Happy Mew Year and a special thank you

Happy Mew Year to all my readers and their human pets. Although humans can be very tiresome a lot of the time, this is still the season of goodwill so spare a few rubs and purrs for them. Besides, there is still cold turkey in the fridge.... As they are probably getting tired of eating it, there should be a few bits for us cats.
This is my chance to thank Fluffy and Cayenne, two lovely cats who live in Canada. They are, with the help of their secretary Michelle, almost co-writers for this blog. It is they who interview other cats like Vegas and help put their letters here. They are tireless in their creativity. As a thank you I am putting on their photos.
Fluffy and Cayenne, I raise a mouse to you.
George
PS. I think the photo of them lying on the carpet suggests they eaten a bit too much this Christmas!

Christmas trees - a good chance to have feline fun

Dear George,

It’s me Vegas. If you remember I’m not one yet and this will be my first Christmas. I’m very excited but quite confused by my human behavior.

Of course I didn’t know what Christmas is and I’m not quite sure I understood it but I was happy when my human brought in the house a tree. At the beginning I thought this tree smelled like my litter but, after all… it’s fun to have a vertical litter box!) That night my human started to decorate the tree and called it “our Christmas tree”. That’s when my problems started as I thought this was a game and “Christmas tree” was the name of the game! I thought that at night my human will decorate the tree and next day I will take off the decorations and so on. I thought that whoever is faster will win. After a day or two I realized that my human is not enjoying our game. I started chewing on some decorations to motivate my human to be more active in the game but all I got was “bad cat! Santa Claus won’t bring you anything”. Now, I’m completely confused. Who’s Santa Claus? Is it Claus or Claws? Should I expect somebody else to join out game? What should I expect from this Santa guy? Should I finish taking the decorations off? I’m half through as you can see in the picture.

George, please share some wisdom and light!

Vegas

Dear Vegas,

You have discovered the true meaning of Christmas, the meaning that escapes humans. Christmas is for cats. Take, for example, the Christmas tree. What is it for? It's for cats. All those dangling bright ornaments, which are ideal to jump at, pull down and (like you) crunch up. Human think they look nice but they don't understand their true purpose -- ornaments are games for felines.

Christmas food is the same. Turkey - mmmmmmmmm. There's so much of it that you are bound to get a few bits of meat. And, if you patrol the kitchen and the dining table carefully, you will pick up some delicious fragments. And, don't forget the trash can. There's probably some delicious turkey skin there too. Just put your front paws on the top of it and pull down strongly. The whole thing will fall on the kitchen floor and the goodies will shoot out.

Yes, I love Christmas too. I don't like the behaviour of humans during this period. They drink too much catnip and behave like large and ungainly kittens. Sometimes they caterwaul strange noises called carols. But I have always loved the parcels round the tree. Such fun to pull off the ribbons, tear the paper, and push my nose through the cardboard into the contents.

Yummy Christ

mas, Vegas.

George

PS I have been sent a very nice Christmas drawing of Lily the cat, from my human friend Naimh. Here it is on the left. I think the ears are really good for a human who is only a kitten herself.

What the best dressed dogs are wearing.

Dear George,
Here I am ready to celebrate Christmas in my special reindeer costume. I hope you admire it. I think I look gorgeous.
My family often dress me up at Christmas and they laugh a lot at me. I am the centre of attention for hours in these clothes. You know how Christmas can be hard for us animals - everybody ignores us. Well in this reindeer costume, nobody could ignore me.
What are you going to wear for Christmas, George.
Willow

Dear Willow,
Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear, I worry about dogs. I really do. Imagine letting a human being put clothes on you. (OK, I admit there was one year when Celia put a Santa Claus hat on me. She waited till I was sound asleep, popped it on and took a rapid photo. I shook it off immediately -- a bit too late to stop the photo,alas.)
We cats do not take kindly to being dressed in human clothes. I want to suggest to you, Willow, that you make it clear you will no longer suffer these indignities. On Christmas night, when the humans are asleep, I recommend tearing the reindeer costume to pieces. And, if you can stomach it, eat it or part of it.
I am keeping a sharp eye out to make sure there are no dressing up plans this Christmas for me. I don't mind if Celia dresses up as a cat and paints whiskers on her cheek - the dumb creature can try to imitate me if she likes. I know she admires me so much that she has thought about this.
However, I am not going to stand for any reindeer heads on me. Nor do I want to look like Santa Claus. He has whiskers, admittedly, but he is a member of an inferior species.
George.
PS. Willow has just emailed me to tell me she is a deer-hunting breed, which explains the choice of headgear. She says it is the ultimate Christmas trophy. Mmmm, maybe, but I don't go around wearing a stuffed rat head, Willow!

Trees, two-timing humans and how to get on the mews

Dear George,

I would call myself SuperCat as my real name is irrelevant for this story. Why SuperCat? Because I manage two sets of adopted human pets; one on a permanent basis and one on a semi-permanent basis. Summertime I have countless “occasional” residences, but that’s yet another story. I spend my days in my semi-permanent residence eating, sleeping, playing, scratching the dog to get off the sofa, pushing their elderly cat off the armchair. The cat is putting up a fight but the others obey in total confusion. When the night comes (or when “she” – my permanent human pet - comes from work) I move to my permanent residence where I train my human into “cat adoration”. She almost reached “perfection”.

Also, I keep an eye on the neighborhood and my two houses from a strategic place as you can see in the photo. I “melt” into that tree and no one sees me there. But, my spot is in danger as I heard my adopted human male saying that he wants to cut the tree off. I’m sure their cat has something to do with it since, I have to admit, she doesn’t like me and she’s the only one knowing my hiding spots. This cat put in this man’s mind that the tree is dead and better cut it off …..just to get me off her property; I’m sure that’s the reason.

But George, I can’t let this happen since there are no other trees “with a view”.

I will hung on and fight for my tree until the last breath (of the tree, of course) but may be you have a better idea how I can reclaim my tree? Should I call the municipality? By the way, aren’t trees protected?

Anxiously yours,

SuperCat

Dear SuperCat

Congratulations, you are showing all the initiativeness and deviousness that makes us cats rulers of the world. Setting up two homes is an extremely intelligent move for any urban cat. One home for the evening meal, full central heating, warm beds, and nice breakfast. The other for daytime - lunch, full central heating, warm beds for that post lunch nap, and perhaps a small tea before setting off to the other home. We cats two-time "owners" all the time and often they don't even know they are time-sharing cat. Poor pets.

Trees... it sounds a serious dilemma. Here in the UK humans can put a tree preservation order on a tree, by ringing their local authority. This wheeze may not be available in your country. If it is, see if you can purrsuade your evening humans to do this. Here it can be done anonymously (I think) and the tree owner is just told about it afterwards.

It's sometimes difficult to find a municipality which takes cats' views seriously. Write to them anyway and keep a copy. Then send this copy with a covering letter to your local paper. A nice covering letter with this very glamorous photo attached, written by your secretary, and signed with your pawprint, should go down very well. What local paper could resist this? If they have any mews sense they will run it.

Love George

My humans, the recession and me

Dear George,
I have just heard I cost about £500 a year to keep and am a bit worried in case they decide to cut my expense account. I don't have a hutch outside which needs to be kept heated in the winter and I don't have an outside run to keep clean and tidy. I try my best not to eat much hay and I only take up a bit of space under the kitchen table.
It's not as though I spread myself over the furniture like cats and dogs leaving hairs about and my cuddle blankets are easily popped into the washing machine. I wouldn't go to the vet at all if they didn't insist so they could easily save money there. I can't think of any way of cutting back on things.
Should I give up my daily slice of banana? Would that help do you think? They won't put me in a rabbit rescue home will they? Do cats cost a lot of money to keep? Oh dear,it's all such a worry.
Harvey
http://www.harvey-diaryofaninspirationalbunny.blogspot.com/

Dear Harvey,
The recession is worrying for us cats, and dogs, and rabbits. The problem is human priorities. Obviously the best kind of human pet buys the pet food first, then their food, and lastly other things like rent, mortgage, petrol and so forth. But, of course, as we all know some pets just aren't properly socialised and may act as if their needs are as important as ours. These under-educated humans badly need further training.
I really don't think you should even contemplate cutting back on your food or your lifestyle. Why should you? I happen to know that your human carers could easily cut back on theirs. The male drives a nice car - he could get a much smaller vehicle. Both would be much healthier if they walked more instead of driving. They (not you) could eat less. I mean, why don't they eat hay and carrots - much cheaper than meat and fish? Why give up your banana? They should give up their bananas.
However, you obviously love them. So here are some suggestions of things you could do. You could cuddle up closer to them on the sofa to help keep them warm - less heating costs. As you say, you could refuse all visits to the vet. That's a big saving and all of us animals loathe and detest vets.You could act as a hot water bottle by burrowing down the bottom of their bed.
I used to recommend that we cats bring in mice as a source of cheap protein for our humans. But, sadly, over the years I have had to admit defeat. They do not EVER eat them. Goodness knows I have tried. I have left a dead mouse in Celia's handbag. I have set loose a living one on their bed one Sunday morning as a treat. I have even left a dead mouse in the toaster. She came down, put a slice of bread in the other side, pushed down the toaster.... and screamed.
It was then I realised my efforts to help them through the recession were not working at all.
Sadly,
George.
PS. Cats and dogs and house rabbits are suffering when humans lose their house and cannot find rented accomodation which will accept pets. Please make a donation to your local animal shelter this Christmas - especially my original home, www.westoxfordshirecats.org.uk