Words with Webster: Henry’s Pocket, Plus Friendly Fill-Ins

We have two fun Friday features for you today. First up is Real Cat Webster, who has an “eary”  word to share. After that, it’s on to Friendly Fill-Ins!

Words with Webster

Hi, everybody! It’s me, Real Cat Webster. Welcome to Words with Me. Today’s word is “Henry’s pocket.” I picked this word because I just thought it was interesting. It is also not in the dictionary, which makes it kind of hard to find its origins or give examples.

But anyway, the important thing is that Henry’s pocket is that little pouchy thing on the bottom part of a cat’s outer ear. It’s also called the “cutaneous marginal pouch,” but “Henry’s pocket” is so much more fun to say. Some kinds of dogs and other animals have these little ear pouches too.

That little pouch at the bottom of this cat's ear is
Henry's pocket. No one knows quite what it's for.
Public domain image by Mattes, via Wikimedia Commons.

Humans like to name things, so they have named this little pouch, but none of them seem to know for sure what its function is. One possibility is that the pouch helps cats detect high-pitched sounds. No one seems to know why it’s called Henry’s pocket either. We have no idea who named it that or when. All in all, Henry’s pocket is kind of a mysterious thing.

One thing that is not so mysterious is that nasty little parasites like to hang out in Henry’s pocket, so you and your vet should keep an eye out for them!

Friendly Fill-Ins

And now it’s time for Friendly Fill-Ins, from 15andmeowing and The Four-Legged Furballs. Real Cat Paisley took on the first two this week, and old SoLT did the next two.

Real Cat Paisley’s answers:

1. I have faith in the Cat Food Gods because they eventually make sure I get some tasty food. Sometimes it takes a while, though. Please see my answer to #2 for an example.

2. Yesterday, I finally got some tasty food after several days of icky food. The gods must have slept through the first part of the week or something.

Old SoLT’s answers:

3. My favorite place to be is sort of theoretical because I almost never get to go there . . . but I love the beach.

4. If I was granted one wish, it would be to live closer to the shore so I could enjoy walking on the beach more often than once a decade.

Words with Webster: Catnap

We have two fun Friday features for you today. First up is Real Cat Webster, who has a sleepy word to share. After that, it’s on to Friendly Fill-Ins!

Words with Webster

Hi, everybody! It’s me, Real Cat Webster. Welcome to Words with Me. Today’s word is “catnap.” I picked this word because today is Nap Day, a day that sure seems made for cats. Anyway, we all know what a catnap is, right? In case you don’t, it is a “very short light nap,” according to my favorite dictionary (Webster’s, obviously [Webster’s Third New International, unabridged, online]).

The Oxford English Dictionary doesn’t have a separate entry for “catnap.” Weird, right? Anyway, they list it under “cat,” along with a whole bunch of other phrases and words that have “cat” in them.  They say a catnap is “a short nap while sitting.”

These definitions make me think that maybe dictionary people have never seen a cat take a nap. When me and Paisley take naps, we don’t mess around with “short,” “light,” or “sitting.” We are serious about it! Maybe other cats do it different, though. Please let us know in the comments if we are taking naps wrong.

The OED says that this word has been around since at least 1823, when it appeared in James Fenimore Cooper’s Pioneers:

I just closed my eyes in order to think the better with myself... It was only some such matter as a cat’s nap. (II.xiii.187)

There weren’t a lot of good quotes for "catnap," so that’s the only one I picked to show you.

Obviously “catnap” is a combination of “cat” and “nap.” If you want to know about “cat” (which has been around since at least the year 800), you can read my post on it. “Nap” has been around since about 1300, according to the Online Etymology Dictionary. It seems to be related to the Old High German hnaffezan and Norwegian napp.

Maybe this will give you something to dream about while you're taking your nap today!

Friendly Fill-Ins

And now it’s time for Friendly Fill-Ins, from 15andmeowing and The Four-Legged Furballs. Old SoLT did the first two, and Real Cat Paisley did the next two.

Old SoLT’s answers:

1. I tried  a cricket and I liked didn’t like it. Someone gave me a “Cricket Lick-It” lollipop once and I thought, Well, why not? so I ate it. Let’s just say it turned out to be not my thing. And the tequila-flavored lollipop with the worm inside? Also not my thing!

2. Am I the only one who would actually eat candy with a cricket in it?

Real Cat Paisley’s answers:

3. Garfield is my hero/heroine. All that lasagna!

4. If I could eat only one food for the rest of my life, it would be … You must be crazy. There is no way I could eat only one food. I get tired of everything after one day, sometimes after one serving, so Mommy has to rotate my food brands and flavors a lot.

Reminder!

Finally, here is your monthly reminder about the Pet Photo Fails Blog Hop, which happens right here next Friday!

So post a couple of those not-quite-right pet photos (we know you have some) and stop by, ready to hop.

We can't wait to see you!

Words with Webster: Panther

We have two fun Friday features for you today. First up is Real Cat Webster, who has another wild word to share. After that, it’s on to Friendly Fill-Ins!

Words with Webster

Hi, everybody! It’s me, Real Cat Webster. Welcome to Words with Me. Today’s word is “panther.” I picked this word because one of the comments to my last post asked, “If leopards aren’t panthers, then what are?” That’s a great question, and we wondered about that ourselves. So of course I looked it up, and Webster’s dictionary says “panther” means

(1): a leopard of a supposed exceptionally large fierce variety (2): a leopard of the black color phase. (Webster’s Third New International Dictionary, unabridged, online)

A panther can also be a cougar or a jaguar, again according to Webster’s.

Next I used Mommy’s library account to look at the Oxford English Dictionary, which defines “panther” like this:

Originally: an exotic spotted big cat that was believed to be distinct from the leopard. Now: a leopard (Panthera pardus), esp. a melanistic one.

The OED also says that “panther” can mean a cougar or jaguar, although it indicates the “jaguar” meaning is obsolete, which seems weird to Mommy because she has seen “panther” used to refer to a melanistic jaguar a whole bunch of times.

I found this fun quote from 1894 to make things more confusing:

The panther was long called a “tyger” in the Carolinas, and a “lyon” elsewhere. (Century magazine, April, 849)

This quote uses "panther" to refer to the cougar, puma, mountain lion, or whatever other synonym you can think of.

Anyway, “panther” has been around since the early 13^th century, according to the Online Etymology Dictionary. It came from the Old French word pantere, which was from the Latin panthera, which was from the Greek panther (“panther, leopard”). Some of you may recognize panthera as the genus name of several big cat species: the lion, tiger, jaguar, leopard, and snow leopard.

This cat could be called a panther (it's a melanistic leopard), but so could a few other cats.
Photo by Davidvraju [CC BY-SA 4.0], from Wikimedia Commons.

There are lots of quotes for this word, so I picked just a couple:

The leoparde or spotted panthere…signifieth the kingdom of great Alexander. (George Joye, 1545, The Exposition of Daniel the Prophete, 1^st ed., vii. f. 98)

In the twelfth edition of the Systema Naturæ the Panther and Leopard seem to be confounded by Linnæus himself, who seems to have considered them as the same species. (George Shaw and James Francis Stephens, 1800, General Zoology, 1^st ed., I. ii. 349)

In conclusion, a panther is a leopard … except when it is something else.

You humans just can’t decide what to call cats, can you?

Friendly Fill-Ins

And now it’s time for Friendly Fill-Ins, from 15 and Meowing and The Four-Legged Furballs. Old SoLT did the first two this week, and Real Cat Paisley did the next two.

Old SoLT’s answers:

1. As a child, I feared ghosts, and I thought everyplace we lived was haunted.

2. Friday the 13th is a movie I remember watching on cable when I was in high school. It scared me then and still kind of freaks me out today. I don’t have any superstitions about the actual day.

 Real Cat Paisley’s answers:

3. I think tortitude is my best quality.

4. You can’t go wrong with taking a nap. Napping solves most problems and gives you more energy to play.

Words with Webster: Leopard

We have two fun Friday features for you today. First up is Real Cat Webster, who has a … spotted word to share. After that, it’s on to Friendly Fill-Ins!

Words with Webster

Hi, everybody! It’s me, Real Cat Webster. Welcome to Words with Me. Today’s word is “leopard.” Maybe you remember that I mentioned this word in my column a couple of weeks ago and said I’d do it soon. I’m doing it today.

A leopard is

a large strong cat (Felis pardus) of southern Asia and Africa that is usually tawny or buff with black spots arranged in broken rings or rosettes, is somewhat arboreal, and often lies in ambush for its prey that consists of most animals small or weak enough for it to overcome—called also panther. (Webster’s Third New International Dictionary, Unabridged, online)

You probably already knew that. And if you read my last post about the word “pard,” you might already suspect that “leopard” is a related word. Well, it is. Let’s go in our usual order, though, with dates and quotes.

“Leopard” has appeared with various spellings since at least about 1330, according to the Oxford English Dictionary. The Online Etymology Dictionary says the English word has been around since the late 13th century and was used as a surname starting in the early 13th century. There were several good quotes. I picked these ones for you to show a couple of the different spellings:

Then answered Kyng Richard, In deed lyon, in thought libbard. (Richard Coer de Lyon, 2182 [about 1400])

There was a lyeparte there aboutes whiche destroyed the people of the contre. (Jacobus de Voragine, Golden Legende, trans. by William Caxton, 416/1 [1483])

Wert thou a Leopard, thou wert Germane to the Lion, and the spottes of thy Kindred, were Iurors on thy life. (Shakespeare, Timon of Athens (1623) iv. iii. 342 [about 1616])

This word comes to us from the Late Latin leopardus (“lion-pard, lion-panther”) and Greek leopardos, says the Online Etymology Dictionary. Back in those times, people thought the leopard was actually a hybrid of a lion and a panther, so that’s what they called it: a lion-panther. Now we know that a leopard is its own thing.

Look closely at the cat in this drawing of an Egyptian chariot...
(By Unknown author [CC BY-SA 2.5], via Wikimedia Commons. Original source is W.W. Loring, "A Confederate Soldier in Egypt," 1884.)

It's spotted, but it also seems to have a sort of mane.
Could it be an ancient lion-pard? 

One last note for today: A few commenters on my last post said that they thought “pard” would have something to do with “partner.” Well, it does, actually. “Pard” is also a colloquial term for “partner, chum.” This usage originated in the US and has been around since at least 1850. It is a shortened form of “pardener,” which has been around since at least 1795:

Improprieties, commonly called Vulgarisms... Pardener for Partner. (Benjamin Dearborn, The Columbian Grammar, 137 [1795])

Friendly Fill-Ins

And now it’s time for Friendly Fill-Ins, from 15andmeowing and The Four-Legged Furballs. The first two are answered by old SoLT this week, and the next two by Real Cat Paisley.

Old SoLT’s answers:

1. When it is hot, I like to sit on the deck (under the awning) and read. I enjoy getting out of the air conditioning, and it is nice to not be mildly to moderately to severely cold all the time.

2. I am looking forward to the end of this month. Because then it will be August, which is one month closer to my favorite season, fall.

Real Cat Paisley’s answers:

3. The theme song of my life would be “Margaritaville,” only I would re-title it “Niparitaville.”

4. There is no such thing as a free lunch. At least that’s what Mommy told me, but she feeds me lunch every day and I never pay her or anything, so I think that might be one of those alternative facts I keep hearing about.

Words with Webster: Pard

We have one fun Friday feature for you today, as Real Cat Webster shares a really old wild cat word. And then we have a reminder for you about next Friday!

Words with Webster

Hi, everybody! It’s me, Real Cat Webster. Welcome to Words with Me. Today’s word is “pard.” This is sort of like last week’s word, “manticore,” because I got the idea for it when Mommy was typing the heraldry post for Miss C. Anyway, “pard,” according to my favorite dictionary, Merriam-Webster’s, is an archaic term for a leopard. The Oxford English Dictionary says it can mean a panther, a leopard, or “an animal resembling these.”

This word has basically been around since the days of ye Olde English, which was before the year 1100. Here is one of the Old English quotes listed in the OED:

Ofer ealle þa niht ðe we ferdon þæt us symle leon & beran & tigris & pardus & wulfas ure ehtan. ([tr.] Alexander’s Letter to Aristotle, 16.234)

Besides the pards, this quote also has lions and tigers and bears. Oh my! (And it has wolves too.)

It was really exciting to see a Shakespeare quote for “pard”:

Then, a Soldier, Full of strange oaths, and bearded like the Pard. (about 1616, As You Like It (1623) ii. vii. 150)

And I’m adding this 19th-century quote just because I like it:  

With the tread of the velvet-footed pard when he creeps upon his prey. (1845, J. H. Ingraham, Scarlet Feather ix. 58)

According to the Online Etymology Dictionary, “pard” comes from the Latin pardus and Greek pardos (both meaning “a male panther”). And those could come from a possibly Iranian source that also led to the Sanskrit prdaku-s (“leopard, tiger, snake”) and Persian palang (“panther”).

This leopard is leaping in a Roman mosaic from Cyprus.
Photo via Adobe Stock.

And in case you’re wondering, yes, I did look up “leopard,” but it was so interesting I decided to save it for my next column, which will be right here on July 6!

Pet Photo Fails

And now here is your friendly reminder that the Pet Photo Fails Blog Hop happens next Friday! So get your not-quite-right pet photos ready to share, and come hop with us. All pets are welcome!

Words with Webster: Manticore, Plus Friendly Fill-Ins

We have two fun Friday features for you today. First up is Real Cat Webster, who has a fantastic word to share. After that, it’s on to Friendly Fill-Ins!

Words with Webster

Hi, everybody! It’s me, Real Cat Webster. Welcome to Words with Me. Today’s word is “manticore.” At first this word doesn’t sound very catty, but a manticore is a

legendary animal having the head of a man often with horns, the body of a lion, and the tail of a dragon or scorpion. (Webster’s Third New International Dictionary, Unabridged, online)

The Oxford English Dictionary describes it a little differently:

A fabulous monster having the body of a lion (occasionally a tiger), the head of a man, porcupine's quills, and the tail or sting of a scorpion.

I first learned about this word when Mommy was researching for our heraldry post a few weeks ago. In heraldry, a manticore is

a monster represented with the body of a beast of prey, the head of a man, sometimes with spiral or curved horns, and sometimes the feet of a dragon. (Oxford English Dictionary)

A manticore as depicted in the Rochester Bestiary,
late 1200s.
British Library, public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.

Well, whether a manticore does or does not have a dragon’s tail and/or porcupine’s quills, it certainly does have the body of a big cat, and that’s what’s important (unless you happen to encounter one in the wild and want to put a name to it, but I really wouldn’t recommend taking the time to do that).

This word has been used in English since at least the 1300s. I found this excellent quote from the 1500s:

The mantycors of ye montaynes Myght fede them on thy braynes. (J. Skelton, Phyllyp Sparowe, sig. A.viii ?1545 [first composed ca. 1529])

That quote also explains why you shouldn’t hang around a manticore trying to figure out exactly what it is.

According to the Online Etymology Dictionary, “manticore” comes to English from the Latin manticora, which is from the Greek mantikhoras, which seems to be a corruption of martikhoras, which could be from an Iranian compound meaning “man-eater”: mar-tiya-khvara.

According to folk etymology, the word comes from a combination of “man” + “tiger.”

Purrsonally, I think the “official” etymology is more convincing; plus, it gives you yet another hint that if you happen upon an actual thing that might be a manticore, you should quietly vacate the area!

Friendly Fill-Ins

And now it’s time for Friendly Fill-Ins, from 15andmeowing and The Four-Legged Furballs. This week old SoLT did the first two and Real Cat Paisley did the second two.

Old SoLT’s answers:

1. My favorite Disney character is Mickey Mouse. But my favorite cartoon character is Bugs Bunny. By the way, I’m currently listening to a great podcast called Drawn: The Story of Animation. I recommend it for anyone who loves animation.

2. If I could stay any age for life, I would choose to be age 25 in body and 49 (current age) in mind. Sometimes I think if I could just get my 25-year-old body back, I’d be all set!

Real Cat Paisley’s answers:

3. Bending everyone to my will is my not so secret talent.

4. Life is like a variety pack of canned food. You never know what you’re going to get.

Words with Webster: Cheshirization, Plus Friendly Fill-Ins

We have two fun Friday features for you today. First up is Real Cat Webster, who has a catty word to share (but perhaps not catty enough, as you’ll see!). After that, it’s on to Friendly Fill-Ins!

Words with Webster

Hi, everybody! It’s me, Real Cat Webster. Welcome to Words with Me. Today’s word is “Cheshirization.” I learned this word last week when Mommy was looking up stuff about Alice in Wonderland. At first I thought it must mean “to turn into a Cheshire Cat” or something like that, but that’s not really it. “Cheshirization” is a word from linguistics. It’s not even in our usual dictionaries, so I went to Wiktionary and learned that this word means this:

One or several sound changes which preserve a phonological distinction in a re-expressed form.

I didn’t understand that at all (even Mommy went, “Huh?” and she’s kind of smart), so I had to look on Wikipedia. Okay … so according to Wikipedia, Cheshirization is when a sound disappears from a word but leaves behind a trace—like how the Cheshire Cat could gradually disappear, until only his smile was left.

The Cheshire Cat vanishing.
Illustration by John Tenniel in Lewis Carroll's
Alice in Wonderland (1865-66).
Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.

It makes more sense when you see an example. The word “night” is a good one. Today the “gh” is silent, but it used to be pronounced—sort of like the end sound in “uhg” or “loch”— but that sound disappeared over time. It left something behind, though, and that is the long “i” sound, which used to be a short “i.” The long “i” is like the cat’s smile. So today we say “nite” instead of “nit.”

I’m sorry I couldn’t find a more catty example, but I had to use one that (a) was in English and (b) I understood!

I think we should make up a new meaning for this word because the current one is boring (except to linguists, I guess). I think the new meaning should be this:

When a cat disappears into a really great hiding spot, leaving only some shed fur behind in plain sight.

Here it is used in a sentence:

That clever Webster is a master of Cheshirization, especially when someone says “Vet.”

Do you have an idea for what Cheshirization could mean? Let us know in the comments!

Friendly Fill-Ins

And now it’s time for Friendly Fill-Ins, from 15andmeowing and The Four-Legged Furballs. This week, old SoLT answered the first two, and Real Cat Paisley did the second two.

Old SoLT’s answers:

1. My favorite subject in school was any kind of science. I took a lot of science in high school and started as a biology major in college.

2. An extracurricular activity I participated in was … well, I was in the science club, but I don’t remember that we ever actually did anything expect get our picture taken for the yearbook. This was back in the days before kids had to be in 67 activities all the time.

Real Cat Paisley’s answers:

3. I want to learn how to get outside. The dog goes outside, so why can’t I?

4. It takes courage to defy me when I want to be fed. I have sharp things on the ends of my paws, and I’m not afraid to use them!

Words with Webster: Cat, Plus Friendly Fill-Ins

We have two fun Friday features for you today. First up is Real Cat Webster, who has a really old feline word to share. After that, it’s on to Friendly Fill-Ins!

Words with Webster

Hi, everybody! It’s me, Real Cat Webster. Welcome to Words with Me. Today’s word is “cat.” Finally! I have been promising to do this word for a while now, and this week Mommy said we could do it. I don’t know why it’s taken so long. Ask Mommy.

Anyway, we all know what a cat is, right? Just in case, here is the definition from the Oxford English Dictionary:

A well-known carnivorous quadruped (Felis domesticus) which has long been domesticated, being kept to destroy mice, and as a house pet.

The word has been used in English since at least 800, when it appeared in this quote:

Fellus (felis), catte.  (Glossary [MS Cambridge, Corpus Christi College 144] H. Sweet: The Oldest English Texts [1885])

That wasn’t such a great quote, since the source name was longer than the actual quote, so I found this other one from about 500 years later (c. 1300):

By nighth als a cat hy seeth. (Kyng Alisaunder [c. 1400–1425], 5275)

Then I tried to figure out where the word “cat” came from. Get this: Nobody knows exactly where “cat” came from. This is what the OED says:

The name is common European of unknown origin: found in Latin and Greek in 1–4th cent., and in the modern languages generally, as far back as their records go.

The Online Etymology Dictionary says the Old English word “catt” entered English from West Germanic, and from the Proto-Germanic kattuz. Latin had the word catta (c. AD 75), and Byzantine Greek had katta (c. 350). The word may ultimately have Afro-Asiatic origins: The Nubian word for “cat” is kadis, and the Berber word is kadiska. We speculate that the Romans might have picked up a version of this word during their North African adventures and then spread it all around.

One other really interesting thing is how similar the different words for “cat” are across much of Europe. Look at this:

Spanish: gato

Italian: gatto

German: katze

Dutch: kat

Welsh: cath

Bulgarian: kotka

Russian: kot (masculine), koshka (feminine)

Finnish: katti

After this post, you should be able to say “cat” in about a dozen different languages!

Friendly Fill-Ins

And now it’s time for Friendly Fill-Ins, from 15andmeowing and McGuffy’s Reader. They are a fun way to learn a little bit about the authors of the blogs you read. The first two questions, answered by old SoLT this week, are from Ellen of 15andmeowing, and the next two, answered by Real Cat Paisley, are from Annie of McGuffy’s Reader.

Old SoLT’s answers:

1. I spend countless hours per day online. I basically have an online dictionary, style guide, and a search engine open all day while I’m working, and then there’s the research for blogging, and visiting friends’ blogs.… I’d guess I spend at least four hours a do actively doing things online, more if I’m working on a book that has tons of stuff to verify. Add in another hour for social media too!

2. When I go online, I use my desktop during the day and my iPad or sometimes a laptop in the evenings.

Real Cat Paisley’s answers:

3. Mother’s Day I always think I should get something really neat for Mommy, but then I remember she already has me, and what could be better than that? Also, I don’t have any cash.

4. I wish I had some cash, or better, a credit card. Then I could go online and order some good food. This stuff Mommy got at the pet store last week is just barely edible!

Words with Webster: Ounce

We have just one fun Friday feature for you today. Today’s post is all on Real Cat Webster, who has a wild word to share.

Words with Webster

Hi, everybody! It’s me, Real Cat Webster. Welcome to Words with Me. Today’s word is “ounce.” If you missed yesterday’s post about heraldry, you might be wondering what an ounce, as in “16 ounces in a pound,” has to do with cats. Well, that’s not the kind of ounce I’m talking about. My favorite dictionary, Merriam-Webster’s, says that an ounce is also

1. archaic :  any of various moderate-sized wildcats (as the ocelot or lynx)
2. snow leopard
3. archaic :  cheetah
4. a heraldic representation of a leopard

That last meaning is how we heard about this word. You know what’s kind of weird, though? The Oxford English Dictionary doesn’t mention that meaning; it just says that an ounce is a “medium-sized member of the cat family” or snow leopard (the scientific name of which is Panthera uncia).

It’s been a while since we’ve gotten to share a Shakespeare quote, but there is one for this word. Good ol’ Will!

Be it Ounce, or Catte, or Beare, Pard, or Boare with bristled haire. (1600, Midsummer Night's Dream ii. ii. 36)  

This lynx could be called an ounce, although that's kind of archaic.

That quote refers to the "medium-sized cat" meaning, by the way. Here’s one for the "snow leopard" meaning, but it’s not from Shakespeare:

We will, therefore, call that animal of the panther kind, which is less than the panther, and with a longer tail, the ounce... (O. Goldsmith, 1774, A History of the Earth, and Animated Nature III.254)

“Ounce” has been around since about 1300, according to the Online Etymology Dictionary. It came from the Old French word once, which used to be lonce, meaning “lynx.” That word came from the Latin lyncea (“lynx-like”), which was from the Latin lynx, which was from the Greek lyngx. The “L” at the beginning lonce may have been dropped along the way because people thought it was an article instead of part of the word.

And just in case you’re wondering, the word referring to a unit of weight also entered English in the early 14th century, but it comes from the Latin uncia, meaning “one-twelfth part.” (The Troy system of weights has 12 ounces in a pound, instead of the 16 we’re more used to.) The English word “inch” has the same origin.

This snow leopard could also be called an ounce.

And if you have been paying really good attention, you probably noticed that the species name of the snow leopard is uncia, which is the same as “one-twelfth part” in Latin. But that’s not what it means in the snow leopard’s name. There, uncia is a Latinized version of the Old French once. So it’s really a Latinized version of an Old French word that came from Latin.

Confusing, no?

Image credits

Photos via Adobe Stock.

Words with Webster: Primordial Pouch, Plus Friendly Fill-Ins

We have two fun Friday features for you today. First up is Real Cat Webster, who has a poochy word to share. After that, it’s on to Friendly Fill-Ins!

Words with Webster

Hi, everybody! It’s me, Real Cat Webster. Welcome to Words with Me. Today’s word is “primordial pouch.” You know that sort of loose-skin-looking flappy things you might see hanging from your cat’s belly? Those are primordial pouches. Sometimes they’re just called belly pouches, and some people call them “spay sway” because they might be more noticeable after a cat has been spayed or neutered. Spaying or neutering doesn’t cause the pouches, though.

Why do cats have primordial pouches? Well, it could be a defensive thing. Think about all the bunny-kicking cats do when they fight play (or fight). The extra skin gives some protection to all the important stuff inside the cat’s belly. It’s also handy for wild cats who might get to eat a super-size meal once in a while: the pouch lets the stomach expand to hold all that food. This would explain one other term we found used for the pouch: “famine pouch.”

Surprisingly, I couldn’t find “primordial pouch” in the dictionary. I tried looking up “famine pouch” in Merriam-Webster’s online, and the spelling suggestion it gave me was “flaming poppy,” which is really not the same thing.

Anyway, “primordial” is in the dictionary. The Oxford English Dictionary says it means “primitive” (this is the condensed version of the definition). This word is recorded in English from the late 14th century (about 1398). The Online Etymology Dictionary says the word comes from the Late Latin primordialis (“first of all, original”), which came from primus (“first”). We don’t know why people started calling the belly pouch on cats a primordial pouch. Maybe because it seems to be something primitive.

Funny story: Years and years ago (seriously, like almost 30 years ago—deep time), when Mommy first noticed that her cat Darya had spay sway, she thought something must be wrong. So she came up with all kinds of crazy possibilities: Cancer! Poison! Mutation! She can’t remember now how she found out that it was normal, since this was before everyone just googled stuff. Someone must have told her. Back then she really didn’t know much about cats at all!

Look very closely and you'll see the primordial pouch
on this Bengal cat's belly.
Photo via Adobe Stock.

(Sources: “Cat Anatomy,” Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cat_anatomy;  Nicholas DeMarino, “What Is the Primordial Pouch in Cats?” The Nest, https://pets.thenest.com/primordial-pouch-cats-11178.html.)

Friendly Fill-Ins

And now it’s time for Friendly Fill-Ins, from 15andmeowing and McGuffy’s Reader. They are a fun way to learn a little bit about the authors of the blogs you read. The first two questions, answered by Real Cat Paisley this week, are from Ellen of 15andmeowing, and the next two, answered by old SoLT, are from Annie of McGuffy’s Reader.

Real Cat Paisley’s answers:

1. New catnip toys are the best!

2. I love to sleep on the bed in the spare bedroom, ’cause no one really goes in there.

Old SoLT’s answers:

3. When I was a child, I loved to play with all sorts of blocks, especially Legos.

4. One day, I will get to BlogPaws again. I’ve been having serious BlogPaws envy this week!

Words with Webster: Cat Squirrel, Plus Friendly Fill-Ins

We have two fun Friday features for you today. First up is Real Cat Webster, who has a squirrely word to share. After that, it’s on to Friendly Fill-Ins!

Words with Webster

Hi, everybody! It’s me, Real Cat Webster. Welcome to Words with Me. Today’s word is “cat squirrel.” Mommy found this word in the dictionary while she was looking up something else. We never heard of it before that, so we thought it would be a fun word to share. A cat squirrel, according to both Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary and the Oxford English Dictionary, is a common squirrel or an American gray squirrel. Merriam-Webster’s also lists the eastern fox squirrel as a definition.

Cat squirrel, fox squirrel.... Sometimes I wish people would just get their animal names straight, you know?

Anyway, people have been calling one or more kinds of squirrels “cat squirrels” since at least the 19th century. The term first appeared in print in 1826. This quote is from 1855:

The species found in these woods was the large ‘cat-squirrel’ (Sciurus cinereus), one of the noblest of its kind. (M. Reid, Hunters’ Feast xix)

I have promised before to do the word “cat” one day in a post all its own, so I won’t cover it today. “Squirrel” has been around since the early 14th century, according to the Online Etymology Dictionary. It comes from Old French escurueil (“squirrel”), which is from the Latin sciurus and Greek skiouros, and that is a combination of skia (“shadow”) and oura (“tail”). Squirrels create shadows with their tails, I guess.

Aside from their frizzy tails, I don’t think squirrels look a whole lot like cats, so I’m not sure why people called them that. But people are often confused by animals, aren’t they?

Does this look like a cat to you? It is a Delmarva fox squirrel.
Apparently, some people call these and other squirrels "cat squirrels."
Photo by US Fish & Wildlife Service, Northeast Region. Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.

Friendly Fill-Ins

And now it’s time for Friendly Fill-Ins, from 15andmeowing and McGuffy’s Reader. They are a fun way to learn a little bit about the authors of the blogs you read. The first two questions, answered by old SoLT this week, are from Ellen of 15andmeowing, and the next two, answered by Real Cat Paisley, are from Annie of McGuffy’s Reader.

Real Cat Paisley’s answers:

1. Mommy keeps me pretty happy most of the time, although sometimes she could pick out better wet food.

2. Having a full belly and a person’s lap to nap on is the secret to happiness if you’re a cat. If you’re a person, I don’t know what you do. Have a cat sit on your lap, maybe.

Old SoLT’s answers:

3. A friend takes you as you are instead of trying to change or improve you.

4. Right now, I am thankful that spring finally seems to be here. Yay!

Words with Webster: Acromelanism, Plus Friendly Fill-Ins

We have two fun Friday features for you today. First up is Real Cat Webster, who has a hot, cold, and colorful word to share. After that, it’s on to Friendly Fill-Ins!

Words with Webster

Hi, everybody! It’s me, Real Cat Webster. Welcome to Words with Me. Today’s word is “acromelanism.” This word is not in either my favorite dictionary (Merriam-Webster’s) or the Oxford English Dictionary. I found it on The Free Dictionary, though, which gives this definition:

Genetically determined, temperature-dependent pigmentation pattern, with full expression only occurring on legs, ears, tail and face. Seen in Siamese and Himalayan cats, and rabbits. (Saunders Comprehensive Veterinary Dictionary, 3rd ed., 2007)

To understand what acromelanism looks like, just picture a typical Siamese cat (and by the way, today is National Siamese Cat Day, which is why I picked this word). In cats with this color pattern, the fur is darker on parts of the body that are cooler. This creates the classic pattern of light-colored bodies and darker-colored “points” on the ears, face, legs, and tail, as seen in Siamese cats and some other breeds. You can learn a lot more about temperature-sensitive coloring in this article from Catster: “Siamese Cats Are Temperature-Sensitive Ablinos, a.k.a. Walking Heat Maps.”

Since “acromelanism” isn’t in our regular dictionaries, we don’t have any great, or even not-so-great, quotes for you. We don’t have any history for you either. We can tell you that the word is made up of the combining forms “acro-,” which is used in terms “relating to peripheral parts, esp. the extremities of the body” (OED) and “melano,” meaning “dark colored.” Both parts come from Greek forms meaning “highest, topmost, at the extremities” and “black,” respectively. 

Happy National Siamese Cat Day!
This cat is an excellent example of acromelanism because his extremities are dark.
Photo via Adobe Stock.

Friendly Fill-Ins

And now it’s time for Friendly Fill-Ins, from 15andmeowing and McGuffy’s Reader. They are a fun way to learn a little bit about the authors of the blogs you read. The first two questions, answered by old SoLT this week, are from Ellen of 15andmeowing, and the next two, answered by Real Cat Paisley, are from Annie of McGuffy’s Reader.

Old SoLT’s answers:

1. Sunshine is one of my favorite things.  I usually have low energy on cloudy days. Sometimes I actually feel ill when it's cloudy out.

2. I love to see the spring bulbs coming up, even if the weather forecast this weekend is for the dreaded “frozen mix.”

Real Cat Paisley’s answers:

3. I have a hard time waking someone up to feed me in the mornings. It is a real challenge, and I am lucky I get fed at all.

4. Being cute is easy for me.

Words with Webster: To Have Kittens

We have two fun Friday features for you today. First up is Real Cat Webster, who has a slang phrase to share. After that, it’s on to Friendly Fill-Ins!

Words with Webster

Hi, everybody! It’s me, Real Cat Webster. Welcome to Words with Me. Today’s word is a phrase: “to have kittens.” This is a slang term meaning “to be in an agitated mood : become perturbed or upset” (according to my favorite dictionary, Merriam-Webster’s). The Oxford English Dictionary has the first known appearance in print in 1900:

Kitten. In phrases ‘get kittens’, ‘have kittens’. 1. To get angry. 2. To be in great anxiety, or to be afraid. (Dialect Notes 2:44)

But, if it was well known enough to be put in a book in 1900, it must have been in fairly common use before that.

We found one interesting idea of the phrase’s origins from The Phrase Finder site. A post from February 11, 2000, claims that “to have kittens” has much deeper origins, going back to when women actually worried that they might give birth to kittens. An old Scottish superstition said that a woman could have kittens if she ate food that had a cat’s semen on it. (I have to wonder about the conditions that would make that particular scenario believable.) In medieval times, women who felt pain while they were pregnant might believe that it was from kittens inside them trying to get out. Sometimes there’d be a helpful witch around who would provide (or “sell,” more likely) a potion to fix the problem. In 1654 in Scotland, a woman on trial for trying to get an abortion pleaded that she’d done it because she had “cats in her bellie.” (From a post by Joel citing How Did It Begin?, by R. Brasch [1966].)

Photo via Adobe Stock.

A post by Elyse Bruce on Historically Speaking (January 2, 2014) says that the expression is recognized in all English-speaking countries, although it isn’t often heard. P. G. Wodehouse used it in chapter 7 of his 1960 book titled Jeeves in the Offing:

“Your uncle will be most upset.”
“He’ll have kittens.”
“Kittens?”
“That’s right.”
“Why kittens?”
“Why not?”

Bruce also repeats the “cats in her bellie” story, but she adds, “Have kittens is difficult to find in newspapers, magazines and books with the trail going cold right before the turn of the century, in the late 1890s.” She puts the term at about 1900.

How accurate is this saying? Well, a long, long time before I was born, Mommy saw some kittens being born, and she remembers the mother being sort of matter-of-fact about finding a safe, comfy place and just getting down to the business of giving birth and taking care of her babies. She says the mother cat was panting and seemed in pain but she (the cat) was calm. This makes me think that this saying doesn’t come from cats actually having kittens. Then again, some mother cats probably get in a bit of a state when they’re about to have kittens. But I’m a boy, so I don’t really know. If you know, please tell me in the comments, because I am trying to learn more about girls!

Friendly Fill-Ins

And now it’s time for Friendly Fill-Ins, from 15andmeowing and McGuffy’s Reader. They are a fun way to learn a little bit about the authors of the blogs you read. The first two questions, answered by old SoLT this week, are from Ellen of 15andmeowing, and the next two, answered by Real Cat Webster, are from Annie of McGuffy’s Reader.

Old SoLT’s answers:

1. I am the cook in my family.  

2. I have no siblings.

Real Cat Webster’ answers:

3. I am looking forward to window whiffies this Spring.

4. The first sign of Spring this year was snow and sleet. Is that a sign of spring? No? Well, that’s what we got. Mommy says the crocuses started blooming before that, so I guess that is a better sign.