Why does my human pull my hair every day?

QUESTION:
Every day I have to run and hide behind the fridge. My human then hauls me out, dumps me on her lap, and starts pulling out my hair with a metal implement. Why does she do it? It hurts? Of course, I try to wriggle free but I can't. So I freeze with misery and just let her do it. Why do humans torture cats in this way?
Jasmine.

ANSWER:
You have to assert yourself, Jasmine. It's not enough to run and hide. Take back your power as a cat. Have pride in yourself. This is a claw and order situation. Claw her. Bite her. Hard.
Why does she do it? She thinks she is grooming you. Have you bothered to look how she grooms herself. She uses the same metal implement or something like it. She pours water on her head. She then puffs hot air on it. Some humans even use hot metal combs. Then they hiss sticky stuff. It's almost unbelievable, except for the fact that they haven't got hair in the right places. They can't use their teeth and tongue on themselves. Can't reach those pathetic few tufts of hair, you see. It's really very sad for this highly dysfunctional species.
But if they had any consideration, they would use tongue and teeth like we do when they groom us. They could easily lie on the floor and lick our fur. Use their teeth to tease out a few knots. Why don't they? It's just too much bother. The servant problem for us cats is really difficult. Humans are lazy creatures. I don't know that I have ever heard of a successful training method for this problem.
Which is why I recommend use of teeth and claw.

Cat Question: What if my humans move house?

Dear George
My primary care giver has been talking about "moving house". This has been going on ages now and they may not get round to it but I'm not sure I approve. I have everything I want here, although the large garden which is mentioned sounds good. What do you think?
I would rather not dump them as I am not going back to the streets and like the regular meals, cat flap, litter tray at this cold tie of year and sit down cuddles/ treats on the sofa. Plus I got tuna for breakfast and a new toy recently - a flat mouse shaped leather tag on a leather string, it came with a "work/documents" file which is useless for playing with so the human got that, I think my end of the deal is best. The flat mouse is good though, and smells nice and animal like, so the humans are worth holding onto.
Smudge

ANSWER:

The human obsession with moving house shows their complete inability to grasp the meaning of territory. "Territory is security" is a well known saying among wise cats. We need core territory, a place to eat, sleep and if necessary hide. We also need the home hunting range. We know the home range intimately - the patch of ivy near the garden shed where a family of wood mice hang out, the box shrub that smells like cat pee so we mark on it, the garden wall next door where we can sit and terrorize next door's smaller cat, the frightening front steps near the pavement where passing dogs leave THEIR marks. We know it. We love it. We feel happy in it.
Moving house just ruins everything for us.
Consider your options. Is there a friendly neighbour you could move in on? Is this the time to develop a huge and very visible series of panic attacks? Run from even the slightest noise, hide under the bed, make strange wailing noises? This might persuade your humans that you are going through a nervous breakdown and should not be moved. Also pee on the property pages of the newspapers NOW. Show them what you think of the idea. When they are consulting websites like Prime Location jump on the keyboard with all four paws to make them disappear.

Let's start at the beginning? What is a Human?

In my new role as pet behaviour counsellor, more accurately human behaviour counsellor, I feel I must start at the beginning. I invite your comments and questions, as ever. I will attempt to answer at least one question a week, interpretting human behaviour in a way which may be helpful to us cats.
This is a female of the species with her young one, a junior male. I chose a female, because probably most of us cats choose to live with the females. Males are more likely to be roaming round outside the house. Females spend more time indoor especially when they have a litter of children. While there are wonderful exceptions - males who are house husbands or just properly devoted to cats - females probably make the best choice for the cat starting out with a pet. Females are more submissive in nature, though surprisingly stubborn at times. The cat that is experienced in training and caring for humans, may well want to choose a male. Males are bigger, more challenging, yet surprisingly easy to train once feline superiority is properly established.
If we are to understand human behaviour, we need to look at the species. Like us they are warm blooded mammals. They belong to the ape family. Unlike their fellow apes, they do not have fur. On the basis of this, it has been argued that Homo sapiens is a neotonised ape, ie an ape that has stayed immature. (if apes were insects, the human would be in the larval stage, so to speak.) This relative immaturity will be obvious when we look more closely at human behaviour.
Why are humans given the taxonomic name of Homo sapiens? Why indeed? It is clear to any right thinking cat, that this is indeed a misnomer of the first order. But the reason for it is obvious. Human beings named themselves so. It is as if we cats sat down and decided we would be Felis sapiens. Obviously the second half of the species name would be more applicable to us than them. But, as I have said, humans named themselves. And the choice of name is one which underlines not just their innate immaturity but their innate arrogance.
It's worth pointing out that not only is the human adult in many ways immature, but this immaturity starts very young indeed. Any kitten, however bad its start in life, is startlingly mature compared with human infants. Kittens mature somewhere about 8 weeks, while humans take about 8 years to get to somewhere near the same stage. We will look more closely at this in later posts, because this too is relevant to our experiences with human behaviour.

News -- George will live on in cyberspace

At last... I have decided what to do. George will live on in cyberspace. He may have vanished from my life but his spirit of compassionate superiority toward humans lives on in my mind. He is setting himself up as a human behaviour counsellor. He will start a new blog giving advice to cats about human behaviour. This will begin end February. Questions from cats welcomed.
Celia , pp George.

Bold from the beginning

George took charge of William from the beginning. He spent many happy hours pouncing on unhappy William who was much too gentle to tell him off. He, William, had been smacked round the face by Fat Mog who simply hated having another cat. She hd put William firmly in his place from the start. But poor William just couldn't do it to George.
George enjoyed himself greatly near water. He jumped in to the lavatory pan, luckily when I was nearby to fish him out before he drowned. He tried to get into the shower with me or Ronnie on all occasions. He ventured out on the ice of the pond and fell in. I rescued him with a big fishing net. He shook himself and promptly jumped in again. This time, I rushed him into the house for warming up. He clearly felt this was a bit of a fuss. A week later, when the ice had melted, he jumped in for the third time. This time I waited to see if he could swim. He could and came safely to shore. Oddly enough, perhaps because I hadn't rescued him with the net, he never jumped in again.
Instead, he waded into puddles. He enjoyed this greatly. He liked it when I laughed, so he would do it when I was near him. But I could also look out of the window and see him - in my absence - carefully walking into the biggest puddles. He liked dripping taps, of course. And he enjoyed swishing the water in his water bowl with his paw. That habit continued all his life.
His other favourite activity was climbing. He climbed up my leg levering himself up with his claws on my jeans. I let out what was to him a very satisfactory yelp. He climbed up sofas and beds, of course. He didn't climb up curtains, perhaps because ours are not posh enough. We wouldn't have minded and so perhaps it wasn't worth the effort for him. He climbed up chests of draws, up piles of linen in the linen cupboard, up bookshelves artfully posing near serious books such as the Memoirs of Creevy, and up the hedge.
His most startling exploits were when he climbed up the huge double trunk oak tree in our garden. The first time he did this, I got a step ladder and retrieved him from one of the lower branches. This was a staid end to his adventure. A little while later on a frosty freezing day, he went for the summit, ending up about 100 yards near the top. He wasn't mewing. He just sat there watching the birds in the branches. He was in no hurry to come down as he was clearly enjoying himself. Every now and again he would look down at the garden and climb a little higher just for fun. I spent an hour ringing the RSPCA, the local tree surgeon, friends, and builders who might have long ladders. I couldn't wait for him to come down. It was too cold for such a small animal.
Luckily John Holcroft, a handsome young man on a tractor, was passing by and saw this tiny kitten up in the high branches. John climbed up to the top and with wonderful skill climbed down again with one hand on the trunk and one gripping an indignant George. George was not at all grateful. He was not pleased to be back at ground level.