A follow up to Oscar the cat
After some simpsons (the 24-inspired ep. was very good) I got a mocha and wandered around downtown Cairns at night (full moon, bats and all). I’m not sure it has hit me that I’m leaving Australia.
All over coffee this week is not one of his absolute best, but it got me missing SF all the same.
Jon Carroll on magical thinking and Oscar the cat.
Brilliant bit; “Then there’s Oscar the cat, who seems to have an “uncanny knack of knowing when people are going to die.” Apparently he walks aloofly around the halls of the Providence, R.I., nursing home where he lives, and then settles down with a person who, only a few hours later, dies. Oscar somehow intuits the imminence of death and provides succor in these last hours – or so the story goes.
From the evidence, an equally viable theory is that Oscar kills people, but no one has mentioned that possibility.”
I love it. A murderous cat getting away with it. (Also – Do the residents know this about Oscar? Because maybe he just picks a bed and the person dies of fright.)
Tags: Travel
jwdmeow
Ha, ha! That’s what I thought! Oscar’s just giving people heart attacks!
But apparently, some of them are in comas, etc. Probably he just smells death. Do cats have a sense of smell like dogs? I know it’s not as good, but it’s probably better than human’s.
I expect that when you’re dying and your systems are shutting down (kidneys, etc.) you probably smell different.
Sheba could always tell when I was pregnant, before I knew. Hormonal changes must emit some sort of odor.