Kendall thought a more likely reason was that cats fit in better with the demands of ‘working owners, of weekending city dwellers and of holidaymakers’, also that ‘they are more self-contained, get less upset when their owners are away, and do their own physical jerks’. And such discerning palates: ‘Their pernickety taste buds keep manufacturers on a treadmill pursuit of variety, grinding up chickens’ necks, knacker’s yard offal and fish waste in search for new flavours.’
Dr Roger Tabor, an urban ecologist, spent 12 months watching London’s feral cats in their colonies on ‘building sites, in alleys around hotels, even on Soho roof-tops’. The cat-about-town, he found, did indeed resemble TS Eliot’s ‘Brummell among cats’.Cats have been at the mercy of man’s whims, ‘worshipped during one era, burnt as devils the next’ and ‘no matter how much we try to pin it down’ concluded Kendall, ‘Shakespeare’s “harmless, necessary cat” retains its enigmatic hold over the human imagination.’Be realistic. Unrealistic goals will only prevent you from growing. There are two common mistakes a dog owner can make that will slam the brakes hard on any potential progress you might be hoping for. First, the expectations we place on our dogs and ourselves. The misguided belief that your dog “should” be performing or responding at a certain predetermined level. Another mistake many owners make is having unrealistic assumptions. Many of us assume that our dog understands what we want and that he knows what we’re asking of him. As if that wasn’t bad enough, some of us assume that the dogs failure to perform means he’s either rebelling, stubborn, or just plain stupid.
‘Their stillness has a spiritual quality,’ one cat breeder told Kendall. ‘Cats fulfil the soul. They are tranquillisers with fur and four legs.’