Where is my Bowler? Male fashion for cats.

Dear George,
As you know, Fiona is my sphynx sister and Sweet Pea is my two legged siser who is 5 years old. They find great delight in chasing me around the house trying to abscound with my Bowler. My Bowler is a very important part of who I am, without it I feel I am not the proper British Mancat who is well Suited and Booted. I feel I cannot show my face or spots without it. Ever since it has gone missing my chin has been down to the ground. What will I do without it I ask myself? Buying another Bowler to replace the one they lost will not do. That Bowler has special meaning to me, it was/is my very first British Bowler, it fits just right. Oh...what will I do? Can you help?
Sincerely
Harry Spotter, at http://spotandfiona.blogspot.com/
PS. I have three large blue spots, blue toupee markings and a blue tail.

Dear Harry,
Are you sure you want a Bowler? What about a Topper? Or a Yorkshire flat 'at? Finding the right size hat for a British (or any other nationality) cat is not going to be easy. Maybe you should have Ratcatcher riding gear (so called among the human hunting set, see http://www.iwfoxhounds.com/hunting_clothes.php ) to go with it - buff or yellow breeches with a tweed riding jacket? Ratcatcher used to be for cub hunting but now has caught on during the proper season. I like to think that humans have taken advice from ratting cats and are wearing as near as the poor souls can get to tabby or dark tortoiseshell fur.
My owner, Oh no, my secretary*, Celia, bought me a Father Christmas hat (see photo left) by buying a Father Christmas soft toy and then detaching the hat. She then gave the doll (which was bald beneath the hat) to a rather puzzled human kitten.
I personally did not appreciate that hat, as you can see from my expression. I felt it was demeaning for me to be dressed like any human being, the inferior species, and worse stlll one that went down chimneys and vocalised "Ho, ho, ho!" (A meaningless bit of human vocalisation but mind you, most of it is, anyway.). I do not wish to go up and down chimneys though I quite like terrifying my humans by getting on the roof.
Your spots bring to mind another thing. Why on earth are there so few cats in the Harry Potter books? Mrs Norris, the cat belonging to Filch the caretaker, is a bad 'un and only Hermione Granger seems to have a proper witches' cat, Crookshanks. Crookshanks is ginger and long haired. Why is there no Grimalkin, the traditional witch's black cat, I ask. We black cats need an PR image consultant.
Sincerely (not love because we are being British)
George
*How could I have made such a mistake. Humans owning cats is just laughable. Everybody knows cats own humans.

At cat is better than a man.... purrsuasions.

Dear George,
I am concerned about my human, Denise. For a week or so she has been off-hand and uncaring towards me. She arrives home late after work, often smelling of alcohol. Last week there were two occasions when she failed to come home until the early hours of the morning. She smelled of male human - you know, that pungent male smell so different from the pleasant female smell. She greets me as if I was no longer the centre of her life. She does her household duties of cleaning the litter tray and putting out more food in a hurried and careless manner. She spends a lot of time vocalising in to the phone in a meaningless way and far less time vocalising to me.
How can I put right our relationship?
Hobbit.
Dear Hobbit,
In normal circumstances most human females know that a cat is better than a man - more graceful, more agile, taking up less space in the bed, and much much cleaner.
But I am afraid your human is showing signs of being on heat. In humans this isn't the monthly physical reaction that we cats understand, know and tolerate. (How much easier it would be if we could just spay them!) It is an emotional thing. Humans, unlike cats, are eager to mate throughout the year. They have no proper seasons. Instead of coming on call (the correct term), hastening off to the nearest group of males, and having a night on the tiles with several of them and getting it all over quickly, humans have a much more drawn out mating ritual.
The likelihood is that Denise has met some male that she fancies. The return in the early hours of the morning means she has spent the night with him. At least she has the good sense to come home, shower, dress and do her household cat duties before leaving again for work. And at least she hasn't given him a home.
What can you do about it? You need to counteract this with a mixture of guile and firmness. Treble your normal greeting rituals. Greet her with loud and pathetic meows. Rub all over her. Crawl all over her. Roll on your back. Generally give the impression of a cat who has suffered intense loneliness in her absence. (Yes, I realise you have probably had a nice day visiting the neighbouring pensioner who feeds you on the sly but she does not need to know this.). Leave some of your food uneaten. Give an unending number of sad looks towards her. You know the score.....
It is a worrying time for you. I will keep my paws crossed for a happy outcome.
Love George.

Cars and roads and cats - I don't get it

Hi George,
I'm Fred and I live with Ginger (who is ginger) and with Ben who is black and doesn't like us younger cats very much. My hunting ground is across the road from where I live, and where the cars are parked. I find the cars handy for hiding under when strangers pass by. So I pop back and forward across the road most days and most nights.
Why does my human worry about this? I know there is traffic. I kind of don't bother about cars. What are they? Nothing much to me. What is this human anxiety about, George? I don't get it.
Love
Fred
Dear Fred,
You right, you don't get it. Neither do I. These metal objects that hurtle down the roads are very mysterious. Most of the time during the day, you and I can manage to avoid them. The speed they do, however, is very confusing. I mean, nothing in nature hurtles along at 50 miles an hour. We cats were designed to avoid big predators like wolves or lions. We are not designed by nature to cope with metal boxes like cars.
At night we don't even have the right kind of eyes for it. Car headlights dazzle us. We can't judge how fast the car is coming at us. We can't see it properly. So most of us just make a run for it. Which is what worries our human pets. They fear we may get killed (as lots of cats do). Of course, if we had them properly under control, we would just ban all cars. But even that might threaten our catfood supplies.
It's tricky. I love hunting at night. I love the moonlit stalk. The pounce in the shadows. Yet crossing the road is a horrible danger. Make your human keep you in at night.
Love George
PS. Posts may be a bit erratic. My secretary's partner is in hospital, so she is spending a lot of time with him instead of doing her duties.

Birthday news from Victoria

Dear George,

It’s me CAT! And….I’m back with good news...

My humans were so surprised by my letter (May 7) I wrote that they ponder all weekend upon the time (and the way) I showed up in their garden.

It seems that I descended from the blue sky on a cosmic ray…. on Victoria’s Day! So, they decided to call me Victoria…as the Queen (no less). I think it’s quite appropriate since I’m convinced of my royal origin.

They were talking about celebrating my birthday on Victoria’s Day from now on. (it doesn’t really matter when one is actually born, right?).

They start decorating the garden and make guest lists and menus! I enjoy watching them from my secret tree (as you can see in this picture). I’m very happy – I’ll have a “chicken pate” cake and many treats.

The garden will be decorated with bells and ribbons that I can play with (see picture). We won’t have any fireworks since I don’t want to scare the other cats but everything else will be fit for royalty! Just wanted to share the news with you.

And. Of course, wishing that all cats out there find their purrfect house & pets!

Very excited,

CAT Victoria

Dear Victoria,

A lovely name for a lovely cat. Welcome to the world of Named Animals. It's one of the ways we know that a cat is a human-owner and has a domesticated human pet. The naming of cats is a serious matter, wrote the poet T. S. Eliot, and if the copyright charges weren't so high I would give you a verse or two! According to him, you have a secret name all of your own which I won't ask for in a blog that is read by humans. And you probably have a name for your humans too.

I call my humans by their human names of Celia and Ronnie in this blog. But I have a secret name for each which (because I am anxious to spare their feelings) I won't put down here. Tempted to do so at the moment, due to Celia's lack of attention to her secretarial duties. Luckily she has finally finished her exams and is now full of human-centered knowledge about cats.

While she has been studying, so have I. Your humans' reactions to your arrival, Victoria, are of interest to us feline anthropologists. Naming ceremonies and birthdays are part of what we call their species-specific behaviour (stuff humans do that only humans do). Interesting rituals to which there might seem little point, except that they strengthen their attachment to us. And, more importantly, as you point out, result in extra food.

Humans are programmed to offer caretaking to human kittens, and we cats have slipped into this system. By careful manipulation of our behaviour - winsome looks, miaows, furry contact by rubbing, delightful play behaviour, -- we get them to feed us and care for us. It's like cuckoos in the nest. We are a supernormal stimulus to them - ie. we are more attractive than human babies. (Obviously. Furrier and we don't leak at both ends). So they "adopt" us not realising we are domesticating them.

So sweet really. They may not realise but they are adopting us as surrogate babies. We have purrsuaded them of this. We are adopting them. And now it's just a question of enjoying their care - regular meals, nice houses. Simple. Dumb humans, clever cats.....

Love George

Teach your humans about cats and cancer

Dear George,
You may notice that there is something wrong with my ears.... it was skin cancer. I came into the care of Downham Market Cats Protection because my owners couldn't afford the treatment and the vets bills. Luckily Cats Protection could and did. So I am now cancer free.
We need keeping indoors when there is a great deal of sun. My owners didn't know this, though my new owners do now. It's particularly important in the middle of the day when the sun is at its height.
Please can you warn other cats so that they can wise up their humans and help protect us.
Love George, your white namesake.

Dear George,
Cats with white faces are very sensitive to sunburn on the non-furry bits - ear tips, eye rims, and nose. Sometimes they suffer from solar dermatitis which is the pre cancerous condition. This may then turn to cancer.
How can humans recognise it? The flesh looks as if it is being eaten away. The ear tips shrink. The area may be crusty and scabby. The tumour is not a lump but more like a red crater with a rim round it.
Some people put sun lotion on their cats but nobody knows if it works. And besides, we normally lick it off. So it is best to make us take a siesta inside the house. We can sun ourselves on the window sill as the sunlight is safe if it has passed through glass.
We cats also need to purrsuade our humans to stop smoking. Scientists have looked at cats with squamous cell cancer and discovered that they are more likely to have been exposed to tobacco smoke. The reference, for anybody who doesn't believe this, is at the bottom of my letter. Save your cat's life: give up smoking. I feel strongly about this as my late companion William died of oral cancer and had spent some years exposed to Ronnie's tobacco smoke. Perhaps he would have lived longer without it.
We should all support The Animal Cancer Trust which was set up in the UK to tell humans more about cancer in all sorts of animals including cats. For a special article on cats and cancer go to the Feline Advisory Bureau website.
Stay well.
Love George
PS. Ref is: Snyder et al., (2004), 'Expression and Environmental Tobacco Smoke Exposure in Feline Oral Squamous Cell Carcinoma', Veterinary Pathology, 41, 209-214