{"id":1014,"date":"2022-04-06T15:17:00","date_gmt":"2022-04-06T23:17:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/rightasrainonline.com\/?p=1014"},"modified":"2022-07-16T12:04:37","modified_gmt":"2022-07-16T20:04:37","slug":"oh-mighty-wolf-what-have-we-done","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rightasrainonline.com\/?p=1014","title":{"rendered":"Oh, mighty wolf, what have we done?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

I ask you, have you ever seen a more perfect example of feline beauty?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

This is my nephew\u2019s cat Bebo. He is a rescue cat with no papers, and I think he knows that he is beautiful.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In not-unrelated news, I recently discovered this meme, and have been laughing about it ever since:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Ah, the magic of selective breeding. I don\u2019t know Bebo\u2019s lineage, but I am pretty sure that he is the feline equivalent of a mutt, as, I believe, are most of our healthiest dogs. It doesn\u2019t take close examination to realize that we as a species got hold of a timber wolf and twisted him into unimaginable shapes and sizes and states of ill health. Dachshunds have bad backs, pugs can\u2019t breathe, and any self-respecting Chihuahua is just a sneeze away from having his eyeballs jump right out of their sockets.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It should be easy. I could just gallop up to the moral high ground, climb up on my tiny soapbox and denounce all dog breeders as disciples of Dr. Moreau; I could stubbornly refer to all purebred dogs as misshapen monsters, and I could righteously declare that anyone who would buy a dog when they are so many deserving mutts languishing in lockup is an incurable idiot. But then, I see a pure white German shepherd or a retriever with a curly perm, or my friend\u2019s Pomeranian springs into my lap. . .and suddenly everything gets very, very complicated.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Anyway, we can\u2019t easily undo ten thousand years of messing with Mother Nature. I\u2019m pretty sure it would take another ten thousand years of a hands-off breeding policy for teacup poodles to stop trembling, and once one gets a taste for Siamese cats with ears big enough to catch radio signals, it\u2019s hard to go back. When I look at my friend Bebo, however, I think it might be worth our while to try.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

*****************************************<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For your further edification: <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Island of Dr. Moreau – Audiobook | Listen Instantly! (audiobookstore.com)<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I ask you, have you ever seen a more perfect example of feline beauty? This is my nephew\u2019s cat Bebo. He is a rescue cat with no papers, and I think he knows that he is beautiful. In not-unrelated news, I recently discovered this meme, and have been laughing about it ever since: Ah, the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[383],"tags":[19,457,91],"class_list":["post-1014","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-pets-and-other-wild-animals","tag-cats","tag-dog-breeding","tag-dogs"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rightasrainonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1014","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rightasrainonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rightasrainonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rightasrainonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rightasrainonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1014"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/rightasrainonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1014\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1017,"href":"https:\/\/rightasrainonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1014\/revisions\/1017"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rightasrainonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1014"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rightasrainonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1014"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rightasrainonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1014"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}