When people say that cats are self-interested and aloof, it’s pretty clear that they have never really lived with one. Cats don’t have ulterior motives when it comes to showing affection. If they love you, it won’t be because you feed them or clean their litter box or play with them. It will be because they just simply do.
Cats reaction when his owner comes home – GIF on Imgur
http://imgur.com/BALT0No
Jackie sent me a link to this beautiful 1918 animated film about the sinking of the Lusitania.
And that reminded me of a family story that’s somewhat apocryphal. Or maybe not?
My great grandmother, Nell Basquille, came to the US from Castlebar, Ireland, in 1916 on the SS Philadelphia. The ship arrived in New York on 1 October. The story goes that there was a fire on-board the ship while it was waiting in port. Given the time period, there was much speculation that it may have been deliberately set by German agents or Nazi sympathizers.
But I say the story is somewhat apocryphal, because I’ve never been able to turn up any reliable mention of it in various fits of researching. Just a single passage in a book whose author’s credentials are unknown to me. But the incident is mentioned there, and surely if it weren’t true, two different people wouldn’t have dreamt it up independently?
Here’s what Captain Henry Landau had to say, in his book, The Enemy Within: the inside story of German sabotage in America.
So even if he doesn’t list his sources (and as far as I can tell, he does not), Landau at least does mention the fire, which leads me to believe it actually happened. Probably.
red paper boat 