Mr Pussy’s viewing habits

Mr Pussy does not care for Current Affairs, Sport, Reality TV, Quiz Shows, Property Programmes or Drama. All those wonderful HBO series like “Six Feet Under” and “True Blood” pass him by, he was not even interested in “Little Dorritt” last year. Mr Pussy reserves his enthusiasm exclusively for Wildlife Programmes and he is particularly fond of those BBC documentaries narrated by David Attenborough.

I think if he was human, he would invest in one of those big widescreen televisions with a powerful home cinema sound system attached because, as you can see above, it is an entirely immersive experience he is seeking. Something he can only achieve at present by pushing his face up against the screen in order to engage fully with the drama of being right there in the Amazonian jungle with David Attenborough.

It would be easy to draw simple conclusions from the picture above and assume that he could not control his blood lust when he saw the outline of a bird on the screen, implying that he is a creature incapable of transcending his base animal instincts. Anyone making such a judgement would dismiss all David Attenborough’s wildlife documentaries featuring birds as mere feline porn, but to do so would be an unjust assumption, because the picture below tells a different story.

In this picture, you see Mr Pussy watching an enchanting documentary about the secret life of India’s snow tigers that live a reclusive existence high in the mountain ranges of the Himalayas. You cannot say that he is in the grip of a hunting instinct here, though it is clear that he recognises the image upon the screen. The curiosity that he manifests, so characteristic of his species – which in this case is directed towards his own distant relatives who lead larger more heroic, majestic lives – is surely evidence of a capacity for aspiration. For Mr Pussy, as for the rest of us, television is the window to open his eyes to the greater world beyond his immediate domestic existence.