Apologies to all my regular and irregular readers. My cat blogging has been suffering because of my day job, which is overboard at this point. In trying to make up a final exam, I ACTUALLY found this question in an online test bank. Multiple Choice Question 1. Which of the following is most similar to the negative feedback mechanism in human physiology? A) A car runs out of gas and stops. B) A teacher marks all the wrong answers on students' exam papers. C) A toilet tank refills itself after a flush. D) An automatic door opens as soon as somebody approaches it. E) A clock ticks on a shelf. Hint:

Youtubes of cats and printers- there are a so many of these! But these two caught my eye. In most I've watched, the cat goes wild and crazy pouncing on the paper, and usually destruction ensues, with funny results. But, watch the way this kitty "Smudge" responds. You can almost read Smudge's mind. Instead of mindlessly pouncing, Smudge wants to understand the details of what's going on. Mostly, I think, "hmmm... where did that paper come from, and how did it get there? Is there any more where that came from? Hmmmm.... is there more at the back of the printer? Is it hidden in the scanner? Why didn't I see it move from the scanner to the printer?" Sure looks to me like Smudge has been paying a lot of attention to the situation, and KNOWS that the human hides pieces of paper under the scanner lid. A most intelligent cat! I wanted to see what Pam/werebear at The Way of Cats had written about cat intelligence, as she is a most astute cat observe...

This kitty looks like a near twin of Tootsie, my Maine coon. I ran across this wonderful picture at I Can Haz Cheezburger. I was intrigued, so I left a comment asking about the kitty. The person who posted the picture (and the caption) was kind enough to reply. Yes, she IS a Maine coon. Human (FuzzyWuzzywasabear) said: "She's my father's Maine Coon. She loves crawling inside her pretzel jar and watching the world. I haven't been able to get a picture of it yet, but she also does backwards summersaults to catch her dangle toy." Direct link (with comments) is here . And, it's fun to track the various captions over at "I can haz cheezburger". I found the photo when it was first put up (~2 days ago), and within an hour or so there were 6 captions. Last time I looked, this photo had 98 captions, and you can see them all here. Mine was one of the first, and reflects what Tootsie would have been thinking (I think), but ebry cats iz diffrnt. ;) Th...

This is Feets, Booglum's Maine coon polydactyl rescue cat: Direct link is here Booglum says: "Here is the baby Maine Coon Kitty, Feets, and his big huge polydactyl paws! Aww, such a baby. He is our snowstorm rescue baby. :)" I've featured Feets before, here . Love that kitty, who, btw, is somehow entered by breed as a "Mancoon" at the vets! So I've been told ;) Here's Tootsie, my Maine coon polydactyl rescue cat (click on photo for a larger image)- also on flickr with Creative Commons License. Click on the label below, "polydactyl", for more polydactyl cats.

Boogie Woogie Basics This is the second installment in ' darkblack educates VG about boogie woogie'. The first installment is here. So, I had found another great kitteh YouTube, of a British Shorthair cat (kitten), with nice musical accompaniment. And, the music sounded really familiar. It took me back to an email chat that darkblack and I had once upon a time, when I was first trying to learn my way around boogie woogie, when I first found this YouTube: VG : I have another music question for you darkblack -- boogie woogie reprise! Found a sweet kitty vid I am planning on using. THEN, got to listening to the music. Rang some memory bells from a discussion we had a long time ago about boogie, and then about Emerson and OP (Oscar Peterson). I've listened multiple times to music on two YouTubes, but just can't make the call- is this the same "tune" in the kitty and Emerson/OP YouTubes? My guess is yes, but not a musician with the "ear". darkbl...

I have a fondness for YouTubes with great music. And, then, there's my Maine coon thing. ;) More about Fletcher Henderson here: Feline Follies- with the exceptional Fletcher Henderson And, in case you're wondering the music above is here also: More information here, and here.

I'm back as of 15 minutes ago! A storm came through here, and I and many others haven't had power for 2 days- fallen trees took out power lines, and blocked roads. So, I'm just gonna do the easy thing, and show you some Maine coon belly fluff. Tootsie my Maine coon loves to have her belly rubbed. Is this a Maine coon thing? Direct link is here Pictures of Cats.org

Audrey Hepburn. Cat. And some guy who can't get the downstairs door open. If you've never seen "Breakfast at Tiffany's"... it's a great movie, and the cat is real as well as metaphoric. Here's a photo tidbit from the denouement- Photo is from Karin at Flickr (CCL) Above is a 3 minute snippet from the first 10 minutes, which comes from Breakfast at Tiffany's(1961), part 1/14 Follow the part 1/14 link, and you can watch the movie from start to finish, thanks to a dedicated YouTuber. And, here's the important part, in text- Quote ( via imdb, with a few corrections) : Holly Golightly: Sure, sure, he's okay. Aren't you, cat? Poor old cat! Poor slob! Poor slob without a name! Well I haven't got the right to give him one. We don't belong to each other. We just took up one day by the river. I don't want to own anything until I find a place where me and things go together. I'm not sure where that is but I know what it is like. It...

Cat and baby prairie dog- more interspecies love- to add to cats and dogs, cats and horses, cats and bunnies... Human says: 猫と遊びたいプレーリードッグベビー。 やんちゃ盛り。 でも、猫の方は少しうっとおしそうな感じ。 眼で訴えてます。「・・・勘弁してくれよ・・・。」 Which roughly translates via online translation as: プレーリードッグベビー that wants to play with a/the cat. the impossibility that analyze an/the attention: a part. However, one of the cat be the feeling that seems as うっa little. I am appealing with the eye a/the subject. ' Forgive it/. ' Hmmm.... well, online translation does have its shortcomings... Click on label "interspecies" for the cat and etc. YTs. Hard to pick a favorite, but the cat and the bunny is pretty sweet. And, of course King Louie the Maine coon and Miss Sassafrass the miniature Schnauzer. King Louie... gone to kitty heaven now. Heart breaker, that. He's Tootsie's godfather.

I just found another great YouTube of yet another sweet British Shorthair kitten en famille. But, had no sound, so read on (below) before you click. Some of my most favorite YouTubes are those that have a great musical accompaniament. And, the kitty YouTube called out for this. And, YES, you can open two YouTubes at the same time. So, my suggestion, click on the one below and let it run until ~ the 1:03 mark, and THEN open the kitty YouTube. Trust me ;). The "mashup" is fun. Among the classical music choices above, I'd vote for Waltz of the Flowers or The Sorcerer's Apprentice. Or maybe Hoedown.

Otto the rescue cat has a huge YouTube fan club. He's Mr. Personality. Direct link is here Otto can also be seen doing another great trick here, with more about Otto's story- Otto the rescue cat- with a huge YouTube fan club Pictures of Cats.org

Here's another great YT of joe joe, the British Shorthair kitty. Direct link is here Yes, I've posted this one (below) before, with a lot more information ( British Shorthair cats- a wonderful YouTube ), but I thought it would be fun to have them together. Direct link is here Is this the cutest kitty ever? More about the British Shorthair breed- This page describes the history of the British Shorthair, AND has great pictures from the incomparable Helmi Flick. This page has more. And this page I found particularly intriguing, because it weaves together the history of a nation and the history of a cat breed.

Ozzie the bengal cat was reunited with his family, after 2 years, thanks to a cat microchip. I read this story earlier this year, and thought of it again after reading about cat microchips over at Michael's place. Selected quotes below are from this newpaper story Cat Ozzie's back from Millport after two years "A MISSING moggie has been reunited with its Bearsden owners — after turning up in Millport TWO YEARS after it vanished. Karen Ratcliffe was stunned when she was told her beloved pet had been found safe and well, 38 miles away in the seaside town last week." Here's the map of the 38 miles- A is Bearsden, B is Millport: "She has no idea how the Bengal tabby managed to cross the waves to the Isle of Cumbrae — but she and her family are delighted to welcome him home. Ozzie was handed into North Ayrshire Cats Protection by a woman who had noticed that he was a stray and they found that he had a microchip which enabled them to trace his original owner. ...

Boogie Woogie Basics My friend darkblack has many gifts, among them the willingness and more so the ability to educate me about music. My cat blogging (started in a moment of therapeutic madness as an escape from political madness) has led me into some musical byways, because I love kitteh vids with great music. One great kitteh YT had music by Meade Lux Lewis : Some VERY silly cats, and great jazz piano And, one thing led to another... I found some great YT film footage of Meade Lux Lewis playing Boogie Woogie . And then I found a YT of Liberace playing pretty much the same "tune" in 1969, well only sorta. The differences between the two YTs were quite striking in just about every way. I am no musician, and I wanted to get darkblack 's take on this. I sent darkblack the YT links, including the idea "compare and contrast". I also mentioned my take - that Liberace didn't "GET" boogie woogie, imho. And, thus, darkblack educated me. I would lik...

Hi guys, it's me Michael, the budding anarchist and cat lover, cat fancier. You know I don't understand how people decided on the phrase, "Cat Fancy" to mean the cat show, cat breeding world. That said, I can't think of a good alternative! But I can understand the mainly young people in the video below who want to make their voice heard, to shout out about the bl**dy politicians who muck up our lives in league with ever more reckless masters of the universe, the people who run big business. And I was pleased to be there to show my support. Cats and politics do go together. What affects us affects our cat companions and the politicians tend to have a negative impact on our lives. The demo happened opposite the Bank of England and one of the chants was a rhythmical, "Jump, Jump". This was directed at some employees of the bank who were on a large balcony overlooking the demonstrators. The video echoes of the 1960s to me, although that wasn't intended o...

In an earlier post, I featured a charming chicken-stealing kitty: Little tiny Brazilian cat steals chicken I said in the comments that I thought it was a Siamese kitten. Nope. If a purebred, most likely a Ragdoll kitten, as Michael pointed out in added comments. So, I did some research on YouTube. This is a Siamese kitten, tho I can't refine the call to say whether it is of "traditional" or "modern" type. Direct link is here Human says: "While my older siamese cat (Autumn) is enjoying some catnip, my five month old siamese kitten (Phoebe) challenges her for a whiff of it. View to see who wins!" And this is a Ragdoll kitten. Direct link is here

I have certainly delved into some unexpected YouTube territory, thanks to my Kitteh Blog. Music stuff. And, as I said in my header, "and occasionally some other stuff, maybe". This would be that. And, this is from 1929. Yanno, 1929. Like, history repeats itself. I couldn't find the lyrics of the opening song, by means of ample use of teh google, so I listened hard, and wrote them out as best I could. Oh my calamity Don’t bother me Keep right on your way, Whatever it takes To make lucky breaks Is what I’m needing today Oh that’s not the place of my complaint I hereby call upon my Patron Saint Oh Lady Luck, I’ve got you on my mind So won’t you won’t please to kind me Oh Lady Luck, Don’t give my hopes a rest And I’ll be happy as can be Just stick around with me for a while Show me your golden smile Oh, Lady Luck You know at times you could So won’t you please be good to me? Singing in the Bathtub- the follow up dancing thingy in the YouTube, with the women dressed in ba...

Two sweet sleepy kittens-- trying so hard not to fall asleep Direct link is here Direct link is here

Yes, this Maine coon snores. But what makes him special (compared with all of the other "cat snoring" YouTubes I've watched) is the way his paws dance along. Direct link is here Human says: "This is Bubba a 22 pound Maine Coon Cat. He started snoring about 4 years ago and no one believes us until they see it for themselves. As you can see his markings are very unique." I've posted before another YouTube of a cat snoring Oska the British Shorthair Cat, snoring madly . Bubba the Maine coon doesn't quite have the same vocal range as Oska, but he makes up for it with some interesting paw and whisker additions.

Cats watching fishies- two views This is a painterly view: White Cats Watching Goldfish - Arthur Heyer (1872 - 1931) Michael at PoC has another Arthur Heyer painting, with more about the cats (Persians, I think he would say) and the artist here. This is what cats actually do: Direct link is here Human says: Viljo is so excited about aquarium that he cannot stop staring at it. Viljo is a Norwegian forest cat in Finland. He is father to two of my favorite YouTube cats, brothers Vinski and Ukko. More YouTubes of Vinski and Ukko here. And, here are Viljo and Ukko meeting - ah, very sweet: Direct link is here More about the Norwegian forest cat here and here.