I love cats, although I don't have any, I barely keep myself alive.

To be perfectly honest, I'm not a cat lover.  In fact I'm not too fond of cats at all, though I kept my ex-g/f's cat for several years after she left.  Now I didn't mind him because he was clean and absolutely no trouble once he was shown his place in the order of things  He was approaching 15 years old when one day he just disappeared and never came back.

We think we was grieving over the death of my elderly next door neighbour.  I used to have her over because she would not feed herself otherwise, and after dinner she would sit with Frog [the cat] on her lap to watch TV until she went home.  Yup, animals know/sense things, and as soon as old Vera stopped coming over he just disappeared and probably went somewhere to die.  They say cats do that, and after all, he was almost 15 in human years.

Speaking of grieving, etc, my rottweiler, Nelson, went into shut-down mode after Frog went.  It was like he'd lost a lifelong partner.  Well they were partners in crime sometimes.... like ganging up together to scare off sales people and the like.  Yup, even Frog was a great sentry/guard dog, with his fangs showing and an unfriendly demeanour toward anyone unfamiliar.  Frog was around 9 ish when Nelson came to live with us at 8 weeks old, so they more or less grew up together and were quite close.

As for cats these days, well I don't think so.  There would be too many negatives... apart from my not being so fond of cats to begin with.   For a start, we already have two dogs, and I think it'd put their noses out of joint if we introduced a cat to the household. 

Then there's the local wildlife.  Cats are known to kill birds and etc, and I don't want to bring a cat into the neighbourhood when we have such beautiful birds in the area.  We have two major parks just up the road a bit from us and they both attract native birds, and this creates another issue.  There are two major roads [one in and one out of Ipswich] between us and the parks, and I would hate for a cat... our cat to be run over while trying to get over to the parks.

See, I mightn't be so fond of cats, but I wouldn't want to see any harm come to them, either.  In fact, if I'm honest, I even shed a tear or two when Frog went away [presumably] to die.  Well he'd been with me for almost 15 years.

Before I got married I wanted to get a cat. But allegories and children don’t mix.