Opinion: Cats are inescapably Fascinating

BY PATRICK WILLIAMS

I have been asked as someone uniquely qualified by his love of cats to write this pro-cat editorial. I am a regular follower of no fewer than five cat-themed RSS feeds. I write this because the cats cannot.

But can you imagine if they could? Look it up on YouTube — I bet it’s pretty cute.

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Oh, and while you’re at it, there are some videos that are supposed to be about cats, but they’re just ads for someone’s blog. Don’t watch those. They’re not cute and they don’t deserve the traffic. There’s also another one that has a picture of a fluffy kitten in a snowboard boot. It looks cute, but you start watching it and then there’s a weird cackle or a lion roar right in the middle. Don’t let people mess around with you like that.

The sole reason YouTube exists is to serve as a repository for cat videos. There’s a building on these Norwegian islands where they store all the seeds for when we destroy the planet and have to grow everything back. YouTube is like that, but for cat videos. Anyway, here are my top three reasons why cats are great, along with some videos to watch as you read this (sort of like a book on tape, but where you have to do all the work).

Reason #1: Cats are stupid

YouTube video: “Many Too Small Boxes and Maru”

Cats are stupid. Don’t let them fool you; they don’t have a whole lot going on upstairs, and the few thoughts they do have are based mainly on fish and, in Maru’s case, boxes. You’ll notice Maru is trying to fit into a bunch of small boxes. MARU, YOU’RE TOO BIG, YOU BIG SILLY! YOU’LL NEVER FIT IN THERE!

Reason #2: Cats are cute

YouTube video: “Kitten That Occupies Bed”

I defy you to watch this video and not say “Aw … ” If you don’t, you’re a broken human being. What made this video even better is its original description: “Elizabethan collar is more comfortable than corn.” As anyone who has seen “Old Yeller” can attest, corn is comfortable — Old Yeller was kept in a corncrib when he was sick. (It was so he’d feel more comfortable, right? I don’t know — my mom never let me watch the end of “Old Yeller,” for some reason.)

Reason #3: Cats are dramatic

YouTube video: “Kitten vs. a Scary Thing”

This cat has his work cut out for him; that tennis ball is super scary. Approach one: come up diagonally to take the ball by surprise — no dice. A head on approach has the same disastrous results. When it comes to tennis balls, it’s probably best to just leave them alone and escape with your life. Any victory against a tennis ball is pyrrhic at best.

Finally, why are cats so great? They just are. Next time you have a stressful day at work or school, just watch a few cat videos or go pet a cat. You’ll see what I mean.