Recently in Funny Category

Perhaps not quite as rare as the African Golden... ladies and gentlemen, the mysterious Bodega Cat:



Very amusing... and very true! Our local bodega has one, though we don't call our local bodega a "bodega" -- we call it Convenience George, to distinguish it from our local small grocer, who we call Grocery George. We have a lot of Georges in our neighborhood. But only one bodega cat -- long may she rule.

Oh, these T-shirts are too good! Why has no one thought of this before? Why haven't I thought of this before? I wonder how... unusual... they would look on women? We really need to see someone actually wearing one of these things, don't we? If anyone spots one in the wild, let me know.

(Of course if our various lovely bumps and bulges create too much dissonance, we could always wear them backwards, right? And why do I have so many question marks in this post? Why?)

by Tom Pappalardo. I love it. I just love names and nicknames for pets, and Flossie is such a great dog name -- full of personality, cute, quaint, sweet, easy for the dog to learn and understand (sticking to one or two syllables is usually best), and doesn't sound like anything else that might confuse her (a dog named "Seth" might become confused with the "sit" command; "Noah" might get confused with "No!" etc.).

But speaking of pet names, I have to mention this: I've looked at a lot of pet name generators and pet name lists, and recently came upon a fairly unique one. Pet-o-licious Namerator is a World of Warcraft pet name generator to help gamers to name their WoW game pets.

You can find names both silly and serious (serious in a massively multiplayer online role-playing game sense, at any rate) for cats, dogs, bats, wolves, moths, wasps, crabs, "spirit beasts," "warp stalkers," "ravagers," and more. Need a silly name for a spider? The generator suggests Lollipop, Bluestar, Scuttlebutt, Waterspout, Tickle, Spinnerz, Nuzzle, and Icanhazfly. My next pet spiders are def being named Scuttlebutt and Tickle.

But I also found a great name for a cat here:  Luxray! Oh yeah. Love it. 50 Nicknames for My Imaginary Cat Luxray: Lux, Luxie, DeLux, Luxomatic, Luxolicious, Raygun, RayRay, FayWray, SprayRay, RuxLay... never mind me, I'll be at this for a while...

I'm feeling amused by a site I stumbled across this weekend (that ended up smeared all over the bottom of my shoe). The Sprinkle Brigade was apparently a group of activists/jokers/artists (take your pick or mix and match) who decided to bring attention to the problem of dog owners who don't pick up their pals' poops -- by decorating said sidewalk surprises in all manner of outlandish ways, with sprinkles (hence the name) of glitter, googly eyes, toy figures, or whatever other odd adornments their twisted little imaginations could muster.

Here's "Law and Order," for example:


The poop crew seems to be no longer active, but they had a good run. Over two or three years they managed to be featured in gallery exhibits, publish a book, travel the world by invitation, and appear on several documentaries and news clips. You can view a gallery of selected poopy images or watch some of their videos on their site.

when they can have ours whenever they need them?
 


via MySmelly.com

Humans aren't the only ones who get cranky and indulge in domestic squabbles: Watch these two Siberian Huskies, Mishka and Laika, navigate an issue of differing expectations about the best way to spend their Saturday afternoon. Seem familiar at all?



These two sweethearts actually each have their very own video blogs on YouTube, where more talking and cuteness ensues: Mishka; Laika.

This just in: "Prosecutors are seeking a prison sentence of 37 to 46 months for a Detroit area strip club owner who they say claimed pet store purchases for the family dog as deductions for fetish toys on his corporate taxes."


PHOTO BY ANN MARIE

Nicholas Faranso "used money from his two strip clubs to pay for veterinary bills, pet shop items and an invisible fence for 'Pebbles,' the family dog, according to a sentencing memorandum filed by prosecutors. The veterinarian bills were deducted on the corporate returns as services while some of the pet store purchases were deducted as fetish toys," prosecutors wrote.

And our award goes to... Puff and Puppet, perfect pals:



Can you guess which one is "Puff"? Hint: the lizard is a Bearded Dragon. I love these adorable little buddies. Elsewhere on YouTube, another Bearded Dragon cross-species relationship is proving a bit more complicated: Puppy is eager to play with Beardy, but Beardy is having none of it:



Awww.

Okay, this video made me laugh 'til I cried. Poor Denver. Really, who could resist delicious kitty party mix? Certainly not Denver.

Or so it would seem. But how reliable is your dog's "guilty face"? According to scientists, not very reliable at all. This article relates an experiment that tricks dogs and owners alike, and shows that dogs will often act guilty when they are scolded -- even if they didn't do anything wrong: "The dogs offered significantly more 'guilty' behaviors when they were scolded, regardless of whether they'd eaten the treat. And -- drumroll -- dogs who didn't eat the treat showed as many guilty-looking behaviors as dogs who did eat it. In other words, how guilty the dogs acted had no connection with their actual 'guilt.' In fact, the dogs who acted guiltiest of all were the 'innocent' ones being scolded." (However, the scientific community is still out on the question of doggy whistleblowers: video.)

Also, see The Myth of the Guilty Dog, and you may want to have a look at this PDF checklist of canine stress indicators, and read Dog Communication and Appeasement Gestures.

And for the love of Dog, please somebody give Denver some delicious party mix.

HUMAN FELINE ALLERGIES ARE CAUSED BY A PROTEIN SECRETED BY CATS ONTO THEIR FUR; PHOTO BY KEVIN STEELE

Good news for allergic cat lovers (I'm one!): researchers in the U.K. have developed a vaccine they are calling "ToleroMune Cat" that "provides long-term protection against the itching, sneezing and watering eyes that cats cause in up to one in 10 people... Early trials suggest the product is safe, effective and lasts longer than current treatments, which can also have serious side-effects." Unfortunately, at the moment it seems that the vaccine will require four to eight injections a year, though scientists hope to develop a longer-lasting alternative. Here's Science Daily's article on the vaccine.

One thing that hasn't been revealed about this study: cats independently developed this peptide immunotherapy solution decades ago, but never told us, despite it obviously being in their best interest to do so. Why not, you may ask? This may help explain: Why Cats Are Not Doctors. It's true. They just don't make good doctors.