Editor’s note: Every once in a while, “Rhymes With Orange” cartoonist Hilary Price sends us a photo of her cat, Tom, getting between her and her morning news. Apparently, she’s not the only one with a cat that likes to curl up on the paper. So, we’re inviting readers to submit photos and captions about their “Cats of the Gazette” to newsroom@gazettenet.com for a chance to be featured in future pages.
I am weeding my garden this past weekend when my neighbor comes over to confess: He feeds Tom wet food. I think of the expensive diet kibble in my pantry. I tell my neighbor the vet’s warning — Tom needs to trim down. My neighbor says, “How about half a can then?” We negotiate down to two spoonfuls. I do not tell my neighbor the vet’s latest suggestion — throwing treats down the hall to get him moving. “Go long,” I imagine the neighbor shouting as he hurls a pound of salmon across his backyard. (Maybe now, with the agreed-on austerity measures, it’s just half a pound.)
This is the second neighbor this year who’s come clean … but it’s a big neighborhood.
So how does my cat inform my cartoon, and why does he plant himself on my newspaper? Because he brings chaos to order, which makes funny things happen.
He is the answer to the joke, “Where does a 15-pound orange cat sit? … Wherever he wants.”
Hilary Price is a cartoonist, speaker and educator. She has been writing and drawing “Rhymes With Orange,” her award-winning daily newspaper comic strip, since 1995.