Subcultural engagement for the 21st Century...
Barbelith is a new kind of community (find out more)...
You can login or register.

A sad, sad thread.

Whale... Whale... Fish!

18:35 / 21.10.04

On our way back from job-hunting sttab noticed a sign on a lamppost near the lorry/skip depot round the corner from where we live. The sign was someone asking if anyone had seen their cat. The cat was called Syd and was 2 1/2 years old, grey with white and black patches and had a little collar with the word "meow" on it. Syd is apparantly very friendly and dearly missed. Syd has been missing since the 3rd of October. This made me feel very sad. I actually might cry.

I want to find and return Syd to her/his home and give this tale a happy ending but I fear it shall not be so.

I always get sad at missing cat signs.

Timelord

14:30 / 22.10.04

So do I.
I love cats.
Cats are lovely, they are.
This evening I witnessed the birth of 7 little slimey kittens and I named them all Matchless in honour of my ex girlfriend who had to move for work and leave her cat behind with friends. The mother is a feral that lives in my garage and tomorrow I have to round them all up, mother and all, and take them to the RSPCA, I guess.
I can't think of anything else responsible to do with them all...
This makes me sad too.

Whale... Whale... Fish!

15:12 / 22.10.04

But they have a chance of finding a home where they will be loved. And have comfy chairs to sleep on. And random objects to chase and all the things that cats love...

If I wasn't so skint, I would adopt one.

My cat is at my parental home a good 500miles away. And apparantly, it's pretty depressed, as neither me or my sister are about (the fact that I haven't really been about in about 4 years doesn't seem to have bothered the cat), and is comfort eating. When all it wants is to be picked up and hugged.

I looked out for Syd on my way back home last night but no avail. Saw other cats though but none were grey and none had a wee collar with meow on it...

Axolotl

15:34 / 22.10.04

Those signs always really upset me. I am at the moment in loco parentis for a couple of cats and am terribly paranoid in case something goes wrong.
Timelord - Good for you about the kittens and the RSPCA, though it's hard they will have a much better life than if they were feral.

ONLY NICE THINGS

15:49 / 22.10.04

I was on the train into work this morning, or actually this afternoon, and found that something I was reading reminded me of a friend who died a few years ago. The narrator of the book I was reading was visiting the grave of her adoptive mother, which was something like the relationship of this friend and myself.

Which put me in mind of the fact that, actually, there wasn't a grave I could visit, which had not really hit me before. Strictly speaking, there wasn't even a region - due to a difference of opinion, the ashes had been scattered in two different countries. It was one of those roller-coaster plummet sad moments.

Whale... Whale... Fish!

16:57 / 13.11.04

I saw Syd today on my way to Tesco looking fed and happy so I'm assuming it returned home!

I stopped and spoke to Syd and am feeling quite happy. Syd was indeed a friendly cat and spoke back a bit then sauntered off. I'm happy.

Grey Area

17:25 / 13.11.04

And this story, in turn, has made me happy. Three cheers for found, friendly cats.

JOY NO WRY

18:28 / 13.11.04

The 'missing pet' posters I used to see in a certain area of Brighton always made me more curious than sad, simply because their were so very many of them. I don't know if anybody knows the Fiveways area, but have a look around and those placards are all over the place, 365 days a year. Its not even like there are any major roads of anything. After a while I kind of hypothesised that their might be some kind of cat-eating beast of Brighton and it was hunting around there in the middle of the night and slinking off silently with them to its lair and I'm way off subject now, sorry.

A fox took my rabbits as a kid, but it *left their tails behind*. Yeah, that still makes me sad. My big sister used to keep them in a box, but I think my parents threw it away.

Olulabelle

22:05 / 14.11.04

There's a horribly sad story I know about a little dog called Bertie who once lived happily in a house near to me but for the last year and three quarters has been running wild on Salisbury Plain and near-abouts, lost. Occasionally he is sighted but people try to catch him and because he's a scaredy dog he runs away from them and remains lost and lonely.

Every now and then I would see an ad in the paper from the lady who owns him, pleading with the public not to try and catch him and instead to call her with his location when he's spotted. But I haven't seen the ads for a while now.

There's a website about him, and everything, but there's no recent news of him on it. I hope he's still alive, but I don't want to mail her and ask her in case he isn't.

And I've even got her number in my phone, just in case I see him.

*Sigh.*

_Boboss

13:23 / 15.11.04

there's quite a lot in the newspepers and corner-shop gossip lately about brighton cat-haters: apparently between round hill crescent and fiveways lots of cats have been injured or gone missing due to a (hopefully) lone nutjob with an air rifle. remember someone saying something similar being reported in whitehawk. news also of 'a van' that goes around snatching them off the street before piling them into bin bags for strangling and roadside dumping. not sure where the urban legend hits the neighbourhood of fact there, but otherwise rational people refusing to let their moggies out the front of the house.
local postman lore is that the cats get got by the foxes, who're about as visible a presence as cats on the street between 4-6am. ours only has a small outside play area is sandwiched between other, larger cat territories, so she never goes far and we're very glad.

Whale... Whale... Fish!

03:04 / 18.11.04

very odd...

There is a man who lives near a friend of mine who herds the local cats. He lurks in the dark corners of the street trying to get the cats to all go wherever he wants to take them, which is quite un-nerving although I am strangely curious about the whole practice. What he does once he has managed this near-impossible task is anyones guess.

In spite of with efforts the numbers of cats in the locality haven't dropped so either he means them no ill or he's just not very successful with his herding. I would imagine maybe the latter.

Papess

03:28 / 18.11.04

Wow Whales, that sounds like some profound yoga/active meditation/zen type thing he's practicing.

That, or he's a nutbar.

Whale... Whale... Fish!

04:42 / 19.11.04

it would require the patience of a saint, however, i tend to go with the latter.

I enquired further with my friend but she hasn't seen the Cat-shepard of Magdelan Green for a while now....

It is all rather odd. What if he travels all over the country herding cats? One week he's in Dundee, the next Brighton...

Add Your Reply