Did St. Francis preach to the birds? Whatever for? If he really liked birds he would have done better to preach to the cats.
— Rebecca West
Author: Mr. Breeze
I do be a kitteh. I haz a blog.
Dogs Can Fly!
Did you know that rescue dogs in the UK were trained to fly a real airplane?
In 2016 Sky 1 aired a TV series called Dogs Might Fly. Twelve dogs underwent acting challenges, made music videos, and even acted in a live play.
Three of the dogs made it to flight school. With special equipment and training, the dogs learned to steer the plane, keep it level, and follow simple flying instructions. Two dogs were able to fly a Cessna 172 in a figure 8.
Good dogs!
The dogs didn’t handle takeoff or landing, but they did control the plane in the air. I think they earned their wings!
#HedgewatchXmas 2025
Hedgewatch Christmas
Quote: Bob Mortimer on Cats
I can’t remember ever cooking food to impress a woman. The idea’s quite cheesy and sort of makes my skin crawl. But I sometimes make a special effort to impress my cats, with chicken liver or something. It’s tricky to know if a cat’s impressed. They might give me a little look, a glimpse at least. That’s cat ownership for you.
— Bob Mortimer
Call Me the Breeze
Purrrr, It’s Mr. Breeze here. Since I’m going to be writing for The Anipal Times I thought it would be a fine thing to post an intro.
In 2007 when I was a few months old I escaped from my home and got lost. I was begging at random doors for food. Then I met a stripey cat. She was eating all kinds of stuff so I followed her home. I hung out under da pine tree watching her humans barbecue. They fed me grilled shrimp because I was getting skinnier by da day. I named myself “Mr. Breeze” because I blew into their yard.
Da stripey cat’s humans called around everywhere trying to find my family. Da lady walked me around da neighborhood asking everybody if I was theirs. No dice. Who doesn’t look for their sweet panfur???
Da lady had been in a car accident and didn’t feel she could make a 20 year commitment to a young cat so she gave me to a rescue along with a ton of cash. I was kind of sad but da rescue lady was very nice and I made lots of barn cat friends.
A couple of months later da rescue lady to a pet expo.Da rescue lady was holding me like a baby, cooing and tickling my belly. MOL!! Suddenly da lady and my daddy showed up. I was so happy to see them and they adopted me right away. I was so happy to see my pine tree again. And then we went inside and there was the stripeycat and a spicy black cat. Their names were @sisfurcats Bugs and Chilipepper!
When I was young I liked to play sticks wif da lady. I liked to hang out on da front porch looking handsome for da neighbors. I sometimes hunted. I climbed trees like a big panfur. I even liked to play in da snow!
As it turned out, I was very photogenic. Dis photo motivated da lady to get me social media accounts. In 2009 I landed on twitter and found lots of anipals here! I even started my own bloggy, Call Me The Breeze.
I was invited to DJ at Frugal Dougal’s #pawpawty in 2009. I made friends there who are still friends to this day. I’ve been DJing at #nipclub on X since the start in 2010. I am involved with the sporadic #NipclubExtra on X and the blog. I also DJ at #pawgaritaville on X and help with the blog. I run #chilipawty on X and the blog (with lots of help from @tweetingtruman and many others) and I help @GeorgetheDuck out with #catmaseve on X and the blog. I love music! It’s a huge bonus that some pawties benefit animal charities.
I’ve also helped da lady learn Photoshop and GIMP.
I loved my sisfurs Bugs and Chilipepper. I was especially sad when Chilipepper went OTRB. I walked around da house crying for her. When Bugs went OTRB da vet gave me my very own kitten, @sisfurcats Ragamuffin. (2016)
I loved to snuggle my daddy. And I trained da lady to give me treats when I held out my paw. I loved to meet new people and give them headbutts. I even got to meet some of my [@kittehboi483] Pokémon GO pals in da park. I wasn’t keen on the car but so many scritches!!
In 2024 I went OTRB after a long illness. @Sisfurcats Ragamuffin still misses me. And of course my humans do too. My mommy wants to get an older cat for her. Hopefully they can become friends. I’ve been talking to the Cat Distribution System about it.
I still hang out wif my pals on twitter/X. DJing, of course. I like learning about new (to me) music to make playlists for pawties.
I make graphics with GIMP, and and enjoy learning how to use effects for pawty banners. Check out Put Your Paws in da Air for some of my work
I’m learning to make AI images with NightCafe Studio. It’s tempting to let @nightcafestudio design the pawty banners, but I like using GIMP too.
I’m still blogging for #pawgaritaville, #nipclubextra, #OwensBlackpaw, and #catmaseve.
I have fun putting ChatGPT through its paces. I sporadically post interesting conversations on my Just Some AI blog.
I make da lady read LOTS of books! Dis da books I making her read.
My favorite book is “Will My Cat Eat My Eyeballs?” by Caitlin Doughty. This humorous book answers questions like “Why Don’t Animals Dig Up All The Graves?” and “Can I Give Grandma A Viking Funeral?” Makes a perfect gift for morbid children.
I’m glad you could join me on The Anipal Times. We are going to have so much fun!
The Jersey Devil
Imagine if you will…
You are camping with your friends in the Pine Barrens of New Jersey. It’s an early fall evening. There’s a chill in the air and the moon is full.
As you sit around the campfire telling ghost stories, there is a sudden thrashing in the blueberry bushes. Something moves quickly toward your campsite. Wait, were those antlers? Is it a deer this late at night?
No, it is not a deer. It is South Jersey’s oldest cryptid, the Jersey Devil himself!
In 1735, decades before the Revolutionary War, Mrs. Leeds had her 13th child. As the boy was born, Mrs. Leeds cursed him. For a time, he seemed like a normal baby. Then one evening Mrs. Leeds entered the nursery to find her baby had grown hooves, wings, and vicious fangs. With a blood-curdling shriek he flew up the chimney and disappeared into the night!
The Jersey Devil has been sighted many times over the centuries, and he is responsible for many strange goings-on. Campers see glowing eyes in the brush. Children go missing, livestock is killed, and banshee-like wails are heard through the pines. He has even been seen on Long Beach Island cavorting with mermaids.
Today there is a little tavern on Leeds Point. The lights of Atlantic City are visible across the bay. And on stormy nights you may hear the Jersey Devil clip-clopping across the tavern roof.
Quote: William S. Burroughs on Cats as Familiars
Cats didn’t start as mousers. Weasels and snakes and dogs are more efficient as rodent-control agents. I postulate that cats started as psychic companions, as Familiars, and have never deviated from this function.
—William S. Burroughs, “The Cat Inside“
Where To Find Free! Ebooks
To acquire the habit of reading is to construct for yourself a refuge from almost all the miseries of life.
— W. Somerset Maugham
If you love to read ebooks, but your wallet is thin, there are many sites online for free ebooks. Here are just a few.
- Your local library!
Your local library’s web page probably includes eBooks and audiobooks to borrow. If you don’t have a library card, do get one! It’s free. - Project Gutenberg
Project Gutenberg is an online library of over 70,000 free eBooks to download or read online. Much of the world’s great public domain literature is available. Many titles are also available as audiobooks. - The Internet Archive
The Internet Archive offers over 20,000,000 freely downloadable ebooks. There is also a collection of 2.3 million modern eBooks that may be borrowed by anyone with a free Internet Archive account. - Open Library
Open Library’s catalog provides links to discover, borrow, and read from the Internet Archive’s collections. Your Internet Archive account can be used to sign-in to Open Library. - Standard Ebooks
Standard Ebooks provides beautifully-formatted editions of ebooks found in Project Gutenberg. - Ebooks.com
400 of their most popular classics to read, free of charge. - Free-eBooks.net
Free-eBooks.net connects readers with thousands of free ebooks across every genre — fiction, business, self-help, mystery, romance, and more. Join free in seconds. - For the Amazon Kindle:
- You can, of course, borrow hardcopy from your local library.
- Use InterLibrary Loan (ILL) to borrow books from other libraries. Ask the librarian.
- OverDrive and WorldCat are both online catalogs to help you locate library books for ILL, including rare or unique hardcopy.
Do you have a favorite site for free ebooks or audiobooks not listed here? Please leave a comment.
Quote: Oleg Gazenko On Laika
Work with animals is a source of suffering to all of us. We treat them like babies who cannot speak. The more time passes, the more I’m sorry about it. We shouldn’t have done it. We did not learn enough from the mission to justify the death of the dog.
— Russian scientist Oleg Gazenko, 1998, speaking about Laika, the first dog in space.
Quote: Milan Kundera on Dogs and Eden
Dogs are our link to paradise. They don’t know evil or jealousy or discontent. To sit with a dog on a hillside on a glorious afternoon is to be back in Eden, where doing nothing was not boring—it was peace.
— Milan Kundera, “The Unbearable Lightness of Being“
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