I’m Feline Glad All Over!
Dogs or cats?
This is Albus! We have had him for over 7 years now, having adopted him from the local Cats Protection shelter. We were never able to get a cat before as we lived in rented accommodation and my daughter was adamant that a cat would be one of the first things we would do!
Since we brought him home he has steadily and successfully achieved the aim of every cat, namely making the household run completely to his requirements 😹😹 He wakes me up to go out at around 3 or 4 o clock and I usually find him in the conservatory when I get up again. The waking up never bothers me. It’s part of the rich tapestry of cat ownership… Of their humans! 🤣🤣
Albus is not the first cat I have had. When I was 8 years old a tiny kitten found its way to our house. My parents were determined not to keep this new arrival so they called her Thing a name that guaranteed they wouldn’t become attached! She was feral when she found us, but she became steadily more domesticated and seemed to enjoy the food and drink available on demand even if she remained fiercely independent. She ended up with our family for 15 years so it wasn’t the most successful idea and she would not answer to any name other than Thing for the rest of her life.
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David Pearce - Popular Culture and Personal Passions 
My grandfather used to love dogs and seemed to have an almost pathological hatred of cats. He would do impressions of cats he saw, which involved him putting on a very posh voice and saying snobby things about dogs. One of his favourite things to ask us as kids was whether we preferred dogs or cats. If we said cats, he’d tell us absurd things about cats being evil say they were friends with witches. Once he told us that cats were the reason for aids. As children, we loved all this and found it hilarious (we still do).
He had a staffordshire bull terrier which he’d take on long journeys with him in his job as a lorry driver. It was an absurd animal which was spoilt beyond anything you can imagine, used to roll over to be tickled, and would whimper if required to walk for about twenty minutes. He would go out “rabbit hunting” with it and claim it had managed to catch a number of animals (it never caught anything). We loved the dog almost as much as he did.
All of this meant that I did definitely think of myself as being on team dog. Then one day, his dog died and he started feeding the local cats. My dad and the rest of the family would laugh and call him a “traitor”. He revelled in the volt face and would say he’d always liked cats. I started preferring cats myself after that I think, and still do.
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What a brilliant story. He sounds like a proper character. My Dad was the one who was most against Thing being allowed to stay but ended up enjoying the way that her presence brightened up the house. When she went missing for two weeks he was as sad as anyone and when she returned he was over the moon. We reckon Thing must have been shut in a garage or shed and that the owners must have gone on holiday and only found out when they opened the door. She was incredibly thin and had virtually no voice left but her reappearance cemented her place at the centre of our family affections.
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Thank you, yes he was some character. Thing as a name is absolutely inspired, and very funny. I am glad she came back and am not surprised your father was as happy as the rest of you that she did so. Animals have a way of cementing themselves in our affections, and I can see Albus is no exception.
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