What's in a Dog Brain??

Ok, I know what you're thinking.  There's not a punch line.  Some so-called canine neuroscientists (scientists who study dogs ... not the other way) tricked some stupid dogs into getting strapped down and then ran them through a brain scanner.  I know, I know, this all presupposes that dogs have brains! But these "scientists" seemed to be comfortable leaping to that conclusion.

Funny photo of dog being tortured in a brain scanner

There was a lot of chatter on the cat blogs about this silliness. The news picked up on this like it was interesting or something.  (Smithsonian  The Scientist  Current Biology)  What they found was that in both dogs and humans, the caudate nucleus got all jumpy in both dogs and peoples when they experience pleasure. To test this they gave a dog a piece of a hot dog. And guess what, dog brains light up when they get a piece of a hotdog. For regular people, think of it as a pleasure response. For my more sciency readers, this takes place in he caudate nucleus, which, as we all know, is rich in dopamine which is what jacks up some neurotransmitter chemical goo. That's right. Dog brains are full of goo. According to the scientists, no need to take my word for it! 

Another dog being tortured. Neuroscience fact: Dogs have to hold themselves really still so the scanner can find their brain since it's really tiny.

Until this fMRI dog research, I thought this was the only medical procedure that dogs needed.

Post-Thanksgiving Visitors: Steph & Jessica - my two sexy new friends!!

OMG!! My owner (not the pretty one) told me a couple friends were coming over because it was Black Friday.

I had to ask myself "Why? Why? Would he invite over people who were celebrating some kind of racist holiday??" Aren't we above that? And why does he have friends that would celebrate Black Friday???

Oh, boy! Do I have egg on my face or what? My research on the Internets revealed that the Black in Black Friday just refers to when stores really start to make money. Apparently humans go berserko on this day and spend all their money on Christmas presents.

So ... this is great!!  The visitors will be bringing me Christmas presents!!! And now, introducing my newest SNFs (sexy new friends, in case you're new to my blog), Jessica and Stephanie! 

Jessica and me (I'm the one in front)

As can be seen in the above photo, I'm looking around for my Christmas present. Also, as can be seen in the above photo, Jess has red hair. I have other SNFs with red hair. BUT notice below that Steph has purple hair. This is a Huskercat first! Never before have I had Red and Purple SNFs at the same time! It was a real colorfest!

Stephanie and me!
(I'm not the one with purple fur!)

It was pretty cool to have Steph and Jess stop by to visit me. They brought some stuff over for my owners. But I'm still waiting for my Christmas present. Maybe they're not into Christmas. Not everyone believes in Jesus.

Catting around! Me & Briana go clubbing!

Briana came over this weekend and spent some time hangin' with my owners. I hadn't seen her over at my place before, but let's face it ... pink hair gets your attention!! There was alot happening during the day, but later Bri took me out clubbing.  FYI, Briana goes by Bri to her friends.  I've never been out clubbing.  At first I was apalled that Bri was into clubbing. She just didn't seem the type.  She's very nice and plenty adorable and didn't seem like the violent type.  I mean ... what did baby seals ever do to her, right?? Wow, was I embarrassed when Bri explained to me what clubbing is!  I didn't know what nightclubs were.  Anyways, Bri was plenty ready to go out.  I think we can all agree that when you're dressed in a silver sequined mini-dress, you are ready to go dancing! My owner wasn't invited to go probably because he's an old fart. HA!!

Me (left; being snuggled), Briana (right; pink hair)

As can be seen in these photos, I decided to stay with my usual gray fur.  I had to be careful. Those PeTA freaks are all over in Hollywood, where we were headed, and they love to throw blood on real fur. They are disgusting people. I'll stay with my real fur coat and PeTA can suck it!

I've never been out dancing before. The reason is probably because I'm a cat. That's not to say I don't get out from time to time. Like that one time my owner took me to the Pink Leopard which is a pretty fancy restaurant. I wrote about that incident because the bouncer was racist against cats and you can read about it here if you haven't been following my blog. Plus, I'm not the first cat to go out dancing (see photo below).

Surveillance photo documenting that I'm not the first cat to go clubbing. This photo also illustrates that my friends are way cooler than these wacked out hillbillies!!  :)

My owner told me that people might not believe that Bri and I went out so I got some pictures to prove it!  Here's my cold, hard evidence. I don't have time for haters who are suspicious about my lifestyle. Well, that's my report! Paparazzi photos are below!

You can see ME right next to my logo! Hangin' with Bri as she dances like there's no tomorrow!! Bri's in the pink hair as one might expect.

Here's a closeup of ME! It was pretty exciting as can be seen in this paparazzi photo.

stupid dog butt dials the cops!

Headline: Dumb dog does heavy breathing number with police.

Headline: Dim-witted dog causes trouble by scratching owners phone instead of her butt.

When a dog is this stupid, I thought I'd suggest a couple more precise headlines. I don't mean to criticize the Associated Press, but in their effort to be politically correct, they aren't laying blame where it is due. People need to understand how stupid dogs can be. Millions of people are catching onto this. In the olden days, there were more dogs in the USA. But now, there are more cats. There are ~74 million cats in the USA which is about 4 million more than dogs. 

It's not racist to call dogs stupid or dumb. It's not even racist to call dogs retarded, although it's a little insulting to retarded people.  Funny thing ... dogs are eaten for lunch and dinner in at least 11 countries! Click here for more info on dogs as meals.   

This dog looks like a dirty mop!!

When dogs aren't busy butt dialing, they are always sniffing butts (see above photo). 

It's Vegas, Baby!!

Things have been a snoozefest around here lately.  So when I saw on Facebook that my Vegas buddies were in Anaheim, for some reason, and my brain went WTF?? Why aren't they here visiting me?? It turns out they did attempt to get me but my media guy wasn't on the ball (that's right, I have my own phone number!). But they came the next day to hang with me so all is good.

It was Dave and Tarra's #1st anniversary. They came to my part of the country for a spontaneous anniversary trip. That's good because a year ago my owners went to Vegas for their wedding. They left me with my #1 pet sitter, Jennifer, who is a credentialed veternary technician.  I don't really need that level of care since I'm plenty healthy. I just need love, food and a water refill and I'm good. But enough about me!

I bring joy to people's lives as can be seen in the above photo where I am bringing joy to Tarra's life. She gets joy from squeezing me. I'm not sure of the exact squeezological mechanism, but it happens with others too, so it's a real phenomenon. It's known as the squeeze theorem. For those of you who failed calculus, it's a thing that Archimedes himself invented to confirm the limit of a function via comparison with two other functions (that would be Tarra and me!) whose limits are easily computed. That's just a long-winded way of saying she loves me! 

Black and white photo of Archimedes. It's not color because they couldn't make color photos back then.

Fun fact: Tarra took my picture that you see at the top of my blog.

Here I am looking kind of weird. Maybe I got squeezed a little too hard! :)

Pictured here is Dave. I'll be honest. We're having a bromance. That means Dave and I are in a homosocial relationship. I hope nobody is getting the wrong idea here - "bromance" is merely a portmanteau of two words and does not refer to some other kind of homo-type of relationship.  Not that there would be anything wrong with having that other kind of relationship. I want to be clear about that since I have a large following in the LGBTF community.  People and cats who are less sophisticated than myself might not be completely familiar with the acronym. That "F" stands for fixed.  That happens a lot to cats and it's not natural and is typically done without an informed consent. Unless it's a dog we're talking about. They all deserve to be fixed.  It would result in a better world, although they would still hump your leg.

Well, no way do I end my post talking about leg humping! Even on their anniversary, Dave and Tarra had to stop by to see me! I'm sure they had a good time! We don't see enough of them around here. 

What happened to my giant water bowl???

I have a 18,000 gallon water bowl in the back yard.  I'll be the first to admit that it's larger than I need, but that's how I roll. But odd things happened today. This is my story. 

Here I am keeping watch on a plastic bag that tried to escape the back yard.  These things need looking after since plastic is unnatural. Plastic bags are killers. Zillions of plastic bags have banned together to form floating islands of death in the oceans. Don't take my word for it - they talk about it in the New York newspaper which is all about science. 

There's this huge sucking noise in the back by my king-size water bowl.  What the hell is up with all this noise??  

What the hell is up is that there is this hose sticking in the water bowl and it turning it into a waterless bowl!  This is more disturbing than A Serbian Film, which is saying alot! I don't watch movies, it takes away from my nap time, but I hear it's bad.   

Check it out! It's almost empty. They pumped all that water out into the street! I thought it was going to deluge the street for forty days and forty nights - another great flood!  That's what it looks like when you're 11 inches tall. 

This is the little machine that sucked more than a chupacabra. The reason for all the drama?? The water wouldn't hold the chemicals.  What's that even mean, you might ask. Or you probably don't really care. My water bowl needs chorine to keep the water sanitary. Imagine that I chase dog into the bowl and he falls in and drowns very slowly so it feels the essence of life leaving its body, its lungs collapsing from all the .  Then you have a release of organic material, ie, dog scum. If the pH is low, then dog scum organics will create turn into phosphates which are food for algae spores. Chlorine kills algae but you got to have more chlorine if you have scum, but chlorine gets wacky and you have to put in cyanuric acid which never leaves the water which means you have to adjust pH with more chlorine and the water gets sick. I'm not a scientist so I don't really know what all that means, but that's the buzz around here. Another way to think about this is if a dog drowns in the big bowl, it's not a problem as long as one's caretaker/feeder drags the carcass and throws it into the street.  

Good thing for me is that there are two water bowls in my house.  So after a drink, it time to catch up on my 18 hours of snooze time I need. 

Cat Head Shots!

No big news here. I was just minding my own business surveying the front yard one Sunday morning and all of a sudden I got a camera in my face! There's no way to know how many lizards and birds walked by the window and were spared the punishing treatment for their existence that is my responsibility to administer.

This is a photo of me! I'm told I have very pretty eyes. I guess there's no point in me denying it now!

This is another photo of me! I am looking especially cute in this one. There are 3 of them. The 3rd one is coming up next!

There's a lot of responsibility that I have for keeping the bird population down to a minimum. This kind of distraction will not have a good effect on the weekly bird quota that I have. All of us neighborhood cats have these quotas. Actually, I'm not supposed to talk about the bird quota business. There's this national group of extremists and terrorists, known as PeTA, that have been known to throw pig blood on cats that go outdoors. This is a true fact. Oh, wait ... my media consultant is telling me that PeTA wackos throwing pig blood on outdoor cats is technically truthy rather than true. Same difference if you ask me! I can't even finish a simple blog entry without the word police showing up around here! Take my word for it though, PeTA is hatin' on cats that enjoy the outdoors. What's next? Probably a visit by Sarah McLachlan! It's hard to believe this is American anymore.

I think I look like a Puma kind of cat. To be honest, I look good in all these photos.

Watch me be close to God!! (Not that I saw him)

Look at me! I've never been to church before, but my owner dropped by a church on Sunday. It's not clear why we took this little excursion. Naturally he took a picture of me on location. Churches are God's house (or houses). He has lots of houses. Many are probably resort houses is the only reason that I can think of why he has so many houses. God must have been at one of those houses because I didn't see him at this house. That's ok as I didn't have an appointment or anything. I don't have any idea who the two ladies were, but they made it clear to me that they didn't want to "bother" with me. They were new to going to a church as can be seen by them kneeling in the aisle rather than sitting on one of the many benches. 

Me in God's House. I'm told he has lots of houses like this. He must be pretty rich!

 

Cats were Gods in Egypt. Contrarily, dogs were often served for dinner in Egypt. Dogs were known to be pretty tasty, but too chewy. Or maybe the hieroglyphics were talking about dog jerky.

This is a picture of two cat gods in Egypt. There have been many hieroglyphics written about my ancestors.  Cats were gods in Egypt. This makes sense as Egypt was the beginning of all civilization. Many hieroglyphics have been written about my cat ancestors which the be beginning of cats being so famous.

Historical photo of a guy with his cat in olden times. The cat's owner sounds a little loopy though. Notice that he is talking about being dead, but clearly he is alive. Nowadays, we have medications for people with problems like this. I don't know ... there's probably more to the story.

Since cats are gods, cats do not need religion.

I should have my own church as it would be an organized way for my fans to visit me and bring Frisky treats, frankinfurters and purr. I should seriously consider this since I am already a minister in the Universal Life Church. That's right, you can check it out right here! I specialize in funeral services for rodents and dogs. I always make it a fun time.

Just one example of why we cats think so highly of ourselves.

I don't give a damn according to scientists!!

"Whatever," says cat.

Ok, I know a lot of my readers have been wanting to know what I think of this study by some Japanese scientists that showed that Felis catus's can hear their owners voices but don't really care one way or another. 

After I get done with my post, I'll make sure to email the Nobel Prize Committee to nominate these scientists for an award commensurate with their groundbreaking research that showed us what any cat already knows!!  Hey, wait a sec … by transitive logic this means that I should get a Nobel Prize!! 

Most people will just read some news blog about this study, but I prefer to go to the scientific literature and make sure the science is being conducted up to Huskercat standards. It was easy to do since the paper was published in Animal Cognition which I subscribe to anyway. I had my web guy put a little picture of the actual journal page.

This is what the journal article looks like!

This is an important journal - Animal Cognition - in that the very title implies the fact that us animal have lots of cognition.  Since it's about animals who have cognitions, you will find very little scientific articles about dogs since they don't really cognitate. After reading the research article, I'm ready to go on the record that this research was conducted in a way that is both valid and reliable. Since most of my readers don't have all the researcher connections that I have, I've included the actual results from the study which conclusively prove that cats are many times smarter than dogs. The reason for this is that dogs are stupid. That's pretty much all you need to know. Feel free to go poke fun at dog owners now. :D

Fancy science results and statistics.

More fancy science results and statistics with histogramical bars.

Glamourized: Huskercat Style!!

I was complaining to my web guy/owner/litterchanger that my site seemed a little humdrum in the photo department. I'm not talking about all the pictures of me; they're all really exciting. I wanted something to make a statement about moving into 2014. The Cornhuskers did it right with a Gator Bowl win over Georgia. We finished off the Football Season with a 24-19 annihilation of Georgia. I was a little surprised by that. I didn't even know Georgia had a university! It wasn't an annihilation really. Let's just say that it was good that Georgia didn't have another 10 minutes to play! It would have been especially embarrassing for the Huskercat's team to have lost to Georgia. Not just because it's a team from the ol' South, but because they actually have a Bulldog for a mascot. If you ask me, it's disgusting and unnatural to have a Bulldog for a mascot. You have to be suspicious of the brain of the person in Georgia who thought it was a good idea to mate a bull with a dog!! I guess that's what passes for Animal Husbandry at the University of Georgia!!

That's ridiculous to have a dog for a mascot anyway. If for no other reason than you have to have one of the Georgia cheerleaders follow him around to put his poops in a little bag! HA!

So, back to me. So I wanted my blog to get a little more snazzy - glammed up in other words. So my owner brings in some real talent. (In the movie biz, the actor people are called "the Talent" so we follow that convention here at Huskercat.com) You always know when the talent is on the set because they walk around in fluffy white robes (see below). Speaking of which I am majorly fluffy right now since it's the winter season. 

Kira in white; me in gray

Kira comes to visit two or three times a year. She comes to visit from Portland, Oregon, but she must have some Hollywood roots because only movie stars are this glamourous. That's as people go; most cats are pretty glamorous. They took like 10 pictures of me (with Kira), and this is one of the best of me.  Kira was looking pretty glamorous too, although I don't think she could wear her outfit just anywhere, if you know what I mean. But it was the perfect thing to pump a little blood into my blog photos, and she certainly qualifies as one of my Sexy New Friends, except that she's not new to me.   

Me with a Movie Star!!!

My only requirement, of course, was to have a RED theme, and they sure got that right!  

This is the Huskercat way to say GO BIG RED!!!

What does the lizard say for News Years???

So why, you might wonder, do I give a rat's ass about what lizards do on New Year's Day.  However, to preface this question, I offer the following photographic evidence that I am usually a laid-back kind of cat. I'm not out to "get" anyone.  I don't enjoy making others suffer.

One Laid-back Cat

This is me snarling. And, yes, I do look adorable when snarling.

I think I see something!!

Us cats have pretty amazing reflexes.  We are faster than a Manhattan switchblade. I'm told … I don't know what that is.  How how are we so fast?  I'm sure you're wondering that. That's natural.  I'm no neurophysiologist, but it's not that hard to understand neuro-stuff, so I'll give you the simple story on how we're so speedy. It has to do with nerves. When a cat (or a human) reacts to a stimulus (like a meandering lizard, this will be important later), a nerve signal gets sent to the spinal cord and follows a reflex arc back to a motor neuron (motor means muscle) or it gets sent to the brain where a decision has to be made. Us cats use reflex arcs due to evolution and stuff for many things where a human have to "think" about it. Our effector muscles are really fast. Check this out if you don't believe me. We also have thick axons which makes us like a Ferrari compared to humans (no offense).

So anyways, I spot something …

This is me spotting something.

It was a lizard. There's a bazillion lizards around here. The surveillance system around this place is woefully inadequate for the needs of our operation at this facility (house) and so there are no photos of me chasing the lizard. But that's what I did and I employed a tried and true method of pursuit - chasing my prey into the swimming pool! The forensic photo evidence below shows his ultimate resting place - about 12 feet underwater! You gotta admit, that's pretty funny. The photo isn't up to my usual standards of quality but that's the problem of taking a picture of something dead at the bottom of the pool. 

Drowned Lizard who is Dead.

Lizards have been around for over 200 million years where us cats have only been around for about 25 million years. It's pretty sad that lizards haven't done more with those 200 million years than to evolve into weird looking creatures that get chased around all the time. That's not time well spent. So there you have it. I chased that lizard to his death and I'm proud of it. It's not like he didn't have it coming either. He was trespassing and thanks to the new Feline Stand Your Yard Law, I can deploy lethal force in these situations. Oh … and PeTA, you can suck hard on this all you want but you can't touch me!! Come on these premises and I'll make sure you are downwind as I, shall we say, express my anal glands in your general direction!

Requisite image mocking PeTA

Oh … so what does the lizard say for New Years? The last New Years sound from this lizard was something like "glub glub."