Cats In The News

Two interesting cats have been in the news recently; my cat-loving readers will surely enjoy reading about them.

Dewey Readmore Books was the library cat at the Spencer Public Library in Spencer, Iowa.   From his bio at the link:

Dewey Readmore Books was the resident cat at Spencer Public Library. He was put in the book return one cold January night in 1988. When the staff found him the next morning, they decided to adopt him. After the library's board of trustees and the city council approved, the kitten was declawed, neutered, and given the proper vaccinations. A contest was held to pick a name, and Dewey Readmore Books was officially added to the staff. The staff cared for Dewey and donated their pop cans to feed the kitty. Patrons and friends from as far away as New York have donated money for Dewey's food.

...

Dewey passed away on November 29, 2006 due to complications from a stomach tumor. He had become very frail because of hyperthyroid disease for which he was receiving medication. He died in the arms of the library director, Vicki Myron. He had just celebrated his 19th birthday eleven days before he died. Although Dewey is gone, he will be remembered by thousands of people who he cheered by simply being a loving presence in the library. Although we may get another library cat, Dewey will never be replaced. The library won't be the same without Dewey.

He was left in the book drop box!  He was a library cat for 19 years!  Can you imagine how jealous my fellow library staffers and I are?  I can assure you that we are already brainstorming about how we could have a library cat.  We wonder about allergies bc it seems like everybody and their grandchild is allergic to cats, dogs, peanut butter, etc. these days.  ('These days'...I sound so old.)  We also wonder about some of our younger patrons, e.g., the ones who thought it was great fun to pour iced tea into the fish tank.  The main perp's excuse?  'He dared me to do it and [pointing at another kid] he made me do it.'  Great.

But perhaps we could work around that by having our library cat take a siesta in a secluded place during the busy after school hours.  I suggested a hairless cat, like a Sphynx, to better get around the allergy issue, but that's been flatly rejected on account of hairless cats being ugly.  Seeing as there is no such thing as an ugly cat I think that argument is baseless, but no one is listening to me.  I even offered to knit sweaters for any hirsute challenged co-worker.

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Via Darling Millie, we hear about Homer, a sweet 12 year old, 3 lb. blind cat.  Homer's person is writer Gwen Cooper.  She's currently writing a book about Homer (titled Homer's Odyssey: Tales of an Eyeless Wondercat) and shares this tidbit about brave, loyal Homer.  The story had me on the edge of my seat!  I can't believe what this little feller did.

Comments

[S.Le.]

We just got that book at Library and some of us would like to have a resident cat. But... We have a number of teen-aged patrons who would probably do harm to a cat. Twits.

[Annie]

Yes, that's a worry for us, too. I don't know about your library, but sometimes I feel more like a babysitter than a library staffer.

Most of our kids are normal; perhaps it's just that the nasty ones tend to stick out and cause the most angst.