Translator’s Note
by Calli Wilks
I bet you didn’t know that I am fluent in cat!
Right up front, I would like to warn readers about the danger of creating musicals based on poems about cats. Just don’t do it. A man from Great Britain did it and ended up with a serious mental health condition that now requires him to employ a therapy dog. Let that be a lesson to us all.
Cats speak in mixture of plaintive mewing AND off-putting body language. “According to Emojipedia, a Japanese phone vendor (au by KDDI) added cat faces to their proprietary emoji set in 2003. In 2010 when emoji characters were officially accepted by the Unicode Consortium—a nonprofit that maintains global text standards across computers—these cat face emoji were retained and eventually used as characters for cat speak.”
To complicate matters, cats do not think linearly, and are generally inscrutable. Most often, cats are ambiguous when communicating their desires. To use a simple example, once out, cats want in. Once in, they want out. Many cat communications can be expressed with emoji and translated from emoji into English or other languages.
The Cat’s Message
I recently came into possession of this message, which is obviously a cry for help in cat speak. Some of our readers may say that cats do nothing but cry, mostly for help, and that translating cat messages which have been transcribed as emoji is really not a huge challenge. This is largely correct. However I did notice at about line 8, position 17 an indication that the cat wants a name. Of course, after an arduous process of naming the cat, it may turn out that it wants the name “Kitty,” in retrospect.
Naming the Cat at Issue
As you can see the cat at issue is not much of a lap cat. She has been advertised as bipolar, somewhat neurotic, and delicate. She definitely cannot be allowed outside because she is a tiny thing and can’t defend herself against marauders. She is currently being called Kitty, or if you prefer the three-name approach (see below), Kitty Kitty Kitty.
Suggest a Name
According to noted authorities, naming cats is a difficult matter involving concocting three names for the cat.
That is why we are asking our readership for nominations for names.
It may take a few days for your nominated name to show up on the website.
Review the Nominations!
Two pages. I haven’t figured out how to make everything show up on one page.
Gallery
Note– comments can be made on individual photos in the gallery. Click and scroll around.
FAQ
Q: Is it bad luck to rename a cat?
A: Let’s be clear. “Kitty” is not a name. “Kitty” is a placeholder until a proper name can be given to a cat. For those who are really worried about whether “Kitty,” is already the cat’s name and believe that giving the cat another name at this point would be renaming the cat – do not despair! Cats can be de-named in a de-naming ceremony. The de-naming ceremony typically involves writing the purported original name of the cat on a piece of paper, folding it and placing it into a box. The box should then be burned and the ashes should be thrown into the sea when the tide is going out. If the ceremony is performed away from the shore, the ashes can be thrown in a river to float downstream or in a lake at night during a full moon.
Q: Can I submit more than one name nomination.
A: Yes. And you can use pen names so people may or may not know that you are submitting multiple nominations.