Photos of readers

September 19, 2019 • 2:30 pm

Today’s reader is also a writer: philosopher Maarten Boudry, with whom I published my only philosophy paper, giving me permanent philosophy credentials for those c.v.-mongerers like M*assim* P*gliucc* who insist that unless you have philosophy cred, you must not speak of philosophy.  But I digress. Maarten just got a new kitten, and below is Winston Purrchill with his staff (Maarten’s words are indented).

I got this adorable kitten as a birthday present from my girlfriend this Summer. As she was reading Andrew Roberts’ biography of Churchill [JAC: I’m reading the same book], we decided to call him ‘Winston’ (Purrchill?) He was born in Breda in the Netherlands, and left the litter at the end of August. With his black-and-white fur it looks like he’s always donning a smoking (with a black mask and white gloves). This is more visible on the other pic at the window sill, where he’s displaying a keen ornithological interest, and at such a tender age! He’s very affectionate and attention-hungry, and almost always purring. He’s also smart: he can tell the difference between a real fish stick and a vegan one (we conducted a test today).

This was the best birthday present ever!

 

21 thoughts on “Photos of readers

  1. M*assim* P*gliucc*

    It seemed you and MP had achieved rapprochement at Sean Carroll’s Moving Naturalism Forward workshop.

    I take it from the asterisks in his name that this modus vivendi is no more? 🙂

  2. A yes – one of those Ghent canals & boat. What a lovely playful, mischievous looking kitty. It took me a while to get the description of his patches, but I got there in the end. 🙂

    An item of male attire called a “smoking”? Seriously? Is that a North Americanism? I’ve never heard of a “smoking” in Britland nor anywhere else, but anything is possible.

    The article linked to is an Englishified version of a French-Canadian Wiki page: Smoking (vêtement) & I wondered if that’s why we have “a smoking” here.

    The smoking jacket, as I call it, came from the British Army – the officers might don it in the mess after they retired for cigars, brandy & snooker. Makes a lot of sense in an era when clothes were very, very expensive & being all natural materials with fine linings, difficult to clean & make free of smells. And [so-called] dry cleaning processes rare & exotic back then [1850s say].

  3. Looks exactly like my wee Ollie right down to the socks up front, boots in the rear. Weird how so many tuxedo cats seem to be identical.

  4. I’m sorry, but I have to point out a “pet peeve” of mine, he said the cat looks like he’s got a, “Smoking”.

    ???????!!!!!

    Yes, yes, I used the Inter-webs to look up what a ,”Smoking” was.

    Namely,https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smoking_jacket.

    If he had just simply said, a Smoking—JACKET, I wouldn’t have given it a second though.

    Oh well, peace.

  5. Maarten Boudry looks happy.. He has just been appointed to the chair established by Ghent University in commemoration of the late philosophy professor and renowned Belgian atheist Etienne Vermeersch

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