One of Schweitzer's two means of escaping the miseries

If, like me, you lack both a roaring fire and a disarmingly cute mass killer of fauna, all you need is a big screen where your fireplace should be and some speakers. Then just play this on repeat:

In Memoriam

My friends Christine and James are in mourning for their large, relaxed cat. James writes movingly about it here. I'm not sure whether they'll find this poem amusing and consolatory, or insensitive. I guess I'll find out:

Ode on the Death of a Favourite Cat Drowned in a Tub of Goldfishes

BY THOMAS GRAY

’Twas on a lofty vase’s side,

Where China’s gayest art had dyed

   The azure flowers that blow;

Demurest of the tabby kind,

The pensive Selima, reclined,

   Gazed on the lake below.

Her conscious tail her joy declared;

The fair round face, the snowy beard,

   The velvet of her paws,

Her coat, that with the tortoise vies,

Her ears of jet, and emerald eyes,

   She saw; and purred applause.

Still had she gazed; but ’midst the tide

Two angel forms were seen to glide,

   The genii of the stream;

Their scaly armour’s Tyrian hue

Through richest purple to the view

   Betrayed a golden gleam.

The hapless nymph with wonder saw;

A whisker first and then a claw,

   With many an ardent wish,

She stretched in vain to reach the prize.

What female heart can gold despise?

   What cat’s averse to fish?

Presumptuous maid! with looks intent

Again she stretch’d, again she bent,

   Nor knew the gulf between.

(Malignant Fate sat by, and smiled)

The slippery verge her feet beguiled,

   She tumbled headlong in.

Eight times emerging from the flood

She mewed to every watery god,

   Some speedy aid to send.

No dolphin came, no Nereid stirred;

Nor cruel Tom, nor Susan heard;

   A Favourite has no friend!

From hence, ye beauties, undeceived,

Know, one false step is ne’er retrieved,

   And be with caution bold.

Not all that tempts your wandering eyes

And heedless hearts, is lawful prize;

   Nor all that glisters, gold.

These people are dead inside

I popped home to see my family yesterday. I was all ready to sympathise with them on the death of our cat, Sherpa, which has died at 23 years old.

Until I noticed this on the fridge (the Pope John Paul II fridge magnet is an added bonus).

That's right. My family and their friends were running a sweepstake predicting the cat's death. Given that my mother won, is a doctor and was the only person in the house when it happened,  I'm calling shenanigans.

How politics works

I'm not really enjoying the squabble between Justice Secretary Ken Clarke and Home Secretary Theresa May over whether or not an immigrant was (as she claimed) or was not (as he said) given leave to remain in the UK 'because he had a pet cat' nearly as much as I should be.

"The illegal immigrant who cannot be deported because – I am not making this up – he had a pet cat."

Obviously, it's not true: the cat was mentioned in court as a jokey anecdote showing that the man in question really had settled down in a family relationship rather than in a marriage of convenience. It's the kind of moronic claim which appears in the Mail, the Express or sadly the Telegraph these days: if it fits your worldview, you splutter and rave down at the golf club. If it doesn't, you start to wonder whether the judicial system is just possibly more intelligent and complex than it's being presented by a politician trying to make a name for herself at a party conference.

What depresses me though is the post-speech spinning. Newsnight, for instance, featured Damian Green, some kind of ministerial flunky, who claimed that a) both May and Clarke were both right although May was most right, and b) that the whole affair was trivial and that there were far more important abuses of the immigration system which deserved attention.

Fair enough. So why did his boss decide to caricature the immigration laws and the courts (disgracefully) by telling stories about cats, on live television? The media didn't trivialise this debate - the government did, for cynical and racist political purposes. Meanwhile, we're in the worst depression for 8 years.

Another three and a half years of this…

Mark ye but this

Mark has:

a three-legged cat

14,500 books

7 broken TVs

no ceilings

no number-plates

3 broken computers

one (semi-) working eye

no spectacles

and is a dear, dear friend and colleague. His research interests are porn, Charles Manson and other freaky stuff. And now he's completely knackered his back - can only shuffle, can't lift things etc - so I'm off to help him move office. He is, of course, in possession of the largest library in the university. See his library and cat here (and mine here)

Bong/Cat interface

OK, I just suggested that people are essentially good. I didn't suggest that they're essentially kind or bright. As evidence, I give you this headline (and video):

Man Arrested For Smoking Bong With His Cat Stuffed Inside

Needless to say, this event took place in the United States. I hope the Nebraskan responsible isn't the one who's been reading this blog.