Mao

I've been thinking lately, Mao would be a nice name for a cat.

Of course I didn't just think of this randomly, you see, I used to want to take a minimalist approach to naming my pets. Instead of Spot or Snowball, why not just name them Dog and Cat? It's simple, clean, and efficient. Kind of like no-name brand goods.

I've actually applied this method to pets since then, but I've taken the selfish way out by saving some respect for my own cat, while calling everyone else's pets by their species name. Take Buddy for example, I take immense joy in calling him Dog. "Hey dog, why are ya so scared of me eh?" Very selfish indeed, spoil my own cat and call her Baby while treating all the other animals of the world with detachment.

Well, balance is still maintained in some way, since Mike often refer to my cat simply as 貓, which she has unexpectedly come to understand. Take for example that one time (and I'm sure there are other occasions, but this is the most demonstrative of them all) we're watching TV down stairs. I found it extremely uncommon to have not been annoyed by the constant tinkering of my cat's collar, so I asked Mike, "貓咧？" To both of our surprise, the cat woke up, jumped and landed from wherever she was sleeping (THUMP!), and made her way downstairs!

Back on topic, so I've been thinking, I would name this imaginary cat Mao, from the phonetic pronunciation of the chinese word for cat. What's even better is that there are no intonations in English, and so it would also be a pun. Mao would be a male, a very arrogant but intelligent cat. He would enjoy his afternoons lying prone in the parallelogram of sunlight shaped by a window, perfecting his plan to liberate the proletariat of the world. When he speaks, he will not beg for food or moan at mistreatment. They will be words of wisdom, each sentence will be archived and recited by the many supporters he has (mostly cats, but Mao will also have several human followers. He definitely has that kind of charisma.)

He wouldn't exactly be a nice cat, but who says cats are nice anyways? What he'd be though, he'd be a nice addition to an intellectual household. He'll fit in naturally. Mao the realist. Mao the wise. Mao the cuddly.