Fornits
General Interest => Open Free for All => Topic started by: Anonymous on September 20, 2009, 09:27:17 AM
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Cats are our cuter superiors.
http://www.mnsu.edu/emuseum/prehistory/ ... /cats.html (http://www.mnsu.edu/emuseum/prehistory/egypt/religion/cats.html)
Animal worship in ancient Egypt is part of the culture of daily life of Egyptians. Animals of every kind were respected and revered, as they were in close contact with deities and gods that the average Egyptian could not reach.
The cat in ancient Egypt, or miw (to see), was a sacred and respected beast. These small companions fascinated the Egyptians, and were venerated by all. It was in Egypt that the cat was first domesticated 4,000 years ago and where they were held in the most admiration and respect. There is evidence of wild felines around the banks of Egypt, but it was not until around 2000 BCE that the fully domesticated cat was brought into the houses of Egyptians.
The first domesticated Egyptian cats in Egypt were more than likely used for warding off the common asp and other snakes, and the typical chasers of rodents. Slowly though, the cat became more to the Egyptians than just a normal animal, the cat became a god.
During the New Kingdom (1540 to 1069 BC), there were many tomb scenes that started showing cats as part of everyday life. The ancient Egyptians took their cats on hunting excursions instead of dogs, The most popular excursions being the marshes where cats may have been trained to retrieve fowl and fish. Another very common scene in tomb paintings was the picturing of a cat seated underneath a woman's chair. Children had become known in their family as Mit or Miut, showing great affection not only for the child but for the cat as well. Statues of cats were placed outside the house to protect the inhabitants and to ward off evil spirits. This showed scientists that the cat had become an integral part of the ancient Egyptian family life.
Mafdet was the first Egyptian feline deity, sometimes depicted as a lynx, but the most famous cat goddesses in the world, first revered by the ancient Egyptians were Bastet (also known as Bast, Pasch, Ubasti) and the lion-headed Sekhmet.
Bastet had the roles of fertility, protector of children and the protector of all cats. Bastet became so popular infact that she became a household goddess. This goddess was called Bastet when in full cat form, and Bast when only having the head of one and the body of a beautiful woman. Bastet's counterpart was the goddess Sekhmet who represented the cat goddess' destructive force. Sekhmet is known as the goddess of war and pestilence. Together, Bastet and Sekhmet represented the balance of the forces of nature in Egypt.
In Bubastis, or Tell Basta, the cats lived a lavish life as the `embodiment' of Bastet in her temples. Here they were served upon and taken care of until they passed away, and it was here that their bodies were mummified and given as offerings to Bastet. Bubastis contains the remains of over 300,000 cat mummies.
When a cat died their former owners and occupants of the house would go into deep mourning and shave their eyebrows as a sign of grief. People are not the only mummies in Egypt, as the cat was also mummified significantly. The process of feline mummification had six steps:
Removal of organs
Body is stuffed with sand or packing material
Feline is placed in a sitting position
Body is wrapped tightly
Faces and designs are painted on wrappings with black ink
No chemicals, only natural dehydration
In the tombs of the cats were set bowls of milk along with mice and rats.
Cats were not only protected by almost every occupant of Egypt, but also by the law. So extreme infact was the devoutness of the Egyptian culture to the cat, that if a human killed a feline, either intentionally or unintentionally, that human was sentenced to death. Laws were set that also forbid the exportation of cats, though more often than not, many were smuggled to the neighboring Mediterranean countries. Documents state that armies sometimes were set out to recapture these cats from the foreign lands.
Herodotus stated a story once about a fire in a house in Egypt. The men from the house stood outside in a line to protect the cats from harm and danger. Another statement from Herodotus explains even greater the significance of the cat to Egypt. Herodotus begins with the Egyptians in war with Persia. The Persian general had decided to collect as many cats that his men could find or steal, knowing the great importance of the cat to Egypt. The soldiers then returned to the town of Pelusium and set the cats free on the battlefield. Horrified, the Egyptians surrendered the city to the Persians rather than harm the cats.
Egyptians once won a battle because of cats. They were fighting a foreign regiment and just at the time of attack by the foreigners, the Egyptian released thousands of cats at the front lines. Seeing the onslaught of these terrifying creatures, the foreign army retreated in panic.
The cat held a powerful spot in the history of Egypt. While she protected his land and his people, she also protected the mystique that is and was the cat in ancient Egypt.
by Leah Marie Graham 2004
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Can cats make you crazy?
Parasite may be factor in mental illness
By Tamara Ikenberg
tikenberg@courier-journal.com
The Courier-Journal
Cats: fluffy puffy friends, or instigators of mental illness?
Q: According to a study by Stanford University researchers called "Parasite Hijacks Brain With Surgical Precision" published April 2 in New Scientist and the new book "Survival of the Sickest" (Morrow, 267 pp., $25.95), by neurogeneticist Sharon Moalem, they could be both. The scientists theorize about toxoplasma gondii, a parasite that can reproduce only in cats and has the power to trigger schizophrenia and other particular behaviors in humans.
We talked to Moalem about this new insight that could make "the crazy cat lady" more than a myth.
Q: Cats have long been suspected of being in league with witches and dark powers. Could there be a connection?
A: There could be. People could've noticed that those who tended to have a lot of cats tended to be strange. There may be something to that old mythology of the crazy cat lady now that we know there's some kind of weird mind control going on.
Q: How does the parasite get to the cat?
A: It changes the behavior of mice and rats. It controls the mouse or rat's behavior to such surgical precision that they just lose their fear of cats, cat urine or cat smell. The parasite literally turns them into cat food. In a weird way, it saves them for the cat. It really doesn't do anything to the cat. It's almost to the cat's benefit to have the parasite. It gets them food. That's really why you shouldn't let your cats out.
Q: Why can T. gondii only reproduce in cats?
A: It's just one of those quirks of nature. It's called co-evolution; one evolved with the other. How it arose? No one has any clue. It needs the cat to do its sexual reproduction. It's just so freaky. It makes an animal lose a fear of only one other animal, and that's the animal it's trying to get to.
Q: How does it get from a cat to a human?
A: The eggs that come out that can infect you are shed in cat excrement. So it's because of the litter box. It'll stick to cat litter; so if the cat drags it out and you ingest it by accident, you can get infected.
I have three cats and am already plenty strange. But I don't let them out.
That's fine. As long as they've never had access to mice.
They're all rescued.
Then most likely they could be carrying the parasites. … If you're exposed to that parasite when you're young, like in the first few years of your life, that may be the worst time to be infected by it. That's when your mind is being formed; structurally it's kind of being put down. The first few years of childhood are so crucial. I find it funny: Parents spend so much time, money and effort to make sure their kids get the best education, not realizing that the cat they have can put them at risk for schizophrenia. Parents buy a good car seat, they drive a Volvo, but the cat could be causing problems. … Pregnant women should not be emptying litter boxes. If you get an infection with this parasite when you're pregnant, it's bad news. You can lose the baby.
Q: What other curious behaviors does T. gondii trigger?
A: Women infected with this parasite tend to be hypersexual; they have more partners. The men (with the parasite) tend to be more withdrawn and pick more fights. With women, there also seems to be an obsession with shopping and appearance; a change in behavior. From a host-parasite relationship, it makes total sense, especially if you think of something as accepted as rabies. It makes animals more aggressive. That's just a simple virus, and look at that behavioral control it's doing. T. gondii is much more complicated than a simple virus.
This all makes me think of Don Konkey on the F/X series "Dirt," the schizophrenic photographer who adores his cats so much he made a shrine for a recently deceased furry friend.
It fits so well. What's interesting and we should remember, too, is (that) it's not a cause of schizophrenia, it's just another risk factor that could push you (over the edge). You have some underlying things that are going on, and if a parasite is manipulating and changing your brain structure anyway, that's what happened.
I am afraid these findings will make people hate kitties.
I think there's enough anti-cat sentiment. It's just not cats. Cats do get the bad rap because that's where they (the parasites) go to reproduce. You can also get this parasite from undercooked meats. There should be a movement to try to make a vaccine or try to get cats free from this parasite completely. It's something that's preventable. Tapeworm used to be in every single pig you'd buy and eat. We've made changes to get that not to happen anymore.
Q: Will any of these findings eventually benefit cats, mice or people?
A: It lends more strength to the idea that if something affects the behavior of a mammal with such surgical precision, there's likely an effect on us. There's work under way to give people with schizophrenia drugs against T. gondii and see if that treats schizophrenia.
Reporter Tamara Ikenberg can be reached at (502) 582-4174.
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mehitabel was once cleopatra
By Don Marquis, in "archy and mehitabel," 1927
boss i am disappointed in
some of your readers they
are always asking how does
archy work the shift so as to get a
new line or how does archy do
this or do that they
are always interested in technical
details when the main question is
whether the stuff is
literature or not
i wish you would leave
that book of george moores on
the floor
mehitabel the cat and i want to
read it i have discovered that
mehitabel s soul formerly inhabited a
human also at least that
is what mehitabel is claiming these
days it may be she got jealous of
my prestige anyhow she and
i have been talking it over in a
friendly way who were you
mehitabel i asked her i was
cleopatra once she said well i said i
suppose you lived in a palace you bet
she said and what lovely fish dinners
we used to have and licked her chops
mehitabel would sell her soul for
a plate of fish any day i told her i thought
you were going to say you were
the favorite wife of the emperor
valerian he was some cat nip eh
mehitabel but she did not get me
archy
http://www.donmarquis.com/readingroom/a ... patra.html (http://www.donmarquis.com/readingroom/archybooks/cleopatra.html)
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http://www.irishcultureandcustoms.com/P ... urBan.html (http://www.irishcultureandcustoms.com/Poetry/PangurBan.html)
Pangur Ban
Written by an unknown ninth century monk. there is some confusion about the attribution. Some sources say it was found in the margins of a manuscript in the Monastery of St Paul, Carinthia, Austria. Worse, it was on a copy of St. Paul's Epistles (in Irish no less - horrors!). Others say it was 'on the back' of a page the monk was copying.
Another reference says the monk was a student and it was written at Reichenau Monastery, on Lake Constance. Yet another sage even states it was done while the monk was working on the Book of Kells.
How to tell?
Well first, we won't believe it was written 'while working on the Book of Kells'; that smacks of 'oyrish' plastic. Let us dismiss that now.
If he was a student we must assume the Epistle was a practice project, otherwise the precentor (usually in charge of the librarii) would not have allowed a student to copy such holy words. If it wasn’t a practice job then there would not have been a blank 'back of the page' to hold the poem.
We're going with a full antiquarii monk doing an official work. He was a warm-hearted fellow who loved his cat and could not resist the tribute; even if it was a little naughty to stick it into St. Paul's Latin.
The other possibility we rather like is a student who fell out with the Abbot. He crept into the monastery's scriptorium while no one was about and penned his poem into another monk's Holy work.
In any case, we're told that the name Pangur would have been recognized as a cat's name in those days. Aideen (our resident Irish speaker) tells us the word 'ban' means the cat was white. In the translation, the cat is referred to as a male. The choice of pronouns implies this but (with cats) this may not be correct. Taken at face value, our cleric had a talented white tomcat.
There is an old saying: 'Never trust a man who doesn't like cats.' I suppose I can assume the Irish loved cats and so here's to all Irish cats.
We trust you will enjoy...
Pangur Ban
I and Pangur Ban, my cat,
'Tis a like task we are at;
Hunting mice is his delight,
Hunting words I sit all night.
Better far than praise of men
'Tis to sit with book and pen;
Pangur bears me no ill will;
He, too, plies his simple skill.
'Tis a merry thing to see
At our task how glad are we,
When at home we sit and find
Entertainment to our mind.
Oftentimes a mouse will stray
Into the hero Pangur's way;
Oftentimes my keen thought set
Takes a meaning in its net.
'Gainst the wall he sets his eye
Full and fierce and sharp and sly;
'Gainst the wall of knowledge I
All my little wisdom try.
When a mouse darts from its den.
O how glad is Pangur then!
O what gladness do I prove
When I solve the doubts I love!
So in peace our tasks we ply,
Pangur Ban, my cat and I;
In our arts we find our bliss,
I have mine, and he has his.
Practice every day has made
Pangur perfect in his trade ;
I get wisdom day and night,
Turning Darkness into light.'
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From what Ive read about the domestication of cats, it seems that recent discoveries reveal that cats may not have been domesticated by Egyptians at all. Rather, it may have happened hundreds of years prior, and apparently, it was cats who initiated contact.
Even back then, cats adopted their "owners."
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same applies for dogs adopting their owners too...in a way.....
Packs of dogs/wolves would stay near to groups of nomads/hunter-gatherers. When the humans moved camp or disposed of offal, the dogs would come around and clean it up. They were scavenger's living on human scraps. As for the process of domestication...i'm sure different regions of the world and different breeds initiated contact differently. For some, the humans trained the dogs to pull loads. for others, the dogs figured out that if they give humans a helping hand in hunting they'd get a share of the bounty. Guarding and shepherding behaviors in dogs are a few evolutionary steps ahead though. so the dogs came to the humans, not the other way around. I would have to say cats and dogs are probably the only domesticated animals that initiated contact in this way.
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same applies for vaginas adopting their owners too...in a way.....
Packs of virgins would stay near to groups of monkey-men. When the monkey-men moved camp or disposed of offal, the virgin vaginas would come around and clean it up. They were scavenger's living on monkey-man scraps. As for the process of domestication...i'm sure different regions of the world and different races initiated contact differently. For some, the monkey-men trained the vaginas to cook and clean. for others, the vaginas figured out that if they give Monkey-men a helping hand, they'd get a share of the bounty and be able to make more monkey-men and vaginas pop out of her belly. behaviors requiring independent thought in vaginas are many, many evolutionary steps ahead though. so the vaginas came to the monkey-men, not the other way around.
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same applies for dogs adopting their owners too...in a way.....
Packs of dogs/wolves would stay near to groups of nomads/hunter-gatherers. When the humans moved camp or disposed of offal, the dogs would come around and clean it up. They were scavenger's living on human scraps. As for the process of domestication...i'm sure different regions of the world and different breeds initiated contact differently. For some, the humans trained the dogs to pull loads. for others, the dogs figured out that if they give humans a helping hand in hunting they'd get a share of the bounty. Guarding and shepherding behaviors in dogs are a few evolutionary steps ahead though. so the dogs came to the humans, not the other way around. I would have to say cats and dogs are probably the only domesticated animals that initiated contact in this way.
What I always found fascinating is that the meow is not instinctual. It is a behavior specifically created and directed at humans.
My first gf had a cat who was a runt, and was never taught to meow by his momma, because she rejected him. As a result, he learned to "meow" from the family dog, and he made a sort of "chhhheah, chhheah" utterance instead. Her father named him Willie, after Willie Nelson, because he felt that Willie never really learned how to sing properly.
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Aw, yer shittin, right?
The geek shall inherit the Earth.
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Aw, yer shittin, right?
I promise its true.
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WASHINGTON—The current session of the 111th Cat Congress was once again suspended Tuesday following the sudden introduction of a sunbeam onto the Senate floor, a development that has left a majority of transfixed lawmakers unable to move forward.
The ray of sunlight, which first appears in the official record at 11:30 a.m., interrupted debate over S. 391, a proposal to provide underprivileged felines with universal access to scratching posts.
"We've come up against an unforeseen circumstance, but we'll resume deliberation and voting as quickly as is reasonably possible," said majority leader and Budget Committee chaircat Sen. Creamsicle (D-ND), stretching out to his entire length and repeatedly kneading the chamber carpet. "I think I speak for most of my colleagues when I say that, while it is extremely important we continue the legislative work at hand, we must first give this warm and bright beam of light the due consideration it deserves."
"And we should, er, debate this for as long as it takes," added Creamsicle, softly swishing his tail back and forth. "Perhaps all day, if we have to."
A majority of senators seemed to agree with Creamsicle. Eighty-nine of the 100 congresscats present immediately joined the new Sunbeam Investigative Committee, and a number of subcommittees are also reported to have been created, the largest of which has been tasked with determining the value of lazily batting at rising dust motes while half-asleep.
A small minority of feline senators, however, took issue with the procedural delay. Sen. Poppy (D-DE) was especially vocal, claiming that the Senate should ignore the seemingly intractable sunbeam issue and continue with other, more pressing matters.
"This irresponsible stoppage is absolutely unacceptable," Poppy said. "Frivolous distractions like these are robbing our constituents of the soft, cozy shafts of…I mean, the reforms they so desperately need…so desperately need… I yield my remaining time."
Some legislators refused to participate in the debate altogether, most notably Sen. Ruby (R-SC), who spent several hours sitting motionless in front of the northwest wall of the Cat Capitol Building, staring unblinkingly at an unknown object.
The sunbeam marked the fourth event to suspend congressional activity this week. According to sources, other disruptions included a thunderclap on Monday that instantly adjourned proceedings; Wednesday's chaotic introduction of a laser pointer; and the discovery of a large cardboard box in the Capitol Rotunda Thursday that prompted minority whip Sen. Tiddles (R-TN) to call a recess so that he could sit inside of it.
None of these delays, however, compares to the appearance of a small sparrow outside the congressional chamber last month, which completely mesmerized House Speaker Jeffy-Boy (D-CA) and brought all government activity to a standstill for approximately 17 minutes.
Big Stripey, founder of the influential political watchdog committeelitter.com, said he isn't surprised by the latest sunbeam debacle, claiming that years of corruption and mating scandals have shown just how ineffectual the current Cat Congress really is.
"Our lawmakers were elected to serve the common cat, not their own self-interests," Big Stripey said. "With over 6 percent of the population stray, millions more going hungry or only getting dry food, and the dogs next door developing a very real litter of puppies, we need action now for the sake of our kittens and our kittens' kittens."
"We're not paying these idiots to sit around and lick each other all day," Big Stripey added.
Many congressional insiders refuted accusations of indolence, saying that the rigorous schedule of cat legislators entitles them to periodic breaks in addition to their 18 scheduled hours of sleep per day.
"Our Founding Toms understood that certain provisions must be made in the interest of the public good," congressional spokescat Georgina said. "Democracy is not always so cut and dried. Sunbeams are going to happen. Vacuum cleaners are going to happen. Those little springy wires with a piece of cardboard at the end are going to happen. It's simply the way the system works."
According to late reports, the Cat Congress had briefly reconvened due to cloudy weather, but was quickly adjourned again after a crumpled up piece of aluminum foil suddenly rolled across the Senate floor
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:roflmao:
pawsome!
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:notworthy:
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:notworthy:
i think we should have a new section on fornits--just for kittehs. :)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ETQ0urHjSIk (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ETQ0urHjSIk)
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http://www.poetv.com/video.php?vid=18480 (http://www.poetv.com/video.php?vid=18480)
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i think we should have a new section on fornits--just for kittehs. :)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ETQ0urHjSIk (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ETQ0urHjSIk)
Please for the love of all things fluffy if that happens let it be moderated.