In Which Some Friends Create Incremental Titles for Sequels
(Names of said friends have been removed to protect them from angry reprisals. And yes, a few of these are mine.) (The list is only ordered because I’m curious as to how bloody many of these we thunk up. A lot, it seems.) (Note: You must at least make it to #113.)
- The Whole Ten Yards
- Die Harder
- Most Final Destination”
- Three Girls and Two Guys
- 29 Days Later
- 9 1/2 Weeks (brad: 9-3/4 Weeks)
- Ridley Scott’s 1493: Description of Paradise, in which Christopher Columbus tells the Spaniards about the New World, was critically panned.
- Stalag 18
- David Fincher’s 8ight / Ei8ht
- Bob & Ted & Carol & Alice & Frank the Cute Waiter at the Mexican Restaurant
- 25 Hour Party People
- The Rock in xXxX.
- Global warming apocalypse continues in Two Days From Now.
- Good Evening, Vietnam
- The Good, the Bad, the Ugly, and Chuck
- To Live and Die and Be Buried in L.A.
- Dial N for Nurder
- Sidney Poitier in Guess Who’s Dropping by for Dessert?
- Grumpy Dead Men
- Rosemary’s Sullen Teenager
- Moulin Orange
- The 401 Blows
- Malcolm XI
- A Light Rail Named Desire
- Francis Ford Coppola’s The Polyester Club
- An Officer (Ret.) and a Gentlemen
- The Arithmetic Mean of All Fears
- Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Grownup
- Aguirre: The Anger Management Course of God
- Clichy-sous Bois, Texas
- The Gods Must Be Given Lithium
- Having Been John Malkovich
- Billy Wilder’s A2
- Shanghai Quartet
- 50 Second Dates
- The Best Medium-to-Large Whorehouse in Texas
- L.A. Widely Known
- Bambii
- Even Bigger Trouble in Littler China
- Pumping Cobalt
- A Chorus Plane
- 32 Feature-Length Presentations About Glenn Gould
- Abel Ferrara’s King of the Tri-State Area.
- Red Mid-Morning
- The Big Wake
- Don’t forget U-572.
- I remain unimpressed by Nine hundred and ninety-nine thousand nine hundred and ninety-nine Years B.C.
- The Great British Patient
- K-20, The Remarrier
- VI
- The Eiger Embargo
- Thoroughly Post-Modern Millie
- The Peninsula of Dr. Moreau
- The Isthmus of Dr. Moreau
- The Land Area Surrounding a Lake of Dr. Moreau
- Down the Esophagus of Madness
- Where The Boys Were
- Cretaceous Park
- Apocalypse Then
- Pumpkin Man
- Paidback
- Expatriate Kane
- Diamonds Are Forever
- No Mohicans
- The Philadelphia Peer-Reviewed Study
- Joe vs. The Atoll
- Phenomenot
- Try to Remember Paris
- A Hard Night’s Night
- The Dry Cleaner of Panama
- Girl, Resumed
- Home Free for Christ
- Me and You and Everyone We Know and Everyone They Know
- Me and You and Everyone We Know and Everyone They Know and Everyone They Know
- Me and You and Everyone We Know and Everyone They Know and Everyone They Know and Everyone They Know
- Five Degrees Of Seperation
- Anne of Red-Shifted Gables
- Life as a Duplex
- The Green Kilometer
- Godot Better Be Dead Or In Jail
- My Uncomfortable Flatulence With Andre
- Grizzly Meal
- Miller’s Clover Leaf
- American Repainting
- From The Moon To The Earth
- The Devil’s Pelvis
- Shone
- And The Dirty Baker’s Dozen.
- If we can get the wiring on Andie McDowell repaired, we can start shooting 5 Weddings and 2 Funerals.
- Bring Me The Lungs and Adrenal Glands of Alfredo Garcia. “Couldn’t you have asked for these when I was getting the head?!”
- American Pie 4: Boner Bongo Bonanza
- The Day After The Day Of The Condor.
- 7 Divorces for 7 Brothers.
- Leprechaun 6: Leprechaun In Inner Space (with Dennis Quaid!)
- Leprechaun 7: Leprechaun In The Crawlspace
- Leprechaun 8: Leprechaun vs. Freddy vs. Jason vs. Alien vs. Predator vs. Chucky vs. Shark
- Snakes On A Plane, Trains and Automobiles
- Two Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest.
- The Wild Oodles.
- Seven Degrees of Separation, perhaps inevitably, stars Kevin Bacon.
- American Pi
- Around the World, or, 69 Days is an excellent porno.
- I’m moving on to song titles.
- 89 Lines about 45 Women
- 26 or 7 to 5
- Once, Twice, Three, Fuck It, FOUR TIMES A LADY
- Turali
- Priscilla, Popette of the Steppes
- As Good As It Gets Up In Your Guts
- Duckier Soup
- Amazon Hermaphrodites on Phobos
- The Credenza of Dr. Caligari
- Nosferateaux
- The Goodbye Old Broad
- Save Every Fucking Dance For Me
- Zombification Becomes Her
- I Am Curious (Microwave)
- The Miracle Loafer
- The Raisins of Sloth
- Earth Girls Are A Pain In the Ass
- The Blackboard Controlled Deforestation Zone
- Charlie and the Fudge Packing Company
- Sunday Morning Hangover
- Dunston Checks Out, Tunes In, Turns On
- Vertigone
- Back to the Waterfront
- Tweet Tweetback’s Badattttttt Tong.
- Scent of a Crone
- The Killing of Sally Fields
- Silence of the Mutton
- Bald (brad: Featuring “Let the Moon Shine In” and “The Twilight of the Age of Aquarius”.)
- The Ten Suggestions
- To Kill Extra Mockingbirds
- The Fucking Wind’s Back
- Episiotomy of a Nation
- I Already Did The Right Thing, Ma
- Good Riddance to Owen Meany
- Smilla’s Sense of Slush
- From Russia With Smoldering Resentment
- Dog Afternoon Evening
- Here’s What the &*%! We Know Already
- There’s Apparently No Way to Leave Africa
- The Cheering Up of A Cocksucker
- Uninteresting Calzone
- I Think I’m Getting Over Her Ridge
- I Guess I Was Wrong About the End of the World
- Can We Just Be Friends, Actually
- All The Pretty Glue Factories
- Jesus of Ottawa
- Schindler’s Doodling
- All’s Horrible, Forever
- I Spit Directly On Your Disinterred Body
- Another Goddam Detail
- Shampee
- Solarisn’t
- I Know I Put Baby Jane Somewhere Around Here
- Too Many Faces of Eve
- Babe, Country Bacon
- Everbody Can See You, Man
- This Canyon Kind of Sucks
- The Born-Again Poets Society
- My Left Yard
- Johnny . . . What’s His Name Again?
- The Lion That Quietly Ate Cheese
- Prospero’s Periodicals
- Nambo Nouth
- Planet of the Humans
- Footless
- Looking for Mr. Betterbar
- No, Being Over There
- Karhead
- Gorkier Park
- Get Lost, and Fuck Off
- It’s Time For Lunch, Vietnam!
- Alice’s Taco Bell
- I’m Full, Thanks (with Catherine Deneuve)
- The World’s Most Dangerous Gameboy
- The Sixth Element
- 20,001 Leagues Under the Sea
- 103 Dalmatians: Electric Boogaloo
- 11, starring Bo Derek and Spinal Tap.
- Mulvae
- The Second Wives Club
- The Ferries of Madison County
- Triathlon Man
- Young Doctors Engaged
- Slightly Older Guns
- Middle-Aged Frankenstein
- 43rd Street
- Encino Man of La Mancha
- Eat, Drink, Man, Woman, Baby
- …And Then Down the Up Staircase
- Yes, We Have No Starfighters
- You Said Never Again, Didn’t You?
- Nonapussy
- Brokeback Molehill
- Boom and Bang (sequels to Crash)
- Goodbye, Dolly!
- You’re Not So Funny Anymore, Girl
- The Fourpenny Opera
- Two Hour Photo
- The Man Who Found His Other Red Shoe
- Higherlander
- The Thomas Crown Palimony Suit
- Stroker Deuce
- Turk 183!
- The Falcon and the Pile of Slush
- Ferris Bueller Returns to School
- TV: Murder, She Blogged
- Nuns Slowing Down, Beginning to Walk
- One More Mule for Sister Sara, Making Three Altogether
- Three for the Jungle Gym
- $1,000,001 Baby
- 9 Heads in a Valise
- Assault on Precinct 14
- Miracle on 43rd Street
- The Fourth Man, where Holly Martins searches for his old buddy who sold counterfeit Sachertortes made with carob.
- You Only Live Thrice
- Who’s Afraid of Leonard Woolf?
- Insurance Claim (sequel to Crash)
- Strep Throat
- Debbie Does Dubuque
- The Man Who Embalmed Liberty Valance
- You Don’t Write, You Don’t Visit, You Just Call When You Need Money, My Concubine
- The Cook the Thief His Wife & Her Lover & Her Lover’s Lover
- Apocalypse Later
- Triple Indemnity
- The Fourth Man
- The Post-Graduate
- The 8 Year Itch
- American History XI
- Postmodern Times
- To Bury a Mockingbird
- 12 Angry Men and a Baby
- 1PM(sequel to High Noon)
- Mr. Smith goes to Topeka(this could be an almost endless road movie series)
- Fiddler in the Bushes
- The Princess Wife: Barefoot and Pregnant
- A Tad Bit More Evil
- Yours, Mine, Ours, and Theirs(hell, this might already be in production)
- Noon of the Dead
- The Seventh Sense
- Deeper Impact
- The Hypotenuse of All Fears
- Perdition
- Forgiven
- Master and Commander: The Pond Out Back
- Sky Captain and the World of the Day After Tomorrow
- Ladder 50
- Love, Sort Of
- Show Me State
- Pirates of the Caspian
- Exit the Dragon
- The Day After the Jackal
- His Girl Saturday
- It’s a Madder, Madder, Madder, Madder World
- One Conversation About Thirteen Things
- Reality Continues to Bite
- Rush-Even-More
- Reversible
- Breakable
- Clueful
- Badderlands
- Yes, They Do Shoot Horses
- Hanging Out In Neverland
- And The Band Continued Playing Interminably
- The Year of Living Cautiously
- Hello Again, My Concubine
- fünfdotcom
- Not to mention pointy-eared Will Farrell in the hit Christmas sequal, Zwölf.
- Armageddon II
- Were Those Russians, Were Those Russians?
- Mr. Smith and the House Ethics Committee
- Upper Stomach
- Fitzcaraldidn’t
- Saving Sergent Ryan
- The Aviary (from the Birdcage)
- Close Encounters of the 4th Kind
- Extinguish the Red Lantern
- Steamworld
- Cube (sequel to Sphere)
- A Bridge Not Quite Far Enough
- Bridge on the Tributary Kwai
- Fried Green Tomatoes In the Fridge
- Crimson Cheer
- Arms Return To Do Laundry
- A River Tame
- All the Prime Minister’s Men
- Bill & Ted’s Clusterfuck of a Voyage
- Snakes in the Baggage Claim Area
- To Julie Newmar, No Worries, Wong Foo
- Einstein.
- A Little Faster With The Drum-Banging, Please.
- Saturday Morning Blindness.
- Lorenzo’s Gas
- Matrix: Transposed
- Enron II: The Most Abused Guys In The Cell
- Fully Fucking Baked.
- O Brother, For Fuck’s Sake, Come Home.
- Broken, Dried Flowers
- Charlie’s Bridge-Playing Karate Hags
- Ghost Malamute
- Okay, Get The Kid Out of The Picture Now.
- Fuck A Huckabee
- Coyote Uglier
- Bloodsnowe
- Aeon Flux Divergence
- What’s Digesting Gilbert Grape?
- In Golden Pond
- Good Will Stuffing
- Decent Burger
- An Additional Five or So Things I Hate About You
- Field of Disrepair
- The Karate Middle-Aged Dad (With a Japan Fetish)
- The Cider House Rules Even Harder
- Basic Instinct 3: Pockmarks of Retribution
- Don’t Hustle and Flow While Doing The Right Thing In The Belly Of The Barbershop
- Purple Puddles
- Quake
- Arnie Edition!
- False Truths
- Foggy Recall
- Last Drama Hero
- The Promenading Man
- First-Grade Cop
- Conan The Rebuilder
- Start of Next Days
- Vampire in Less-Expensive Queens
- Dirty Dancing: Tijuana Mornings
- Sisterhood of the Travelling Tapered Jeans
- Pirates of the Florida Keys
- Four Funerals and an Exhuming
- Xanadid
- My Curiosity Has Been Satisfied (Yellow)
- Very Funny, Fred, Now Get Up Off The Floor And Don’t Be So Sarcastic
- Turn Your Goddamn Boombox Down On The Western Front
- ^Ator: The Endangered Eagle^
- Repairin’
- A River Was Diverted Around It
- Goonies 2 : Chunk’s Revenge
- some kind of mediocrity
- “E.U.: Da Butt.”
- The Andromeda Sprain
- Greasier
- Carbon (sequel to “The Fifth Element”)
- The Last Webelos
- The Italian Internship
- The Bourne Submission
- The Day After The Day After Tomorrow
- Twin Peaks: Go To The Podiatrist With Me
- Battlefield Epcot
- Breakin’ 3: Elective Surgery
- Yo, Jimbo!
- Airbrush Your Wagon
- High Noonish
- Jeff Bridges of Madison County
- Planes, Trains, and Segways
- Beverly Sills Ninja
- The Hot Apparatchik
- Stuart Shaves His Family
- Seed of Chuck Eddy
- Screen Test Icicles
- Failure to Lunch
- The Jock of Zorro
- For Your Thighs Only
- Scooby-Didn’t
- The Polar Local
- Jamocha Sky
- Emmanuelle vs. Blacula
- Last Year at Marion Barry
- Judge Dredd at Nuremburg
- Citizen Korn
- Q: The Winged Serpent (And Not U-571)
- Repertory Danny Rose
- Harold
- Indiana Jones and the Retirement Home of Boredom
- Dracula 4000
- Tora Tora Tora Tora
- Grandchildren of a Lesser God
- Adolecents of the Corn
- Star Peace
- Dude, Where’s my Hovercraft?
- Harold & Kumar Go to the bathroom
- Alienii
- American Graffitti Removal
- EMPEROR KONG
- How to Fold an American Quilt
- Dead Man Rotting
- Hawaii Five-1
- Room 223
- My Own Private Idahoer
- Field of Disrepair
- The Nextorcist
- Taxi Parker
- Goodnight, Good Luck, and Get The Fuck Out of My Apartment
- Gladinineor
- Hello Again My Concubine
- The Long, Long RV
- 9
- Don’t Tell Mom The Babysitter’s a Zombie
- Cat with Burned Paws
- Sisterhood of the Traveling Support Hose
- Freshly-Showered Harry
- Rest, Lola, Rest
- Shirley Shamrock
- Looking for Mister Low-Carb Power Bar
- How Stella Decided Her Groove Was Overrated
- When Harry Got Sick and Tired of Sally
- Jail House Lite Jazz
- Bodycast Mountain
- What Ate Gilbert Grape?
- Managers
- Once Were Veterans
- Sereneyoo
- Serelety
- Zardozn’t
- Prospero’s e-Books
- Smoldering Pile of the Vanities
- The Landing
- Sophie’s Consequences
- Blood Somewhat Complicated
- Lord of the Earrings
- Dogs!
- The Found Boys
- Duke of the Flies
- Room-Temperature Hand Luke
- Trainspotted
- The Grandgodfather
- L-PAX
- 9mm
- J, Claudius
- Alice in Twoderland
- Expatriate Kane
- The Phantom Womenace
- Attack of the Clones’ Clones
- Threevenge of the Sith
- A Slightly Old Hope
- The Empire Struck Back
- Refund of the Jedi
- The Thin Red Space
- Sex, Lies, and Digital Video Recorders
- To Wong Foo, Why Didn’t You Call? –Julie Newmar
- Okay, I Found Bobby Fischer, Now What Do I Do With Him?
- Pulp Non-Fiction
- Doc Bollywood
- You’ve Got Gmail
- Roman Workday
- Dave, Jr.
- Fahrenheit 912
- Chittier Chittier Bang Bang
- Red Afternoon
- Five Moderately Difficult Pieces
- Been There
- Friday the 14th
- Fargone
- The Later, Greater Planet Earth
- Narcoleptic in Seattle
- Some Other Kind of Wonderful
- The Mid-morning Snack Club
- Raiders of the Found Ark
- Batman Continues
- Body Triple
- Little Shop of Things That Might Make You Somewhat Uncomfortable
- Bigger Top Pee Wee
- Dead Man Sitting Down In The Electric Chair
- Vermilion Planet
- Howl’s Stationary Castle
- Non-event Horizon
- Eight Samurai
- Brewster’s Thousands
- The Stung
- It Happened Another Night
- The Morning After of the Hunter
- Prequels:
- All About Lilith
- The African Princess
- Sunrise Boulevard
- Apocalypse Soon
- Some Like It Defrosted
- His Girl Thursday
- The Lady Reappears
- Aguirre: The Wrath of God Is Dead
- Toddler Face
- Bunny Lake is Found
- Splendor in the Hay
- The Sniveling and Blowing Your Nose Game
- Clean Up After Yourself at Hanging Rock
- The Afterbirth of a Nation
- Clammy Corpse-Hand Luke
- If You Want Tango, Try Argentina
- Chariots of Ash
- Actually, I Didn’t Want to Know Any of That About Sex, But Thanks For Asking
- The Harder They Winter
- eYisten1
- N. Butterfly
- Naked Dinner
- Resurrected Ringers
- The Zombie Zone
- The Flew
- Not Particularly Faraway, but Also Not Quite as Close
- O Brother, There You Are
- The Royal Elevenenbaums
- Having Broken the Waves
- W for Wendetta
- The Lost Weekday
- Fine, I Forgive You Already
- Gosbridge Park
- The Bad Seedling
- Lord of the Bracelets
- 17 Candles
- The Lunch Club
- Say Everything
- H4ckers
- Buffy the Vampire
- Office Nth Space
- Fallow State
- Noel Stoker’s Son’s Dracula
- Bram Stoker’s Son’s Dracula
- Noel Stoker’s Dracula.
- The Bridge Was Too Far
- X for Xanadu
- Two Eyed Queens
- Session 10
- 13 Monkeys
- The 41 Year Old Stud
- 4-Iron
- Eviler Dead
- Army of Darkness (starring Charlie Murphy)
- Blade Jogger
- The Big Nap
- Matrices
- Hachinin no Samurai
- Post-Modern Times
- The Constant Gardner, Still (Succa: Alternately: Won’t Stop Gardening)
- The Man Who Was There, Only He Was In the Bathroom for a Moment
- Corpse Divorcee
- Come On, Sam, One More Time
- The Big Red Two
May I ask why you call yourself Frykitty. I am only curious, being a cat person. Perhaps a crazy cat woman, and a cat trapper. Crazy is an ok title. I think. Considering the world is basically nuts. So, I’m surfing the web meaninglessly and stumble onto your site and the question popped up, “Hmmmm, I wonder about the origin of Fry Kitty, although it’s most likely completely unimportant. Have a nice night, fix your pets and possibly also your teens. Remember, a fixed cat is a healthy cat and rarely pees on a neighbors car tire.
Hello there! I remember reading Cat Trapper’s Journal when you first started writing it (I assume you are the same cat trapper?). I not only think cats should be be spayed or neutered, I’m a believer in indoor-only cats.
You’re right, “frykitty” is of no consequence. My name is Cat, and I have a long-standing love of them, and I was just being contrary one day many years ago when I thought “kitty fritters” would be a funny online name. It is, but it’s too long. Thus, frykitty.
Why indoor-only cats? (Not asking to be critical, but out of curiosity.)
I understand that indoor-only cats are generally healthier, and do less damage to the avian and rodent populations, and those two factors alone may be enough for many people to keep their cats indoors. And in Canby, we had indoor-only cats for years (followed by indoor-mostly cats). But since we’ve moved to Oak Grove, and live on 3/5 an acre surrounded on three sides by high fences and on the fourth side by a low-speed low-traffic road, we’ve taken to letting out cats out fairly often (though not as often as they could wish). It’s true that they kill the occasional bird, but we hope our karma with our winged friend is balanced by the fact that we provide them with a bounty of food. (As you know, we have a lot of bird friends who visit us, and who nest in our yard.) It’s also true that our cats get in an occasional fight, or wander into a neighbor’s yard, but we’re very conscientious about seeking vetrinarian care. Being outside makes our cats so happy, that I can’t imagine not letting them out anymore. At least not while we’re at this house.
When I was a kid, it was perfectly normal to let the dog out. She got to wander around, have a great time, and poop wherever she liked. This was the neighborhood norm. Over time, people realized that loose dogs were a hazard to other humans, the cleanliness of the neighborhood, and to the health of the dogs themselves. So now the norm is much more responsible–take your dog out on a leash, and clean up after it.
At this time, the norm for most folks is to let their cats roam free. They can do whatever they like in the neighbors’ yards, catch and spread diseases, and decimate the local wildlife. Domestic cats are a non-native species, imported and bred for our pleasure. I love, love, love cats, but they don’t belong outdoors on their own. We did take ours out on a harness for a while, but because we hadn’t trained her for this from kittenhood, it ended up being too stressful for everyone. I do regret that. But not letting her out? Christ, I have a friend who has lost two cats in as many years, because she won’t keep them in (W, I’m sorry if you’re reading this, but it fucking KILLS me). She went through horrible grief and guilt each time. I’ve been there, and I won’t be again. Because you know what? If your cat is killed by a dog, or a disease she picked up outside, or in some other horrible fashion because you couldn’t keep her indoors, then it’s your fault. Your fault that you couldn’t take care of her in her last moments. Your fault that she died in fear.
Last year, I lost a kitty. She was very old (something that rarely happens to outdoor cats) and had had a fantastic life. At the end, she had amazing care, and she died while Bill and I were petting her and soothing her. She slipped away even before she was given the euthanizing shot. If she had died somewhere outdoors, afraid, without me, well, I would deserve to die, too. The grief was horrible, but at least I knew I’d done all I could, and taken care of her to the best of my ability. Cats are a lifetime commitment, and sometimes doing what’s best for them isn’t the most fun.
JD, you know I really like you, and consider you a friend, but this is one area where we vehemently disagree. I stopped following your photo feed because every picture of a cat with a dead bird in his mouth made me deeply angry, and I would rather follow the bits of JD that I like.
Sorry this turned into a rant. It’s an extremely hot button for me, especially after seeing my friend go through the awful grief and guilt once, and learn nothing, and then get the lesson again. As far as I know, her cats are still roaming. I meant to make it a post in a few days, and I may yet. There are a lot more thoughts, and some of them got jumbled up a bit.
In re: kittyfritters, it seems others have had similar silly thoughts.
In re: outdoor cats, are your cats spayed and neutered JD? The most serious environmental problem relating to cats is viable breeding populations of feral ex-pets and the resulting never-pets. I do not know whether there are enough pet cats for their predatory activities to have a significant impact on native species, though in the absence of data my feeling is that it’s likely. In any case, each dead bird is a loss, and feeding your feathered friends (aka luring them into the claws of your cats) hardly makes up for, well, anything. Similarly, being conscientious about vet visits will not help a mortally wounded or fatally infected cat. A quick google turns up some hard data and a wealth of informed and reasonable opinion, all of which indicates that letting your cats outdoors comes pretty close to neglecting them.
Cat, first let me say that I respect your beliefs and the polite (yet effective) way in which you express them. Thank you for sharing. This helps me understand where you are coming from.
Domestic cats are a non-native species…
This is an excellent point, and something I’d never really considered. I mean it’s obvious is one respect, but I hadn’t ever considered it from the “non-native” species perspective. Do you know what I mean? When I think of non-native species, I think of Scotch Broom and Starlings, and so on, but not cats. Thinking of them in this way sheds a different light on things.
If your cat is killed by a dog, or a disease she picked up outside, or in some other horrible fashion because you couldn’t keep her indoors, then it’s your fault. Your fault that you couldn’t take care of her in her last moments. Your fault that she died in fear.
This, too, is valid. When we lived in Canby, we had one cat — Satchel — who could not grasp the concept of The Road. (We lived on a much busier street than we do currently.) One day he was chasing another cat across the road during rush hour, and Satchel was hit. I try to console myself that he died happy, but that’s really just a rationalization. On another morning driving to work on the same road, I came across a cat who had been hits only seconds before. That image has stuck with me for a decade, and will stick with me the rest of my life. It saddens and sickens me. I grew up in the country, and all of our cats were outside-only. We lost a number of them to the road, at least one each year. Perhaps that’s why I’m desensitized to it. Our friends who still live out here constantly lose cats to the road.
I agree: this is a bad thing. (My approach has always been “ban cars”, though, which has several other advantages in my eyes. It’s also not a very pragmatic solution.)
Sorry this turned into a rant. It’s an extremely hot button for me
It’s no problem. I understand, and I respect your position. We all have hot-button issues. And even though we may recognize the validity of a friend’s logic on a hot-button issue, it may not match our own. You might not think that television and advertising are the scourges I believe them to be (to use a hypothetical), but you might understand my reasoning, even if you don’t agree with my conclusions.
I stopped following your photo feed because every picture of a cat with a dead bird in his mouth made me deeply angry
I will make a vow: no more such photos in my Flickr feed, and if I feel absolutely compelled to post such a photo to my weblog, I’ll be sure to post warning at the top. (But I’ll try to refrain from posting such photos to my weblog.)
All this agreement having been stated, I will still choose to allow my cats outside, despite their bird-hunting, and despite the chance they may be struck on the road. My cats at least are happy outside, especially Simon. When Simon is trapped indoors on a sunny day, he is miserable. He was born outside (his mother was a barn cat), grew up outside, and has been allowed outside privileges all his life. In my mind, it is a greater moral wrong to keep him cooped inside the house than it is to let him outside. If we still lived in the house in Canby, I’d be torn. (I was always torn when we let the cats outside there.) I’m not torn now. Yes, he will kill a couple of birds a year, and yes, there’s a chance that he may suffer some tragic fate, but he will have lived an happy life.
I guess that in my mind, the inside/outside issue is contingent on a number of factors, including the nature of your cat, the location of your home, the amount of traffic, etc. If a cat is happy indoors, or if it cannot be let outside safely, then I agree: the cat should be kept indoors. Otherwise, it’s my opinion that other factors should be considered.
Thanks for discussing this. I apologize for any past stress my cat photos may have caused!
JD: Thanks so much for your thoughtful response. I have to admit I would have a hell of a time keeping a barn cat indoors, and therefore probably would never take one in unless it was unavoidable. These things happen. Your consideration on the photos is extremely generous, and I thank you.
And why did we have to start this conversation on such a long post?
Heh. It always amuses me when tangential conversations begin on weblog posts. I often transpose them into real posts on my site, but then conversation just dies for some reason. Never have figured it out…
Back to work.
JD: I don’t agree that (your assessment of) your cats’ happiness outweighs your responsibilities to the animals they kill, or to the cats themselves. Be that as it may, your present cats clearly have established patterns of behaviour which you are unwilling to disrupt. So, what about future cats? Will they also be outdoor cats, or will you take the opportunity to establish in them patterns of happy indoor living, so as to avoid the same problem?
What about future cats? Will they also be outdoor cats, or will you take the opportunity to establish in them patterns of happy indoor living, so as to avoid the same problem?
Ah, this is a Good Question, one to which I do not have a Good Answer. It probably depends on the cat. If we adopt from the Humane Society (as we’ve done on occasion), or we are certain that the cat has always lived indoors, or we adopt a kitten, then I’m sure we’ll do our best to keep the cat indoors. But if we adopt an adult cat who is already used to being outside, I’m sure we’ll allow it outside.
We currently have three cats. Simon loves outside more than anything else, and he is completely miserable when he’s not allowed outside in good weather. Nemo likes outside, but he’d be perfectly happy inside all the time, too, so long as he got to wrassle from time-to-time. Toto used to like outside, but now she’s old and bitter and doesn’t like anything or anyone. She rarely goes outside. She’ll follow me around the yard if I’m gardening sometimes. And often in the evening she’ll ask to be let outside for two minutes (why? we don’t know — she’s a cat). But other than that, she doesn’t want to be outside. She’s inside and likes it that way.
Kris and I love our cats. They are like children to us. We don’t take their health and happiness lightly. (As my pocketbook demonstrates.) We just feel that in our situation, with our cats, it’s best for them to have outside access.
How many cats do you guys have by the way? I know you’ve posted photos, but I can’t recall ever actually enumerating them…
We just have KC now, since Prisolm died about a year ago. She absolutely loves being the only cat–her personality changed quite a bit for the better–so she’ll probably stay an only cat. ^Selfish little bugger.^
Incidentally, KC was adopted as a stray, and would prefer to be an indoor/outdoor cat, but for all the reasons we’ve discussed, she is not.
I’ve managed to save up roughly $42457 in my bank account, but I’m not sure if I should buy a house or not. Do you think the market is stable or do you think that home prices will decrease by a lot?
The housing market depends on where you live. It’s going down a little in some areas, but in desirable cities like San Francisco and Portland, it’s going strong. But that may not be the biggest consideration. The housing market, like the stock market, will always have dips and surges, but is good over time. What you want to consider is loss of cash. Sit down and add up everything you’ve paid in rent over your lifetime. That money is *gone*. Continuing to pay rent is throwing good money after bad.