Today’s Caturday report is a bit sad in that two of the items involve moggies who died. But we all do, and sometimes we need to read about people’s reactions to moggies who have crossed the Rainbow Bridge.
The first piece comes from the NYT, and you can read it by clicking the headline or reading the free version archived here. This involved a beloved local cat called Kit Kat, who suffered a needless death from a driverless car.
A recent poster from the supervisor’s Instagram post:
An excerpt:
At Delirium, a dive bar in San Francisco’s Mission District, the décor is dark, the drinks are strong, and the emotions are raw. The punk rockers and old-school city natives here look tough, but they are in mourning.
Kit Kat used to bar-hop along the block, slinking into Delirium for company and chin rubs. Everybody knew the bodega cat, affectionately calling him the Mayor of 16th Street. Kit Kat was their “dawg,” the guys hanging out on the corner said.
But shortly before midnight on Oct. 27, the tabby was run over just outside the bar and left for dead. The culprit?
A robot taxi.
Hundreds of animals are killed by human drivers in San Francisco each year. But the death of a single cat, crushed by the back tire of a Waymo self-driving taxi, has infuriated some residents in the Mission who loved Kit Kat — and led to consternation among those who resent how automation has encroached on so many parts of society.
. . .Kit Kat’s death has sparked outrage and debate for the past three weeks in San Francisco. A feline shrine quickly emerged. Tempers flared on social media, with some bemoaning the way robot taxis had taken over the city and others wondering why there hadn’t been the same level of concern over the San Francisco pedestrians and pets killed by human drivers over the years.
You can see a picture of the shrine below, taken from Facebook;
More:
A city supervisor called for state leaders to give residents local control over self-driving taxis. And, this being San Francisco, there are now rival Kit Kat meme coins inspired by the cat’s demise.
. . . . But all of that is noise at Delirium. Kit Kat was loved there. And now he is gone.
“Kit Kat had star quality,” said Lee Ellsworth, wearing a San Francisco 49ers hat and drinking a can of Pabst Blue Ribbon beer.
. . .Kit Kat’s death has given new fuel to detractors. They argue that robot taxis steal riders from public transit, eliminate jobs for people, enrich Silicon Valley executives — and are just plain creepy.
Jackie Fielder, a progressive San Francisco supervisor who represents the Mission District, has been among the most vocal critics. She introduced a city resolution after Kit Kat’s death that calls for the state Legislature to let voters decide if driverless cars can operate where they live. (Currently, the state regulates autonomous vehicles in California.)
“A human driver can be held accountable, can hop out, say sorry, can be tracked down by police if it’s a hit-and-run,” Ms. Fielder said in an interview. “Here, there is no one to hold accountable.”
. . .Waymo does not dispute that one of its cars killed Kit Kat. The company released a statement saying that when one of its vehicles was picking up passengers, a cat “darted under our vehicle as it was pulling away.”
“We send our deepest sympathies to the cat’s owner and the community who knew and loved him,” Waymo said in a statement.
I think Waymo also made a donation to a cat charity, but that’s not enough. One cat is too much!
What do you think about driverless cars?
The shrine, from Cats Doing Cat Stuff:
A short CNN video showing Kit Kat as well as Jackie Fielder demanding the right of community regulation of self-driving vehicles. I agree!
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Willamette Week reports on yet another semi-feral cat who is a mayor (alive this time): Nutmeg, the mayor of a part of Portland called Sellwood, Click to read:
I love how Nutmeg gets carried home every evening! An excerpt:
It’s not clear what drew Nutmeg to the Sellwood CVS. He’s a 14-year-old cat who, for most of his life, has preferred to spend as much time outside as possible. But in October or November of last year, the long-haired ginger started hanging out in the store’s parking lot. Then he figured out how the store’s automatic doors worked and wandered in.
One clue: CVS does carry some pet supplies, and John Burgon, an Executive Security guard, tells WW that Nutmeg once tore into a bag of cat treats and helped himself. He also once broke into the store’s pharmacy, though it’s unclear whether he was attempting a Drugstore Cowboy-style heist or simply exploring a potential career as a pharmacy technician, as his owner, Joe Moore, suggests.
Moore and his wife, Gabi, adopted Nutmeg a year ago after a friend had to rehome him. The cat was born under a trailer in Boone County, West Virginia, and has spent the bulk of his life in Centralia, Wash., as a mostly outdoor cat. The Moores set him up with a heated dog house in the backyard, put a collar and tag on him (along with an AirTag), and let him continue his wandering ways, though they do bring him in at night.
Store manager Mike Rogers says Nutmeg usually comes in early in the evening and hangs out until the store closes at 10. At that point, Joe Moore comes in—the store is about half a block from the Moores’ house—and carries him home.
. . .customers love him, the Moores love knowing he’s somewhere safe, and staff is delighted to have Nutmeg around, providing him with a fleece blanket and on-the-job snacks. Sometimes, Rogers says, he perches on the counter and quietly demands petting from customers.
“He’s basically become our Norm from Cheers.”
Click below go to the Facebook post:
And a video in an Instagram post; if you can’t see it, click “View this post” link to see Nutmeg in the fur:
View this post on Instagram
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From The Dispatch, a man says farewell to a beloved cat (article archived here):
You can see Gracie above. Here’s an excerpt, but you can read the whole elegy at the free link above:
We got Gracie almost 18 years ago from the shelter. Our daughter, then 5, wanted a kitten. We wanted a kitten. But there was a lady volunteer at the shelter who had a tip for us. People throw around the term “cat lady” a lot, but she was the real thing. I remember her sweater seemed to be on backward, and she gave the distinct impression that the shelter cats were just the surplus from the much larger supply at her house. But she was very kind. More importantly, she knew her cats. In movies, and a few TV shows, one of my favorite bit characters is the racing tout. You know, the shoeshine guy or omnipresent loiterer with a toothpick or cigarillo in his mouth and racing form in his hand who seems to know everything about every horse (“His muddah was a mudder”). That was this lady, but for cats.
She took a shine to us and said something like, “Take a look at that one. I see something special.”
She pointed to a thin gray cat, a few months out of little-kittenhood. She was regal but friendly. Lucy, my daughter, decided she was the one when another family seemed to want her, and Lucy’s jealousy told her we needed to act. We put our names down for her.
But the high-stakes world of cat adoption in the nation’s capital being what it is, we couldn’t just take the yet-to-be-named Gracie home. Because we had a dog, the people at the shelter had to be sure that, Bill Murray’s insinuations about “cats and dogs living together” aside, they would get along. They required an introduction, on the premises. So, we made an appointment and came back a few days later with Cosmo the Wonderdog. We waited in a canine-feline interaction room. They brought in Gracie. Gracie saw Cosmo, and her tail inflated tenfold. Imagine one of those shawarma cones at the gyro joint, but made of fluffy gray fur.
. . .Gracie was the friendliest cat I’ve ever known. After a brief interrogation, she would let anybody rub her belly. She insisted upon sitting on every visitor’s lap—or at least trying. Every cat sitter we’ve ever had fell in love with her, because she was so lovable.
But I know a lot of people don’t want to hear a lot of stories about a cat. Talking about your pets can be a bit like describing your dreams: It’s got to be pretty unusual to be interesting at all. And I know from experience that there are a lot of people who will say, “It’s just a cat.”
No, it’s not.
I feel a strange obligation to explain this to people who don’t get it. And there are a lot of them.
When people say, “It’s just a cat,” or “It’s only a dog,” I hear a confession that they have never loved a cat or dog, not really. Such admissions of emotional ignorance clank off my ear and pinch my heart the same way as hearing that someone’s grandmother was “just an old lady.” No, I am not saying that there’s moral equivalence between people and animals. I’m saying that the love people feel for their animals is a real form of love. The people who leap at the opportunity to take offense, or simply argue, at such comparisons miss the point entirely. They want to drag reason into a realm where reason isn’t all that useful and even less welcome. I’m fine if people think loving animals is irrational in the exact same way I’m fine with people saying loving anything or anyone is irrational. I think they’re wrong. I can give you a rational explanation, a just-so story about evolution and whatnot. The materialists will tell you that love is an evolutionary mechanism necessary for ensuring your genes pass on. Okay, fine, maybe, probably, whatever; but who cares? The only relevant fact is that we love. And so do animals.
. . . and the sad farewell. Pay attention to the Jewish expression, one that I love, and is really the only thing you can say as condolence if you don’t believe in God (and many who do believe say it anyway):
This has been a horrible week in a pretty horrible year. My daughter loved her girl more than anything. I love Lucy more than anything. The pain she went through as we ran out of medical options for Gracie and had not only to say goodbye to Gracie but to be the facilitator of her passing and the end of her suffering was indescribable. Lucy’s pain multiplied my sorrow at losing this wonderful creature who served as a center of gravity in my family. They say you’re only as happy as your least happy child. Well, Lucy’s the only child I have, and so her misery is my own. As a dad, I take some solace in the fact that Lucy will learn important things from all of this, but those lessons are learned over time. This has been some terrible quality time, but it will improve as it melts into quantity time.
One of the best expressions the Jews have given the world is “May their memory be a blessing.” Having lost so many people, and so many animals, I’ve come to have a deep appreciation for this simple condolence. It’s partly why I unapologetically talk about my parents and brother so often. It honors them and my debts to them. But more than that, it brings joy. It keeps them alive in the only way possible in this life. It demonstrates that even when family members depart, the family endures and carries their indelible imprint. Amid all the crying these last few days, we’ve already started telling stories about Gracie and sharing pictures of her. Because her memory is a blessing, not just because we loved this silly creature, but because our family formed in so many ways around her. And family is a blessing, one of the only real ones in life.
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Lagniappe: A moggyt photobomb
The man wanted to record the romantic moments he was dancing with his wife, but an uninvited guest joined in. pic.twitter.com/bSjHXygRxs
— The Figen (@TheFigen_) February 13, 2026
And Nimbus, the Mount Washington Observatory Cat:
h/t: Marion
People in Willamette have their priorities right.
Very sad about the cat, but what an overreaction by the community. I was in San Francisco a few weeks ago. Waymos are everywhere. I had 4 Waymo rides. What an experience. Unlike human drivers, Waymos go the speed limit, they come to full stops at stop signs, they only pass when it is safe, they don’t go through red lights, etc. Three of my four trips were perfect. The last trip had a bit of a problem. The Waymo was a bit confused about a double-parked car on our side of the street and a car a bit further up trying to parallel park. The Waymo decided to turn into an alley and reboot. We were soon on our way. Sorry for the “anthropomorphizing.” Waymos will be here in Dallas in a few months.
Cats are killed every day by cars with humans driving them. I’m all for banning humans, as are I’m sure is almost every other form of life on the planet. I know I’ll never get my way on this (or anything else), so in the meantime, we should summarily execute anyone who hits and kills a cat.
That is worlds more reasonable than what SFers want.
“What do you think about driverless cars?” I’ve never seen one, and if one stopped at the curb to pick me up, I don’t know if I’d get in. It would seem so strange. What’s it like to ride in a driverless car?
Our last cat, Tobi (z’ll) died many years ago now, more than ten. May her memory be a blessing.
Driverless cars have more than 90% fewer accidents per mile driven than those by nearsighted, texting, drunk, elderly, entitled, arrogant, and/or belligerent naked monkeys.
Plus if you use a Waymo, you also don’t have to worry about listening to or smelling obnoxious, boring, nearsighted, texting, drunk, elderly, entitled, arrogant, and/or belligerent naked Uber/Taxi monkeys.
My wife and I rode home from SeaTac Airport last year in an Uber. We were lucky to survive. The driver was talking loudly to himself the entire way, almost entirely in a foreign language. He seemed insane. We got home and I told my wife we’re lucky to be alive, but she didn’t understand why. She thought the driver was talking on the phone. He was not.
The elegy is a lovely piece of writing. I’m definitely easy, because I got quite a good giggle from the cat photobombing the video!
I was actually in San Francisco a few years ago. Autonomous vehicles were notable for their absence The hotel did have a robot that did room service.
Generally I regard autonomous vehicles as a “good thing”. People who drink, the elderly, children, blind people, etc. will all gain mobility from AVs (that really work).