David McElroy

For the past couple of years, I’ve been reading a web comic that captured cat personalities in a way that I’ve never seen in art — and it just started running in newspapers nationally today.

“Breaking Cat News” captured my imagination from the beginning. The concept was brilliant and the execution was even better. Artist Georgia Dunn watched her three cats — Elvis, Puck and Lupin — and then developed a continuing story around them. She imagined them as the operators of their own television news operation — and she imagined how they would view and report the events of her own household.

If you’ve lived with cats and have a love for them, her work just might melt your heart, because she imagines her cats in ways that many of us have done. (Although I never got around to making the website for him, my Merlin ran for president last year on a platform of every cat receiving his dinner on time.) I immediately identified with the work Dunn was doing based on her cats — and I suspect millions of others who live with cats might feel exactly the same.

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I noticed the cupcakes in the woman’s arms as we waited for the elevator on the fourth floor. It was a tray of a dozen or so cupcakes you get at any grocery store’s bakery section. It was lunch and I was hungry, so they looked good.

“If I ever turn to a life of crime, I’m going to start robbing people with cupcakes like those,” I joked with her.

A elevator dinged to announced its arrival and we stepped on. As we rode to the first floor, we joked about the difficulty of staying away from sugar.

As we stepped out of the elevator in the lobby, another woman joined her. As we were walking out of the building, the first woman pointed to the second and made a mocking accusation.

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Every day, the world wants to sell us just a little bit more.

The sales pitch is seductive. You can have this car, this house, this vacation, these clothes, these electronics, these toys. You can have a life of luxury and pride.

People can look up to you. They can envy you. They can admire you. Maybe, the sales pitch whispers, they might even love you. They might give you approval.

And the price? It’s trivial. Just a little bit more of your time.

The world can be yours if you’ll just hand over more of the only thing you really have — your hours, your days, your weeks, your years.

Your family won’t mind if you’re gone most of the time. Your wife won’t care if you work nights. Your husband won’t care if you have an additional job. After all, it’s extra money for the family — to buy all those things that are so important.

And your children? They won’t mind a few extra hours in “school” or being placed with a relative. They won’t mind if you’re not giving them your attention as they grow up. After all, you’re doing this for them. Right?

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