National Pet Week: Cat

I've shared with you that I own a dog.  (Smiley) Riley (Wiley) is his name.  But to be very very honest, I am a huge dog person, not just evident in that I own a dog, but because I love every breed (except for Pekingese.  I just...don't like them).

I am not a cat person.

Not really.

I mean, I do like Bestie's cats.  And I did have a tabby cat with the planned name of Toby waiting for me at Pet Ranch before it closed.

Overall, though, I don't really like cats.

They think they're all that.  Stop petting me: I'll nip you.  Dogs usually don't do that.  So I prefer dogs.

However, some Disney characters think otherwise.  And that leads us into our cat spotlight for National Pet Week!

Since I "chose" the dog "spotlighter" (is that a word?  Spell-check doesn't like it), I asked The Disney Mermaid the first Disney character when I said a word.  "Cat."

"The cat from Alice in Wonderland."

Great.  I haven't seen that movie since I was like really really little (MMM says we weren't allowed to watch it since the Cheshire Cat creeped us out).  So I wasn't sure what to share with you.

Luckily, the second character she had thought of were the cats from The Aristocats.  So....

You chose to do her instead of me?
Meow?
Picture from the Disney Wiki.

Now we'll do our spotlight.


Cat Spotlight: Duchess

Refined.
(I tried to get a picture of Duchess with her eyes
averted upwards to meet Dinah's gaze downwards...
but I couldn't find one.)
Picture from the Disney Wiki.

Duchess is the white (most likely Persian) cat from the movie The Aristocats.  Though we do not learn her mate's/husband's name, she is also the mother of three kittens: Marie, Berlioz, and Toulouse (the first being a girl; the latter two being boys).

Duchess and her kittens live with Madame Adelaide Bonfamille, one of the richest women in Paris.  Madame loves her cats very much, as Duchess often says.

At the start of the film, Duchess and her kittens are returning home from an outing with Madame.  Madame's friend lawyer Georges is on his way, and Madame's butler Edgar shows him in when he gets there.  After some dancing, Madame has Georges sit down to write her will.  Edgar, listening through the pipes, learns she is leaving everything to her cats!  Only after the cats are gone will Edgar get the vast fortunes she owns.

"Cats!" gasps Edgar.  He must get rid of them; that money belongs to him!

His plan involves slipping sleeping pills into the cat's food...but until then, we are introduced to the fact that Duchess and her kittens can talk (of course).  The kittens being their lessons: Toulouse paints while Marie and Berlioz practice piano and singing.

Such a lovely family of cats.

So perfect.

Until Edgar.

With the cats drugged, Edgar slips them out at night and takes them for a ride on his motorcycle.  After getting involved in a chase with some farmer's dogs, he ends up leaving Duchess and the kittens in the French countryside.  Duchess awakes after a crash of thunder to find her kittens, who were thrown out of the basket like she was.  Reunited, they curl in the basket and try to sleep.

The next morning, Thomas O'Malley, an alley cat, appears and sings to Duchess.  He agrees to help them get back home to "poor Madame."  The rest of the movie revolves around their journey home, ending with an epic fight against Edgar, who seeing the cat's return, plans to ship them to Timbuktu.  The cats win, Edgar gets shipped to Timbuktu instead, and all their new friends are taken in by Madame for her new charity foundation "for all the stray cats in Paris!"

The End.

Oh, and of course, Thomas joins the family.

Phew, let me catch my breath.

Outside of the original film, Duchess and her family do not appear much other than in "House of Mouse."  And as I failed to mention for Bruno, Eva Gabor (who also voiced Bianca) voiced this fancy cat, but Robie Lester did her singing voice (as she would also do for Bianca).

Check back soon for another pet spotlight!

***UPDATE***

Time didn't allow me to get more spotlights in by the end of the week, especially since I got a late start (I didn't think of these posts until right before I posted the first one!).  At least I got spotlights for the two very important pets: Cats and Dogs.


Are you a cat person...or a dog person?  Vote now!