Tom Salinsky

Sorry to have been away for so long. I will put up a few catch-up posts now and in the next couple of days and try to get back on a reasonable blogging schedule shortly.

Kittens!

Fulfilling a long-held desire to be cat owners (that’s not how they see it of course, to them we are staff), we completed our current phase of home improvement and immediately went and picked up two adorable ragdoll kittens – sisters from the same litter. Here they are on their first day with us.

Ragdolls are a breed of cat developed by a slightly-more-than-usually-demented American cat breeder. They are known for their tendency to go limp and floppy when picked up (hence the name), their friendly and trusting disposition, their long-but-manageable coats and for being happy to be kept indoors – vitally important for a couple living in a second floor flat.

We named our two Mimi (after Emilia Lanier, the first Englishwoman to make a living as a writer) and Toast (after grilled bread). Mimi is the one with the white stripe on her nose – plump, lazy and contented with almost everything. Toast is the one with the white face and pink nose – she’s the eccentric who jumps on to the bed at 6:00am demanding playtime and who tries to clamber into the bathroom sink when I’m shaving. She seems to defer to Mimi if there’s competition over who gets her nose in the food bowl first though. Toast will sometimes sleep on my lap for a bit, if I pick her up and put her there, but neither of them go floppy when picked up as advertised – in fact they both start squirming almost immediately.

As if they weren’t adorable enough on their own, they often sleep snuggled up together, like this.

I am acutely aware that the Internet is already fairly full of cat pictures, and I’m also aware that while (almost) everyone likes kittens, there’s a pretty thin line between enjoying sharing your life with feline companions and being a Crazy Cat Person. For anyone else who is worried about on which side of this line they fall, here’s a quick check-list.

• If you call yourself “Mummy” or “Daddy” to your cats, you are a Crazy Cat Person. (Note if you provide voices for your cats, you are not a Crazy Cat Person, provided the conversations are witty and/or infrequent enough. If you genuinely believe you can understand what your cats are saying or they you, then you are obviously a Crazy Cat Person.
• If there are more cats than adults in the household, you are a Crazy Cat Person. No exceptions. Adults must be over 18. A couple can have two kittens. If you live on your own, you can have a cat. If there are three of you and you have four cats, you are Crazy Cat People. Not fair? Hey, I don’t make the rules.
• You may give your cat a human name like Joe or Susan, or a “pet” name like Patch or Whiskers as you like, but if you give your cat two or more names like “Lady Purrington” or “Sir Furball Kittychops Fluffbundle III” you are a Crazy Cat Person. Exception – if the vet pleases to append your surname to your cat’s name, that’s just an administrative convenience for them. You are not a Crazy Cat Person.
• If you put your cats in any clothing more elaborate than a collar, you are Crazy Cat Person – obviously.
• If you cook food only for your cats to eat, you are a Crazy Cat Person – even on Christmas Day.
• You may have photos of your cats on your phone, or on your computer, but no more than one small one on your mantelpiece, and definitely none in lockets, or portraits in oils. If they sneak into family portraits, that’s okay.

I don’t think making lists of criteria regarding who is and who is not a Crazy Cat Person in itself makes you a Crazy Cat Person. At least I hope not.