“
Cats are the ultimate narcissists. You can tell this by all the time they spend on personal grooming. Dogs aren't like this. A dog's idea of personal grooming is to roll in a dead fish.
”
”
James Gorman
“
Cats have a sort of game they play when they meet. A player alternates between watching the strange cat and ignoring her, grooming or examining everything around herself - a dead leaf, a cloud - with complete absorption. It is almost accidental how the two cats approach, a sidelong step and then the sitting again. This often ends in a flurry of spitting and slashing claws, too fast to see clearly, and then one or the other (or both) of the cats leap out of range. The game can have one exchange or many - and is not so different from the first meetings of women.
”
”
Kij Johnson (Fudoki (Love/War/Death, #2))
“
No, he keeps the schedule of a cat. Long hours of slumber interrupted by brief periods of self-grooming.
”
”
Lisa Kleypas (Cold-Hearted Rake (The Ravenels, #1))
“
Bast had insisted we keep everyone up-to-speed on the regular subjects like math and reading, although she did sometimes add her own elective courses, such as Advanced Cat Grooming, or Napping. There was a waiting list to get into Napping.
”
”
Rick Riordan (The Throne of Fire (Kane Chronicles, #2))
“
Elizabeth recognized that look well. It was the look of a cat circling a birdcage — calm, predatory patience masked by feigned elegance.
”
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Nora Jane Crawford (A Groom Before Christmas : A 'Pride and Prejudice' Novella Variation)
“
You know, it’s hell to work with a cat. They really are smarter than we are. Have you ever gotten anyone to feed you, pay your bills, give you the best chair in the house, tell you how beautiful you are, and groom you daily? Me, neither. Yours,
”
”
Rita Mae Brown (Sour Puss (Mrs. Murphy, #14))
“
Now I take care of animals. I go to their homes while their owners are away and feed them and groom them and play with them. They don't ask a lot of questions or expect much from me, and I don't have to interact with people any more than I choose to. At least most of the time.
”
”
Blaize Clement (Curiosity Killed the Cat Sitter (A Dixie Hemingway Mystery, #1))
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I produced a fulsome sermon. When the appointed Sunday arrived, I used all of my best grooming skills. I picked the cat hairs off my most expensive suit, smoothed my hair, and put a Band-aid on the thumb I had chewed while working overtime on my sermon. Once I met the delegation at church I did my best to dazzle them, and after the service was over we sat for almost two hours in a Sunday School room as I answered question after question about my history, my beliefs, my weaknesses, and my strengths. One man on the committee noticed the Band-aid on my thumb. "What did you do to yourself?" he asked sympathetically. "I cut it while I was cooking, "I lied.
”
”
Barbara Brown Taylor (Leaving Church: A Memoir of Faith)
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Since Madam Conk makes impermissible use of such things as the happenings at Azuma Bridge; since she hires underlings to spy and eavesdrop on us; since she triumphantly retails to all and sundry the products of her espionage; since by the employment of rickshaw-folk, mere grooms, plain rogues, student riff-raff, crone daily-help, midwives, witches, masseurs, and other trouble-makers she seeks to trouble a man of talent; for all these reasons even a cat must do what can be done to prevent her getting away with it.
”
”
Natsume Sōseki (I Am A Cat (Tuttle Classics))
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BY THE TIME SHE WAS EIGHT, MACKENSIE ELLIOT HAD BEEN married fourteen times. She’d married each of her three best friends—as both bride and groom—her best friend’s brother (under his protest), two dogs, three cats, and a rabbit. She’d served at countless other weddings as maid of honor, bridesmaid, groomsman, best man, and officiant.
”
”
Nora Roberts (Vision in White (Bride Quartet, #1))
“
The remainder of my estate, including twenty-two percent of Barrington Shipping, as well as the Manor House—” Mr. Siddons couldn’t resist a glance in the direction of Lady Virginia Fenwick, who was sitting on the edge of her seat—“is to be left to my beloved … daughters Emma and Grace, to dispose of as they see fit, with the exception of my Siamese cat, Cleopatra, who I leave to Lady Virginia Fenwick, because they have so much in common. They are both beautiful, well-groomed, vain, cunning, manipulative predators, who assume that everyone else was put on earth to serve them, including my besotted son, who I can only pray will break from the spell she has cast on him before it is too late.
”
”
Jeffrey Archer (Best Kept Secret (The Clifton Chronicles, #3))
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Alone in her anxieties and insecurities, alone in the tyranny of her mind, but also simply, literally, physically alone, her only companion an oversized, paraplegic cat who dragged himself around the apartment like a mythological creature, his front half leonine and furry, his hindquarters shaved bald, for he no longer had the flexibility to groom them.
”
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Joanna Rakoff (My Salinger Year: A Memoir)
“
Alex decided the stakes were high enough to justify one of his advanced psychological theories. He knew all women liked cats. People liked things that resembled themselves. Therefore applying some of the rules for interacting with cats to the reality of interacting with women could only help.
Most rules were straightforward:
• Admire their grace.
• Don’t interrupt them when they’re grooming.
• Back off if they hiss.
”
”
Karl Drinkwater (Cold Fusion 2000)
“
Tarquin himself was too busy to notice our entrance. He stood with his back to us, at the information desk, yelling at the bookshop cat.
'Answer me, beast!' the king screamed. 'Where are the Books?'
Aristophanes sat on the desk, one leg straight up in the air, calmly licking his nether regions - which, last I checked, was considered impolite in the presence of royalty.
'I will destroy you!' Tarquin said.
The cat looked up briefly, hissed, then returned to his personal grooming.
”
”
Rick Riordan (The Tyrant’s Tomb (The Trials of Apollo, #4))
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Within, a cheerful bustle in the bar announced the near arrival of opening time. Eight ducks crossed the road in Indian file. A cat sprang up upon the bench, stretched herself, tucked her hind legs under her and coiled her tail tightly round them as though to prevent them from accidentally working loose. A groom passed, riding a tall bay horse and leading a chestnut with a hogged mane; a spaniel followed them, running ridiculously, with one ear flopped inside-out over his foolish head.
”
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Dorothy L. Sayers (The Lord Peter Wimsey Mysteries Volume One: Whose Body?, Clouds of Witness, and Unnatural Death)
“
The cat paused. :What always happens when religion goes to the bad?: the cat replied, and resumed his grooming. :Power. The love of power overcomes the love of the gods. Priests stop listening for the voice in their hearts and souls—which is very, very hard to hear even at the best of times—and start to listen only to what they wish to hear or to the voice of their own selfish desires. Priests begin to believe that they, and not the gods, are the real authorities. Priests confine broad truths into narrow doctrines, because more rules mean that they have more power. Priests mistake their own prejudice for conscience and mistake what they personally fear for what should universally be feared. Priests look inward to their own small souls and try to impress that smallness on the world, when they should be looking at the greatness of the universe and trying to impress that upon their souls. Priests forget they owe everything to their gods and begin to think the world owes everything to them . . . : the cat stopped, and shook his head. :Power is a poison. Priests should know better than to indulge in it.
”
”
Mercedes Lackey (Redoubt (Valdemar: Collegium Chronicles, #4))
“
Without warning, a smooth voice spoke next to her ear- a woman's voice with an American accent. "You're nothing but a skinny, awkward child, just as he described. He's visited me since the wedding, you know. He and I have laughed together over your juvenile infatuation with him. You bore him senseless."
Pandora turned and found herself confronted by Mrs. Nola Black. The woman was breathtaking, her features creamy-skinned and flawless, her eyes deep and dark under brows so perfectly groomed and delineated, they looked like thin strips of velvet. Although Mrs. Black was approximately the same height as Pandora, her figure was a remarkable hourglass shape, with a waist so small one could have buckled a cat's collar around it.
"That's nothing but bitchful thinking," Pandora said calmly. "He hasn't visited you, or he would have told me."
Mrs. Black was clearly "picking for a fight," as Winterborne would have put it. "He'll never be faithful to you. Everyone knows you're a peculiar girl who tricked him into marriage. He appreciates novelty, to be sure, but it will wear off, and then he'll send you packing to some remote country house."
Pandora was filled with a confusing mixture of feelings. Jealousy, because this woman had known Gabriel intimately, and had meant something to him... and antagonism, but also a stirring of pity, because there was something wounded in the biting darkness of her eyes. Behind the stunning façade, she was a savagely unhappy woman.
"I'm sure you think that's what I should fear," Pandora said, "but I actually don't worry about that at all. I didn't trick him, by the way." She paused before adding, "I'll admit to being peculiar. But he seems to like that.
”
”
Lisa Kleypas (Devil in Spring (The Ravenels, #3))
“
On a quiet day, when the wind was still, the creek could be heard all the way up to where the old beech stood. Under its branches, cats would come to dream and be dreamed. Black cats and calicos, white cats and marmalade ones, too. Sometimes they exchanged gossip or told stories about L'il Pater, the trickster cat. More often they lay in a drowsy circle around the fat trunk of the ancient beech that spread its boughs above them. Then one of them might tell a story of the old and powerful Father of Cats, and though the sun might still be high and the day warm, they would shiver and groom themselves with nervous tongues.
But they hadn't yet gathered on the day the orphan girl fell asleep among the beech's roots, nestling in the weeds and long grass like the gangly, tousle-haired girl she was.
Her name was Lillian Kindred.
”
”
Charles de Lint (The Cats of Tanglewood Forest (Newford, #18))
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I should not have stooped to her level but the opportunity was irresistible. 'Did you buy a new gown or will you be wearing the one from your last almost-wedding?' I asked. 'After all, it was barely used.'
Dad strangled a chuckle. Chip blanched, no doubt remembering the groom left standing at the altar and wondering if he’d suffer the same fate. Cat’s eyes widened and she gasped.
'I’ll be wearing a new dress for the most important day of my life.' she said stiffly, her eyes shooting bullets. 'That one was white. This one will be black. They’re as different as night and day.' If looks could kill, I’d be flat on the floor." Cinnamon Greene, from The Bride Wore Black
”
”
Bonnie J. Cardone
“
Cats’ source of Mojo is unquestioned ownership of their territory and having an important job to do within that territory. That job is a biological imperative that cats inherited from their wildcat ancestors, and I call it: Hunt, Catch, Kill, Eat, Groom, Sleep.
”
”
Jackson Galaxy (Total Cat Mojo: The Ultimate Guide to Life with Your Cat)
“
Just as the globus pallidus fixes various body parts in particular positions, so does the striate body initiate and monitor many stereotyped movements. Cats and dogs and horses and pigs all graze and chew, prick up their ears at a new sound, coordinate various gaits, and so on. Humans also share a wide range of stereotyped movements, similar in their features because they are designed to accomplish the same things for each individual. And further, we have noted that although both dogs and cats do many similar things—sitting, walking, drinking, jumping, grooming, and the like—they each do them in distinctly canine or feline ways. Every species has a way of doing the normal tasks of living, a manner of movement that is peculiar to it. A good mime can represent “cat” or “mouse,” or “horse,” or “ape” with a brief imitation of these animals’ manner of movement just as effectively as he could with an elaborate costume. These too are stereotypes of movement. The striate body seems to control a wide range of such movements—individual movements that have common utility, movements which continually correct our balance, movements which are the synchronized background motions’ that necessarily accompany the use of a limb, or movements which establish such standard communications as sexual arousal, docility, fear, anger, or defensiveness. As with fixed positions, in the human being both the repertoire of stereotyped movements and the stereotyped manner in which all movements are done may markedly display habitual preferences built up by compulsions, training, job requirements, and dispositions. And as with chronic fixations, there is the tendency over long periods of repetition to confuse how I do things with who I am. My most common movements, designed to be controlled by my unconscious mind so that I can freely direct my attention elsewhere, become more than stereotypes; they become straight jackets, and I find myself the prisoner of the very unconscious processes which are supposed to protect and liberate me. Re-establishing for the individual the sense of a wide array of equally possible movements is the real significance behind the work of freeing a person from limited neuromuscular patterns.
”
”
Deane Juhan (Job's Body: A Handbook for Bodywork)
“
Although the once-thriving city is now in ruins, the marble bones tell marvelous stories. We see elegant carvings and dramatic columns and streets and courtyards paved in mosaic tiles. We see the remnants of baths and public toilets. And everywhere among the ruins are sweet, plump cats … stretching out in the sun on slabs of ancient marble, or grooming themselves atop marble posts or broken marble columns or posing like professional models.
”
”
Al Lockwood (Cruising the Mediterranean)
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Cats groomed daily as kittens learn to expect and relish
”
”
Amy Shojai (Complete Kitten Care)
“
Ugh. Reeeeowl." He swore in cat and Faerie tongue and set to grooming his bedraggled tail. "My coat is ruined. My life is over.
”
”
Anne Elisabeth Stengl (Starflower (Tales of Goldstone Wood, #4))
“
have never had a poodle but I know that they are very special dogs. People who have poodles are crazy about them and often have more than one! My friend Annie loves her two black miniature poodles, Oggi and Pearl. They are so smart and funny and they love to curl up in your lap just like a cat would. And my friend Leda has two golden doodles, Pippa and Pogo. They love to play together. Even though they are only half poodle (the other half is golden retriever), they have to be groomed every ten weeks, just like poodles do. Yours from the Puppy Place, Ellen Miles P.S.
”
”
Ellen Miles (Sweetie (The Puppy Place, #18))
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Then, in 2018, researchers gathered three more observed cases of what might as well be called bonobo midwifery—this time in captivity, where observations were naturally easier (the bonobos were used to human beings being around, and the location of the births were more predictable and visible). In each case, other females gathered around the laboring bonobo, grooming her and standing guard. In a couple of cases, females even cupped their paws under the newborn as it came out of the mother, and again they all shared a bit of placenta as a bloody reward. This is, as the researchers note, entirely unlike the behavior of the chimpanzee, whether in the wild or in captivity, most likely—they plainly note—because chimpanzee society is male dominated, whereas bonobo society has strong female coalitions and is female dominated.
”
”
Cat Bohannon (Eve: How the Female Body Drove 200 Million Years of Human Evolution)
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How did the muskrat discover our composter in the first place? Chased there by a predator scare, a waft of citrus scent carried to the creek by the evening thermal, or some adventurous urge to journey beyond the safety of the creek? The latter, admittedly anthropomorphic possibility appeals to me. While it’s important not to get so far into such projections of human qualities into non-human realities that they begin to masquerade as fact, it’s equally important to recognize that they provide openings for affection not unlike those that enable our affections for fellow human beings. Drawn into closer observation of the small details of muskrat behavior, the hand-like deftness of their front paws, their cat-like grooming, the contrast between their nervousness on land and their confident ease in the water, I quickly realized that I’d been observing more than one, perhaps several, individuals. I looked upon them with growing affection, with friendship.
”
”
Reg Darling (Boondock Politics)
“
You can’t seriously expect me to trust my mane to a woman?”
Sexism, alive and well in Arik’s world, the fault of the females in his pride who’d raised him. No coddling for Arik. They didn’t believe in letting him play with dolls or caving to others. His mother and aunts, not to mention his numerous female cousins, had taught him to be tough. They didn’t allow softness in his world, not when they groomed him as the future leader of their pride. He was all male, all the time, and dammit, a man used a barber, not a hairdresser.
Even if she was cute.
“Suit yourself. I’ve got more than enough men to take care of—”
Was that his cat growling?
“— without adding a pompous one to the list.”
“Pompous?” Even if she’d pegged him right, it didn’t stop his indignant glare.
A glare she chose to ignore.
She crossed her arms over her chest, plumping her cleavage— ooh, pretty, shadowy cleft.
His curious nature drew his eyes to the mysterious and beckoning vee until she cleared her throat.
“My eyes are up here, big guy.”
Caught.
Good thing he was a cat. His kind had no shame, nor did they apologize.
He shot her his most engaging, boyish grin. “My name is Arik. Arik Castiglione.”
She didn’t react to his smile or titles, so he elaborated, “The CEO for Castiglione Enterprises.”
He stretched his lips wide enough to engage his deadly dimple.
And still failed to impress.
She raised a brow. “Is that supposed to mean something?”
Surely she jested. Within his mind, his poor lion lay down in a traumatized heap and crossed its paws over its eyes.
“We are the largest importer of meat in the world.”
Her shoulders lifted in a shrug. “I don’t check the label to see who brings me my steak. I just eat it.”
“What about our chain of restaurants? A Lion’s Pride Steakhouses.”
“Those I’ve heard of. Decent, I hear, but overpriced. I can get a bigger plate of food at LongHorn. And according to my girlfriends, the male waiters are cuter too.
”
”
Eve Langlais (When an Alpha Purrs (A Lion's Pride, #1))
“
One large cat bounded up the side of the outcrop to stand in full view on an overhanging boulder. She stared down at them, inside their protective enclosure, tilting her head from side to side. Her scarred yellow-brown coat was immaculately groomed, but the long tufting hair of her snout was matted with the bright red smear of uncongealed blood from a recent kill. Her upper lip curved over the top of foot-long saber teeth.
”
”
P.J. Parker (America Túwaqachi: The Saga of an American Family)
Cat Cahill (A Groom for Josie (The Blizzard Brides, #24))
“
Prince Severin happened to be pacing in the little hall when the stained-glass skylight shattered, and a young woman fell through the ceiling with the broken glass. She dropped like a twisting cat and landed with an ominous crack. The handful of chateau servants that had been hovering around him slapped their hands to their masked faces, their mouths dropping open in screams that couldn’t tear loose from their throats. Severin flexed his paw-like hands, drawing his claws as the servants scurried towards the girl. A footman and one of the grooms reached her first. She was passably pretty, but plain, wearing the muted colors of a villager. Her breathing was ragged, and her face tight with pain. The groom tried to roll her onto her side. “No!” she screamed. The footman and
”
”
K.M. Shea (Beauty and the Beast (Timeless Fairy Tales, #1))
“
I’d like to see the grounds,” he said. “Will you walk with me?”
Looking perturbed, Kathleen retreated a half step. “I’ll arrange for the head gardener to show them to you.”
“I would prefer you.” Devon paused before asking deliberately, “You’re not afraid of me, are you?”
Her brows rushed downward. “Certainly not.”
“Then walk with me.”
Ignoring his proffered arm, she slid him a wary glance. “Shall we invite your brother?”
Devon shook his head. “He’s napping.”
“At this hour of the day? Is he ill?”
“No, he keeps the schedule of a cat. Long hours of slumber interrupted by brief periods of self-grooming.”
He saw the corners of her lips deepen with reluctant amusement. “Come, then,” she murmured, brushing by him to walk briskly along the hallway, and he followed without hesitation.
”
”
Lisa Kleypas (Cold-Hearted Rake (The Ravenels, #1))
“
Shall we invite your brother?”
Devon shook his head. “He’s napping.”
“At this hour of the day? Is he ill?”
“No, he keeps the schedule of a cat. Long hours of slumber interrupted by brief periods of self-grooming.
”
”
Lisa Kleypas (Cold-Hearted Rake (The Ravenels, #1))
“
Shadowpaw craned his neck over his back, straining to groom the hard-to-reach spot at the base of his tail. He had just managed to give his fur a few vigorous licks when he heard paw steps approaching. He looked up to see his father, Tiger star, and his mother, Dovewing, their pelts brushing as they gazed down at him with pride and joy shining in their eyes. “What is it?” he asked, sitting up and giving his pelt a shake. “We just came to see you off,” Tiger star responded, while Dovewing gave her son’s ears a quick, affectionate lick. Shadowpaw’s fur prickled with embarrassment. Like I haven’t been to the Moonpool before, he thought. They’re still treating me as if I’m a kit in the nursery! He was sure that his parents hadn’t made such a fuss when his littermates, Pouncestep and Lightleap, had been warrior apprentices. I guess it’s because I’m going to be a medicine cat.
”
”
Erin Hunter (Bravelands: The Spirit-Eaters (Bravelands, #5))
“
she told the girl that in some places it was customary for the groom to bring the cat to his newly wed bride on their wedding night and kill it with his bare hands to demonstrate to his wife his supremacy, to teach her to fear him.
”
”
Pajtim Statovci (My Cat Yugoslavia)
“
I can’t cross my legs like you can,” I said. “And I can’t sit for that long without sleeping or needing to groom myself.
”
”
Chris Behrsin (A Cat's Guide to Saving the Kingdom (Dragoncat #3))