Just a little something to remember...

World Cat Day

Today is World Cat Day. Yes, there is an entire day for the world to celebrate cats, as if they needed an excuse to be worshipped! I may be a little cat obsessed and on my way to becoming a crazy cat lady, I realise this. 

On Sunday, after talking about how much we really didn't feel like working, a friend and I decided on a spontaneous trip to the Grahamstown SPCA to visit the cats. Until then, I’d forgotten just how much happiness stroking a cat could bring. These are some of the gorgeous fluffballs that we met. 

Photos of the cats are credited to the Instagram skills of Tristam Riordan

I used to have three cats at home until we learnt that my sister was allergic to most animals and so the cats had to go. I still wish we could have given the sister away instead but the SPCA wouldn't take her. 

This is my sister, Annelisa, with one of the cats, named... well... I called her something different every day. Not that she ever responded to my calls unless food was involved.

As I no longer have a pet at home or at university because I live in res, I've been thinking about ways to help animals even when I don't own one. Here's what I have so far:

1) Volunteer to walk the dogs regularly at your local SPCA, or if you have limited time, then visit when you can and play with the animals. They will show you more love than your own mother ever will. True story. 

2) Every time you do your grocery shopping, add a tin of dog/cat food to your trolley to donate.

3) Support the Animal Anti-Cruelty League. They work in areas where poverty and ignorance lead to animal cruelty, not by prosecuting people but by advising and educating them. They give talks on animal cruelty and also provide mobile animal clinics in townships. 

I've supported them this year by buying their personalised diary, which is not only very pretty but also packed with useful advice and tips. Inside there are basic first aid instructions, energy saving information, pet care advice, cooking and baking info, and even recession fighting tips to save money. Not that I know how to cook or save energy or money but hey, with this diary I'm a step closer to getting there. 

4) Encourage people to adopt pets from the SPCA instead of buying them. 

5) Support local groups that care for feral cats. If you're a Rhodes student like me, that would be the Grahamstown Feral Cat Project that traps, neuters or spays and then releases feral cats. For more info, click here. 

6) Got an old blanket or two? Donate it to the SPCA or an animal shelter.

7) As for fireworks, if you're near animals, just don't.

On a lighter note...

The writings on the wall

I am intrigued by what people write on the walls of bathrooms at clubs. Maybe I read them to beat the boredom of standing in the long lines that seem to form only at female bathrooms. Or maybe because among the usual "so-and-so was here" and "X loves Y", there are some genuinely interesting things on those walls. I found this at the MonAstery in Grahamstown, where the bathrooms are unisex and the scribblings a little more creative.

And then there is this, the most wonderful collection of music, literature, theatre and philosophy in the form of quotes scribbled down on an A4 page, stuck to the inside of a toilet door at the top floor of the Rhodes University English department. 

"If we shadows have offended,
 Think but this, and all is mended—
 That you have but slumbered here
 While these visions did appear.
 And this weak and idle theme,
 No more yielding but a dream"
- A Midsummer Night's Dream

"We read the world wrong, and say it deceives us" - Tagore

"Cloudlight
Floating in magically colorful pieces of sky
Pieces of skylight"
Cloudlight - Eskmo

“If only, if only…”
The moon speaks no reply,
Reflecting the sun and all that’s gone by.
Be strong, my weary wolf;
Turn around boldly.
Fly high, my baby bird—
My angel, my only.

If only, if only,”
The woodpecker sighs,
“The bark on the trees was as soft as the skies.”
While the wolf waits below, hungry and lonely;
Crying to the moon,
“If only, if only…” - Holes

"It was only a kiss. How did it end up like this?"
Mr Brightside - The Killers

"It all started with a man who lost his cat" - Murakami

"I think I'll go home and mull this over before I cram it down my throat
At long last it's crashed, the colossal mass has broken up into bits in my moat."
Caring is Creepy - The Shins

Mid-week inspiration

Thank you tumblr for the never ending supply of pretty quote photos.

Sugar packet wisdom

Sometimes you find what you need in the oddest places.

A while ago a friend told me that I'm the kind of person who, when everyone is going left, I'll be going right and taking my own random route. Since then, I've been thinking about this, wondering whether I really do the opposite of everyone else (I didn't even realise) and whether I should try to be more normal, whatever that is. 

At the end of last year, I applied for a job to be a sub-warden in my residence at Rhodes and I was worried that I had to be more responsible, more serious, more stern, make less dodgy jokes, wear smart pants to the interview, and most importantly, be less ditzy and blonde (not sure how that's even possible). This was just one out of MANY times when I felt like to be "right" and succeed I had to be something I'm not.

And then, while taking a 15 hour bus trip from Durban to Grahamstown, I got a complimentary cup of coffee with some life changing sugar. This is what the packaging said.

I took that as a sign (from the bus driver? Huletts? God?) and decided to just be my not very serious self, say whatever is on my mind and embrace the fact that I will always be a little bit of a silly girl. I even wore a short skirt to the interview because let's face it, I look strange in formal black pants and a shirt and all that jazz. 

The result? I got the job. 

The moral? Be you. Be different. Be strange. Be a success.