite - because of the vile taste. And, if you purrsist, you will have awful indigestion.

You will be up all night being sick not knowing which end - face or butt - to put on the lavatory. 

YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED....

What do these capital letters remind you of? A certain style which appears on the ill-named Truth Social.

Oh and by the way there is a great song you can listen to on Youtube. You can even buy it here. All the money will go to cat and dog rescue.

So good comes out of harm....

PS. The blog is late due to my secretary being at The Cat Show in Birmingham. And it may be intermittent for a couple of weeks in Sept and Oct, as she is gallivanting around Turkey. You can't get the staff nowadays.

When all else fails - try a fly.

Hunting is what I like best but as an indoor-only cat I don't have many chances. I have been unable to purrsuade my human to supply living mice for me.

She just won't. She used to keep them as pets, and she thinks mice are rather nice.

Instead she plays games with me using a fishing rod toy. Now this is OK, but a fishing rod toy is not a mouse. And when I catch it, there is nothing to kill.

She tried lazer lights too. I quite liked these but I found them even more frustrating than the fishing rod toy. With the toy I could grab it and rake it with my back legs even if I couldn't give the kill bite. But with a lazer there was nothing to grab.

And besides, she never gives me enough play time.d

So I I decided it would have to be flies. Bluebottles, ordinary house flies, are best. They are big enough to see properly and when you catch them they are crunchy.

You can still enjoy being a serial killer, even if your victims are just small insects.

Wasps, those insects that are yellow and stripey, are a mistake. A big mistake. Bite a wasp and you find yourself in the vet's surgery. 

Rescue smarter... homeless cats need your help.

 This is the problem.... how can we help find not just any solution but the right solution for all of us cats. By all of us I mean the wild feral cats, the community cats and (of course) the homeless pet cats.

I've been researching this and my human is going to give a talk about it at the Birmingham Cat Show in the UK on September 14. She's also going to sell a few books -- with luck!

Purrlease get up to date on cat rescue. Don't put feral cats in "sanctuaries". Trap, neuter them and put them back where they belong where they can have a happier longer life, now that they are not worn out by kitten bearing or by sexual diseases.

Rescue smarter. The quicker cats get out of a rescue into a home, the more cats can be helped.

If you can't listen to Celia on September 14, go straight to International Cat Care for details of how to rescue smartly, take a course, and learn Trap, Neuter and Return.

Help us NOW.

Disgusted... a kitten

 

This is Max. He looks quiet in this photo. He's not.

She's done it again. She's imported another awful foster kitten. It's disgusting.

Humans are so selfish. OK so she tried to hide it away in the spare room. Huh. Of course I could smell the intruder.

I walked to the closed door and gave the loudest hiss that I could. Don't know if the kitten heard it, but she did. "That will teach her to think I might mother it," I said to myself.

But did it? The kitten is still there. Worse still, it's completely manic. She lets it out sometimes and it tears round the house at the speed of knots.

Of course if it comes near me - and she has the decency to try to make sure it doesn't by shutting various doors - I arch my back and hiss again.

For about two seconds that stops it in its tracks. Then it speeds off again jumping and running and cavorting everywhere.

She says she is just fostering it. Thank goodness. I can't bear much more.

That kitten is a revolting intruder. It must go....

The joy of scratching....

 

Humans amuse me! Particularly scientists! They have been studying why we scratch and have come up with some delightful theories - mainly that we scratch because we are stressed.

Ridiculous, of course. We scratch because we enjoy it. I love the way it makes my claws tingle, the relief when an old claw sheath falls off, the satisfaction of a good long stretch of the whole body.

It's fun, humans. We do it because we can - where we can, when we can, and how we can.

So maybe we scratch a bit more often to cheer ourselves up when we are stressed... but the basic reason is the joy of scratching.

Purrsonally I enjoy the edge of the sofa best. The furniture covering has just the right kind of tension to make my claws tingle. 

And  scratching on the furniture always gets my human's attention -  "Gerroffit" she shouts! So satisfying.

I also scratch the doormat when she comes home. This is a courtesy greeting to say "I am so pleased you came home, look at the way I show it."

Other pleasing scratch places are the  table legs in the kitchen, the door to the bedroom (when I am shut out by mistake) and of course the early morning scratch on the side of the bed to wake her up.

But best of all was the wonderful scratch I once had on an oak tree. Get your human to buy a forest.

 

Giving a home to a homeless human....

No, this isn't Giles... but I wouldn't mind fostering a Aussie firefighter....

 I have just taken in a homeless human.... well, sort of. I have my own permanent pet human, Celia, and lately I added a temporary foster human, Giles. He won't be staying long only until he has found a new home! 

He's more or less trained. Not a stray. Puts out food when I ask him. Pets me when I get close enough. So now I have two human servants rather than one.

They more or less get on together - though there is some disagreement about TV programmes and both of them show an unhealthy addiction to smart phones rather than focusing solely on me.

Last Thursday was Homeless Animals Day. I have mixed feelings about that. Of course, I want more human homes for cats, but I don't necessarily want my own home invaded by another cat. I like living alone.

There is a pesky foster kitten in my spare room at the moment and I am not at all pleased. Foster humans I can bear: foster cats I hiss at when I see them.

Luckily the kitten will be going soon..... But I shall miss the foster human when he goes.