The thumb and cats top of the evolutionary tree

Dear George, 
Have you come across this ridiculous complacency among humans regarding the thumb. Who on earth needs an opposable thumb?   
In every paw we hold a Swiss army knife, or better. The claws are pitons, scrapers, shredders, garden forks. Chopsticks, diggers and grooming tools. Scalpels, punchers, package openers, staplers, hooks and hypodermic fringe makes. Okum pickers. Combs and pincers. 
And that is not to mention the pads. Face Flannels. Massagers. Printers, boxing gloves and pats.

Poor souls they are struggling still with evolution.
We long since attained purrfection. As you know.

Out of kindness we must disguise our prowess.

A mousy kiss

Vincent.

Dear Vincent,

An interesting discussion. Many claims have been made, by humans, of course, for the importance of the thumb. They have even suggested the thumb was an adaption that helped this pathetic species climb to the top of the evolutionary tree.

As we know this is all bunkum. We are the better climbers. Humans did not climb to the top of the evolutionary tree anyway.  

 This diagram, produced by one of our foremost feline evolutionary biologists, shows the tree of life in its proper form. You will see that at the top of it is Felis sylvestris catus, not Homo so-called sapiens. That species is towards the right only slightly higher than the gorilla.

How this important fact has escaped the attention of human evolutionary biologists is beyond feline comprehension. 

Yours in disgust

George  

Hsss..... growl.....that's what I think of celebrity cats....

Dear George,
Celebrity culture really annoys me. It's bad enough when humans do it. I'm a Celebrity Get me out of Here, for instance, shows the innate trashiness and lack of intelligence of the human species.
But now cats are muscling in - Doing the Rounds with Oscar. What's so special about Oscar? Just a cat that lives in a nursing home.  A street cat named Bob. There are thousands of cats on the street so why highlight just one of them?
The latest celebrity memoir is Tilly the Ugliest Cat in the Shelter. This really infuriates me as it seems she is proud of being ugly. We cats are graceful and beautiful. Why sink so low as to be proud of being bad looking?
Yesterday, I felt I simply had to express my feelings about this ridiculous trend in celebritising cats. I sank my teeth into the offending book!

Tore it to pieces. I felt better after that. Sort of purged.
Yours
Disgusted of Brixton

Dear Disgusted of Brixton,
I share your loathing of celebrity culture. Its meaningless and the pathetic humans that take part in it. I don't know even who they are most of the time. My interest in TV is focussed solely on wildlife programmes and I usually just sleep through the rest of it. MIndlessness may appeal to humans: but not to me.
I am less sure about this trend for feline memoirs. Is it a step forward that, for the first time in years, cats are becoming celebrities? In one sense I think it is. Putting felines in the forefront of literature must be a good idea. True, we have had Saki's short story about Tobermory, and several Thomas Hardy poems about cats, but the idea of cat personalities has never really made it into the lower forms of popular literature. Till now.
Like you, I feel some of these books are frankly undignified in their appeal to those dumb creatures who are our pets. Yet humans, intellectually limited as they are, really seem to like these stories. I am not sure why but I feel we should encourage our inferior species to study us. And these books usually contain one or two necessary bits of information, the pill below the sugared surface so to speak.
Yours still pondering,
George.

Brush addiction - it's her problem, not mine

 

Dear George,

I must admit I got inspired by Jake’s letter last week and I started paying more attention to my human’s behavior. I truly believe that humans use “us” as excuses for their addictions, emotional and psychological problems! We, cats, are not “psychologically” handicapped or damaged….but humans definitely are! Let’s me give you just one example and you’ll be the judge! George, if you remember I took up meditation as a way to cope with being home alone for long periods of time and to avoid knocking down THAT vase that my human loves that much. Being an indoor cat and being bored it’s no fun! A week ago my human came home with a special brush – it is called a “kong brush” (you can see it in the picture) – and start brushing me. Of course I liked it and I liked the attention I was getting….so I start stretching giving her “meows” of approval.

But soon I realized that my human has a “brush addiction” if this is possible.

Guess she can’t sleep just thinking of that brush and brushing – I can’t explain otherwise why she’s up at 6 in the morning brushing me and then in the evening and before bed again. I heard her telling someone that “her baby” (that’s me …for your records) is “addicted to this brush” and that I’m drooling with pleasure when brushed!  Way far from the truth!  As I said before, I like the attention, I like to be brushed but far from being addicted. George, she doesn’t realize that IT IS more her need than mine but what can I do since she has no hair and I can’t brush her! Any advice?

Hugs

Shumba

Dear Shumba,

Psychological projection is a known attitude among human beings, as all human behaviour experts like me will confirm. Humans cannot face their own inadequacies, their own faults, and their own ridiculous attitudes. By pretending that these belong to us, not them, they are able to stay in a state of denial.
I have no difficulty in believing that your human is suffering from brush addiction, a example of codependancy in which she needs to brush you more than you need to be brushed. The act of brushing will satisfy her caretaking needs and (more healthily) give her the pleasure of seeing your pleasure. By pretending it is you who are addicted to brushing, she does not have to examine her own need to be needed.
Women who love cats too much are common in our society. Personally, I do not bother to put in place a behaviour modification programme for them, unless the welfare of their feline owners is suffering. For example, women who dress up cats, put them in prams to take for a walk, or collect a house full of cats, are showing pathological altruism. Do they need help? Yes, but normally projection and denial will mean they are not willing to change. Thus help must be focussed on the suffering cats.
Your human does not fall into this category, fortunately. The human need to be needed by their cat can be quite pleasurable for the cat - better quality food, more of it, new cat beds appearing regularly, human body warmth in the bed during cold nights.
Just let her keep brushing. If you get fed up with it, just rise to your feet and sit looking dignified. If need be get high up. But usually a dignified sneer will put a stop to what has become human harassment.
Hugs
George.

Am I psychologically damaged?

Hello George,

My name is Jake, Shakey Jake and a girl – don’t ask; that’s another story. My slave keeps suggesting I’m ‘damaged’. Me? You should see some of the things she gets up to! Anyway I am concerned she may be right but to understand why I think this you need to understand where I have come from. This is me at about four weeks old. ‘Where is your mother?’ I hear you ask; well I’d like to know that too! I was found in a metal fright container by a man; my slave calls him ‘dad’. I went to the vets who believed I was about 2 days old. I had fleas and a flea allergy to boot, this left me with no fur. 

This is me as a kitten

When the aforementioned ‘dad’ opened the box slave asked ‘what the hell is that?’ but I was asking myself the very same questions. I forgave her this indiscretion when she woke up every two hours to feed and help me do my business. She treated my fleas and when I went back to the vets 2 days later he thought I was doing well – naturally. The vet then made the suggestion they sneak me in with dad’s dog that had just had puppies. Sneak me in? Like that would work, but alas it did!

When I was 5 weeks me and the slave moved. I like to think this was all for me but apparently it was planned. So I left the dog and the brute, Rufus (big feral ginger tom – you know the type), it was just me and the slave. She’s a reasonably good slave. I have a good vocal range with an impressive volume which is hard to ignore and have mastered the art of knocking things off surfaces to get her attention.  I have a pillow and she knows it, if she tries to sleep on it I sleep on her, she soon moves! 
Now this brings me back to my concern. I have a habit or more of a compulsion. I still like to suckle, suckle my slave to be precise. She wears a fab purple fleece dressing at times which is great but failing that I will suckle her nose, collar bone, I don’t even mind a toe. Everyone thought I would grow out of this but I’m three now and still love it – I just can’t help it!

Jake x

Dear Jake,
I have to admit that needing to suckle your human's dressing gown or body parts can be classified as a little eccentric. But really it's quite natural. It's a kitten thing. Your human brought you up, fed you, cleaned you, and generally acted as your mother. So she is your mother. 
But.... your real mother would have pushed you away when she had decided it was time to wean you. You would have learned that further sucking would result in a fed up mum. Humans can't teach us all the stuff we need to know.  Your slave should start gently pushing you away each time you do it and turning her back on you or leaving the room immediately afterwards, withdrawing her attention. In a word, she must try to wean you.
I don't usually recommend too much co-operation with humans. They get above themselves too easily. But this is a rare exception when you should try to co-operate, Jake. What you don't want is to develop a real eating disorder and become one of those cats that starts eating the dressing gown rather than just sucking. I don't think this will happen to you, unless your biological mother or father were Siamese. It seems to be a breed thing. But it might.
I also think too much affection or dependence is bad for humans. They should not be given the impression that we need them (except for food and shelter). Cultivate a little distance from her, Jake. Don't become a cat who loves too much. Keep your pet in her place. She may be your foster mother but remember she is your intellectual, social and physiological inferior.
George.
PS. Don't get too worried by this. Cats that persist in suckling their humans usually come to no great harm. It's the dressing gown, not the body parts, that worries me!

Stressed, unhappy and never off the litter tray... what's going on?

Dear George,  
I am a very troubled boy, and I hope that you can help me.

 I lived in a nice house with my human, and I liked it very much. I had all my things around me, direct access to the garden and I was very comfortable and relaxed there. It was my house – my home!

 Then about 8 weeks ago, there was lots of disruptions all my things were packed away and I was put in my cat basket and taken to another house – a strange house, with lots of strange smells…and none of them my comforting home smells. Obviously I was distressed by this and began meowing continuously to my human and pacing up and down the rooms. My human tried to comfort me by stroking me and talking softly to me. She also put down worn items of her clothing in different rooms so I could smell her everywhere around the house, but it still didn’t calm me.

 As the weeks went on my agitation grew and I just couldn’t settle. My agitation was made worse by the fact that we are now living in a flat, so I have to go out of my house and down a strange ‘shared’ corridor to get outside. And there is another cat who lives next door to us that uses the corridor too, and he didn’t take kindly to me using it and spat at me. Now I am even more upset. My human bought some Feliway plug ins, and whilst they calm me down for a while, my anxiety comes back.

 I have taken to using my litter tray constantly, sometimes as much as every ten minutes, which has given me a very sore and irritated bottom and I sometimes have a bit of blood in my urine. My human is very, very worried about me and doesn’t know where to turn.

 A few months before the move, I got lost for a number of weeks before I was found and re-united with my human. I was a rather traumatised from the experience, but soon settled down back in my home. So I don’t know if this has anything to do with my reaction now at the house move?

 Can you help me George and help my human to understand why I’m behaving like this and not settling down?

 Yours tearfully,

 Thomas.

Dear Thomas,
There is few things more upsetting to a cat than moving house. There you are settled and happy in your territory, when suddenly your pet human stuffs you in a cat box and turns you out into a strange new place. All the smells are wrong. You don't know where anything is. And it feels very very unsafe.
Most of us hide under the bed for a day or two. But some sensitive cats like you suffer from stress-induced illness. All that going to the litter tray is, I fear, a sign of cystitis. Vets (loathsome people) call it FIC, Feline Idiopathic Cystitis.  "Idiopathic" just means "we don't know the cause." But we cats do know the cause. It's stress due to house moving.
The earlier trauma of getting lost will not have helped. That must have been unsettling and probably also very frightening. Then this... poor Thomas. Even loathsome vets know that moving house is stressful for cats and can result in FIC.
Having to share the corridor with another strange cat (who hisses because he is frightened too) is another stress. Perhaps your humans could invest in a cat ladder letting you go outside from the window. Or put several cardboard boxes with entrances in them, where you can hide if the strange cat passes by. Or just keep you safely in the flat till you have recovered. My human's website has some suggestions for how to make indoor life more interesting for you.
Why humans insist on changing their territory is beyond my imagination.  They are a very insensitive species. Your letter makes me feel angry about their ridiculous behaviour.
They must reduce your stress and read the instructions at  http://www.catexpert.co.uk/cats/reasons-why-your-cat-feels-stressed-and-unhappy-and-what-to-do-about-them/
Yours with sympathy,
George.
PS. We hate vets but this is one time when you need their help.