Deborah Ross: 'I've never encountered a sniffer cat, a police cat, a guide cat for the blind, or a cat that has solved mysteries'
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People who have dogs always say dogs are better than cats whereas people who have cats always say cats are better than dogs – but that's just dumb, as dogs are so obviously better.
I've led a sheltered life, I admit – and never more so than now, as I hate to leave the house these days – but still, in all my years, I have never encountered a sniffer cat, a police cat, a guide cat for the blind, an assistance cat for the deaf, a cat that has pulled its owner from a fire, a pack of cats willing to pull a sled several hundred miles across the Arctic or a cat that has solved ghostly mysteries, like Scooby Doo.
In fact, how would any ghostly mysteries have ever been solved without Scooby Doo? We'd be drowning in unsolved ghostly mysteries! If I were ever to go out, I wouldn't even be able to get to the corner, what with all the unsolved ghostly mysteries littering the streets! Is this any incentive to leave the house? The fact is: cats are lousy detectives, and also dull.
I have two cats, as well as a dog, and the cats don't do a single thing that's amusing, unless you count hanging from the curtains and hissing and spitting at the dog, which I don't think you should, as it's just silly, as well as the worst kind of showing off, and what's the dog ever done to them? Aside from giving chase while trying to bite their tails off? If they want to call him off, why can't they be clever about it and say something along the lines of: "Quick, quick! There's a ghostly mystery happening outside No 12! Go solve, go solve!" Of course, it's always the fairground owner who's really behind any ghostly mystery, but the dog doesn't have to know that. He could be gone for hours.
OK, dogs are harder work. I will give you that. And unless you repeatedly tell a dog it is a "good dog" and "Mummy's favourite little fella" it'll get depressed and might even hang itself – but a dog will, at least, always chase a tennis ball. This isn't that interesting but it is still more than a cat can do. I just threw a ball for the cats and you know what? They didn't even try. So dogs are better than cats. End of. Also, I have never heard of a guard cat.
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