THE LAST DAYS OF APRIL, WE SPENT WITH APRIL SHOWERS not-so-briefly interrupting the spectacular spring we've had lately. Instead of battling the suddenly soggy outdoors, I spent the weekend dry and cozy at home, rolling around in too much sweaters and pestering the cat with too much cuddles.
Who can resist? As far back as Egypt's Bastet, and as recently as the latest lolcat, cats have proven their peculiarities worthy of confusion, fascination, obsession and comical gratification. Ancient religions were said to have exalted the little felines as all-knowing souls made mute, so as to not influence human decisions. Today's "kitteh" on the other hand, invades human idle time with more than just "speech". For the past 7 years, she's developed her own distinct lolspeaking lingo.
Throw in classic cat icons Felix, Garfield, Heathcliff, Puss in Boots, Hello Kitty, Tom and Sylvester, along with real-life cat celebrities Grumpy Cat and Karl Lagerfeld's Choupette, to name a few, fondness for felines has come to be so well celebrated, so that being a cat lover no longer commercially equates to being odd and obscure.
My current favorite: the artsy cool cats of Kaori Mitsushima's Cats I Know blog. Featuring kitties performing human activities in chic outfits, the coffee-drinking, sailor-stripe-wearing felines also appear on the illustrator's Cats I Know postcards, calendar and zine, as well as in her newly-launched Book of House Cats.
Purr!
Cats I Know illustrations by Kaori Mitsushima, www.catsiknow.com and kaorimitsushima.com
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