Monday, September 18, 2006
Try cuddling with a cat, I double-dog dare you
As a faithful consumer of current events and global developments, you've been battered with so many depressing and awful stories lately that you might have missed the interesting and very good news about cats and dogs in this country.
Dogs won!
According to the new Statistical Abstract of the United States (which was released earlier this month by the Census Bureau and contains such valuable information as the factoid that the average cell phone call in 2001 lasted approximately three minutes), among American households that have pets, 36 percent have dogs, while 32 percent have cats.
Did I mention: Dogs won!
The abstract also reports that about 5 percent of homes with pets have birds and about 2 percent have horses. (One presumes most of the birds are actually in the homes, whereas most of the horses are not.)
And of course, 0.00000004 percent of Americans have giraffes, elephants, a chimp named Bubbles and their very own climbing tree.
But let's talk about how dogs are clearly better than cats and how that margin of victory should have been more decisive. With the exception of guys with missing front teeth who have dirt front yards that are populated by killer pit bulls that could clean out the entire meat section of Fox & Obel without coming up for air, I won't hesitate to spend time at just about any home populated by one or more well-trained canines--but I'll come up with a thousand excuses not to visit cat owners.
That's because most dogs are friendly, cuddly, loving, joyful, beautiful creatures, while most cats are shifty. Also, I have a better-developed sense of smell than Matt Murdock a k a Daredevil, and no matter what cat owners do to de-cat-ify their homes, I can always tell when a house contains a feline. Cat homes always have that certain smell. It's part hospital, part public restroom and all bad.
One of my best friends is a dog named Norman. This dog is so cool he should have his own TV show. In all honesty, I like Norman better than about 65 percent of the humans I've ever met.
I've never had that kind of a bond with a cat. I love to pet dogs and play with dogs and feed treats to dogs and let dogs curl up near my feet--but the closest I've ever been to a cat, literally the closest, was when a jealous and quite sharp-clawed feline pounced on my head while I was, um, playing Twister with the cat's owner. She (the cat's owner) thought it was so cute that Tinkerdoo was so possessive. I didn't. I put on my shoes and coat, walked out the door, dug my car out of a 2-foot snowbank, drove 40 miles home and immediately changed my phone number.
Oh, wait, I just remembered I did once have a positive experience with a cat, many years ago. I took one of those Persians and strapped him to my Dale Murphy model Louisville slugger, turned him upside down and swabbed the kitchen floor. And I have to say, that cat was one hell of a dust mop.
But look, it's not just my opinion that dogs are far more valuable than cats. Year after year, there's proof in the news.
Just a few examples, culled from the headlines:
From the Express of Scotland: "A dog rescued his injured owner after running for help--exactly like Lassie. Former police sergeant Jimmy King, 56, shattered his ribs and badly hurt his leg when he fell off a ladder in his garage. . . . In a scene that could have come straight from Hollywood, the pooch ran to find Mr. King's wife, Margaret, and convinced him to follow her to the garage where her husband lay in agony . . ."
From the Allentown Morning Call: "There was [a] hero in Monday's two-alarm blaze [in a] burning Allentown apartment: a 14-month-old copper-and-white pit bull named Rocky who jumped into the bed of his owners, Edward and Angela Diaz, to warn them . . ."
From the Wichita Eagle: "An Australian blue heeler who saved his 85-year-old owner from an alligator has been named the Heinz Pet Products 47th Dog Hero of the Year . . ."
From the Greenville (S.C.) News: "An early morning fire has left a family of three homeless and a hero puppy dead. . . . 'I felt the puppy jump on the bed and start to tug at my blankets,' said Robert Payne, 44 . . .
"Coco never got out. 'That puppy saved my life,' Payne said . . ."
Now let's see if I can find any stories about cats. Ah, here's one:
"CHICAGO--A cat has ignored its owner for the 37th consecutive day, despite the man's efforts to engage the cat with a series of toys, silly voices and tasty treats.
"'I'm a real cat-lover, but Mr. Tuggles just won't give me a chance,' said Waymon Hummerts, a 27-year-old Bucktown resident. "In fact, I couldn't even tell you where he is right now."
All right, so I made that up--but it sounds legit, because that's what cats are really like and everybody knows it.
Not that I have anything against cat owners per se. In fact, every cat owner in the country has a keen sense of humor, and that's why I'm sure none of them will be the least bit offended by this column.
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