The cat distribution system strikes when you least expect it! 

Like when you're sitting by the poolside on vacation with your family in Puerto Rico. They were minding their own business at the hotel, when this void kitten was hanging out next to them. She was really friendly towards them and was there for half an hour. The following evening, they went back and saw her again. They decided to call a local rescue, and the rescue told them that they'd drop off a carrier at the hotel so that the couple could take the kitten home. They caught the kitten themselves with a can of wet food and waited for someone from the rescue to take her. They got her to the vet and gave her everything she needed there. Then it was easy: just buy her a plane ticket back home! She's a year old now, and has a brother. Something really quirky about her is that her tail is freakishly long. Read the full story below, and remember that the cat distribution system doesn't care whether you're on family vacation, in the middle of a crisis, or living your best life. Enjoy! 

Is a former colleague a reference that is as appropriate as a manager?

Switching jobs is often a challenging process on many levels, and even more so when somebody doesn't leave their previous employment on good terms.  Applying and interviewing are a chore no matter how high you get in a career, and usually, companies expect other people to vouch for your credibility as well. 

This means that the ideal conditions for leaving a job are a well-thought-out resignation and maintaining decent working relationships with former colleagues. Nobody wants to get as far as securing a shiny new position and then realizing that their former employer has taken the chance away because of what they have to say about their work ethic.

With all the stress that comes from job searching, it is easy to look at references as an afterthought, just a little something to allow a new workplace to double-check they are making a good decision. However, they are a necessity for many positions, and not being able to produce adequate proof of them can be a problem. Even if somebody aces the interviews and has a glowing resume, they also need to be a trustworthy hire.

 

 

 

No cat is left behind!

I love a daring cat rescue story on any day of the week. Not all adopted cats get their heroic tale, but others, like Baby the cat, could probably tell with her purrs and meows about how she was rescued from raging dogs of a neighbor, chased into a rusty shed. I hate hearing about cats chased by dogs - like, control your hecking dogs, dog owners. No cat deserves to be chased by a potential predator like that. Cats deserve love, comfort, and a forever home. I'd say "change mind", but on this matter - you can't.

Look. I'm not saying that all dogs do that. My cat met plenty of dogs who came to visit us with their humans, who just wanted to be her friends. One Shih Tzu even brought her his favorite toy over and over again. It's not the dogs' fault that my cat is afraid of them, regardless. But you just can't deny that sometimes, sometimes, dogs pose a real danger to cats. And this is what I don't like seeing. But luckily for this one cat below, Baby, she was rescued. And after two whole years, this cat is thriving. I always love seeing a cat thriving in their forever home.

Robotic behaviour is not the same as effective behavior

We thought we had to worry about robots becoming more like people, but it turns out we have to worry about people becoming more and more like robots. I will never understand how some people will literally avoid doing anything they weren't specifically told to do, even if that thing would potentially help somebody else and/or avoid a bigger issue.

At our workplaces, we have to be a little more careful about what we say, but that doesn't mean we should avoid getting involved in anything that's not specified in our contracts. This is precisely why we still need to hire people instead of robots; we can trust other humans to have the flexibility to see something is going wrong and step in, even if it's not their job.

This employee could've definitely stopped this issue sooner, but we all make mistakes, and I think he still has the chance to make amends. But do we really think HR should get their way, collect the extra money they wrongfully gave to this person, and leave it at that? Or should they also 'pay the price' somehow for what they did?

There are many sides to raising a cat at home, but the sass that comes with this experience is undeniable. And definitely part of why we love them so much.

Some people experience an extreme level of sass from their cats. I feel like my cat can be sassy sometimes, because she's the literal princess of the house. But some stories I hear from my fellow cat pawrents make me doubt if my cat could be described as "sassy" at all. I mean, sure, she will not leave me alone if I dare eat chicken and not share (to the point of her sending her tiny paws into my plate), but my friends with cats tell some very different stories:

1. My friend Marissa tells me that her cat, Biscuit, has developed a full-blown vendetta against her alarm clock. Every single morning, precisely three minutes before it goes off, Biscuit plants himself directly on Marissa's chest and stares at her face, unblinking, until she wakes up on her own. If she dares hit snooze, he responds by knocking her phone off the nightstand - not out of malice, she insists, but pure principle. "He's not trying to hurt it, he's making a statement". Apparently the statement is: "I decide when breakfast happens, not some beeping little box".
2. My friend Dev tells me that his cat, Olive, refuses to drink water from her actual bowl on philosophical grounds nobody in the house understands. Instead, she waits - patiently, dramatically - for someone to leave a glass unattended, then marches over and drinks from that instead, maintaining aggressive eye contact the entire time as if daring you to object. Dev's bought her fountains, fancy filtered bowls, even a whole ceramic dish shaped like a fish. Olive looked at each one, then walked directly past it to sip from his roommate's abandoned iced coffee. Some cats just enjoy chaos as a lifestyle.
3. My friend Kayla tells me that her cat, Theodore, has strong feelings about closed doors, namely that they shouldn't exist. If Kayla dares shut the bathroom door for even a second of privacy, Theodore parks himself directly outside and yowls like he's being personally betrayed by the architecture of the house. The moment the door opens, though? He saunters in slowly, sniffs the air once, and walks right back out, completely uninterested, as if to say the whole ordeal was never actually about getting in - it was about making sure Kayla knew who's really in charge here.

Sometimes we do our best, and it's still not enough

We're wired to believe more effort equals better performance, but sadly, it doesn't always work like that. Thankfully, we've got managers who look at us with kindness and think about rewarding our efforts, not only our performance.

This is an interesting moral debate for me. I don't like to imagine a world where our efforts are never taken into consideration. I think being a hard worker is a virtue in and of itself, and it is a virtue that can be valuable to a company. I'm glad there is someone in that company who believes in that as well.And before that, we need to be told that our efforts are not being fruitful; to me, the key is to always give people the chance to get better at something. Maybe this manager wasn't very efective in helping him, and that's why he always ends up doing his employee's work for him.

Evidently, the hard-working employee hasn't realized things aren't going well for him, or maybe he has, and that's why he is making such a big effort. In any case, this situation warrants an urgent conversation.

If every opportunity we got demanded our best output, and our best output only, there would never be any room for improvement; we need many failures before we succeed.

Are we responsible for other people's children?

The short answer is: no. Parents alone are responsible for their children, and that involves education, time, recreation, health and money. Yet, sometimes parents seem to forget that not everybody out there has children, and that no one but them is responsible for those kids, even if they are a bit older. The rest of the people around them can be a big help, especially with younger kids. But even when they do it gladly, they don't replace the parents, nor should they take responsibility for them. 

That can be a source of friction with people, especially between family. Since we're all related, the boundaries between what relatives do out of the goodness of their hearts and what the parents see as an obligation for them can be a bit blurry. Aunts and uncles might be expected to act as substitute parents, or accept their sibling's children as their own. While the bond between nieces and nephews and their aunts and uncles can be beautiful and very close, those aunts and uncles still have lives of their own, outside of those children that are not theirs. They can give gifts, watch them from time to time when their parents have their hands full, be there to support them, take them out, and such, but they are not the parents. They can offer to give as much as they want, but the parents should never expect their siblings to take charge of their kids.

A woman on r/AITH shared that her sister doesn't always understand boundaries. She had organized a weekend trip for both of them, plus two close friends, and split the cost of the stay between the four. On the day of the trip, the sister showed up with a fifth person, her sixteen-year-old daughter. The girl ate most of the food they had bought, and the women spent the whole trip revolving around the girl's schedule. Her mother never told any of them she was planning on bringing her, and just assumed it would be fine. Her sister disagreed and asked her to pay the equivalent for the girl's stay, since she was a fifth person not meant to be there in the first place. Now, the girl and her mother seem to be offended by the aunt and are telling people that "she only cares about money."

What do you think? Was it alright for the aunt to ask for the money for her niece's stay? 

When the summer sun is pounding down upon you and you simply cannot carry on there is only one thing that can refresh your wrecked retinas, and that is these zesty orange cat memes. Designed to put some zip, pop and pep in your step.

Now yes, we know this is not the usual tact that one might take when trying to boost the mood of feline fans, but hear us out here. Much in the same way that your favorite refreshing sports beverage uses sharp flavors to set your palate alight and wake you up, so we will be using the striking sass of feline kind to get you back to your normal self. After all, the summer sun has been beating us down harder than usual and with all that extra energy going to recovery our brains can start to feel more than a little boggy.

So no matter how hard it has been to get to this point in the day, rest assured that you will come out the other end of this list refresh and reenergized ready to enjoy a little more weekend fun. Now put your sassy hats on and get ready for a wild and wacky ride into the world of this hilarious and savage feline who does not take any guff from anyone. 
 

It is not often that the initial rescuer, the first snout on the scene if you will as a dog and not a hooman. But that is very much the case in this story where a very large dog has the golden opportunity to show just how loving he is by saving the life of a seriously smol kitten.

If we had not seen this story for ourselves we would not have believed it to be true, it is just that much like a movie. It has all the twists and turns that a dramatic box office hit requires while also being a coming of age story where opposites attract and come together to make something beautiful and ultimately save a life. And the fact that none of this would have happened if it weren't for the Big Friendly Doggo (BFD) if you will, that sniffed out the smol kitten in the first place, is simply sublime.

Much like in the Roald Dahl classic the Big Friendly Giant, our canine colossus takes pity upon the poor innocent kitten he had stumbled upon while out for walkies one day. After sniffing out the sweet creature it dutifully alerted it's mom who quickly scooped up the kitten and rushed it to the vet. Suspecting the kitten might be fading she took no chances, but the vet assured her that while the kitten was weak it was in fact fine and would make a full recovery with some food and water. Once home, the true love story begins between Duke and Chopper.
 

Working hours have an end, which is fixed and cannot be changed just because some boss wants to exploit their employees.

Being an employee is really hard, especially if you have to put up with an annoying boss who takes pride in pushing you over your working hours, micromanaging you, and ignoring your complaints and recommendations. We can use a thousand tips to make the situation better, but the truth is, there is no out till you resign or you change bosses. So really, it isn't particularly in your power how your manager treats you. Of course you could always get the law involved as you are working extra hours for free, but it will most likely just categorize you as a difficult employee, which is worse.

So what can the person in this story do? Nothing? Well, she could try to do a quick checkup at 4:30 so she could leave on time, or maybe she could express the issues to human resources in the hope that they would fix it. But really, nothing guarantees that this toxic workspace will change into a good one, because the toxic part is just the boss. So she can only really hope that her manager lives or that she finds a new job where the environment is different.

There is actually no certain way to be sure that a workspace isn't toxic till you are a part of it. So what do other people do to know that they won't be miserable at their job? Accept their fate? Work remotely? Be your own boss? I'm actually curious how employees manage to know this information beforehand or how they fix the environment once they are already a part of the company. How can we change something like this? Is the toxic aspect really just the manager of this office? Do we just look forward to escalating the career ladder to avoid having bosses? I really don't know how to help this girl. It seems like she's deemed, and she just has to accept it or leave. 

Beware of one brain cell orange…beware! 

They really will get you. They have a one brain cell mind of their own, and they might trick you into thinking something's wrong when all is well. That's exactly what happens in this story, when after six months of using his automatic litter box, a silly orange decides he will help the litter box in it's disposal. He didn't realize before that there's a delay from the litter box after the cat uses it, and takes the clump and breaks it up before disposing of it. The one brain cell orange realizes this and thinks, "I should help out." So he decides to hop back in the litter box and break up the clumps himself so it's easier for the litter box to take care of. This is a selfless and sweet gesture for the cat, and also incredibly silly and stupid. This cat, named Romeo, concerns his owner when the cat dad sees that the clumps are different sizes. He calls the vet immediately and they tell him he needs to go to the ER. 

Concerned and afraid, they go. Any pet pawrent knows that pets are not cheap. After several checks, tests, and procedures, the vet claims there's nothing wrong with him. And after further observation, he actually witnesses Romeo doing this, so he has an explanation for the clumps. There's actually nothing better than when extreme worry turns into relief, but now he's out almost 1k. Read the hilarious and wholesome story below, and remember that they really do have just one brain cell, so you don't have to take everything they do so seriously. 

Their idea of fun is making you clean your whole apartment of paper towels shredded everywhere after you just cleaned your apartment. 

No matter where you are in the world, it's the season for celebrations and cutesy commemorations. Regardless of your gender, religion, or language, people are getting into the New Year, some with twinkling lights, decadent desserts, with fasting and some with feasting. Good thing cats don't have a religion to follow, they're just along for the ride! Our feline friends are more aware than we think. The news bombards us with tragedies and calamities all day long, touching our hearts with images of car accidents, protests, or celebrity drama that only pulls at our heart strings. But where does the bad news end? It ends here, in this collection of feel-good feline friendly photos of rescue cats post adoption. These parents of street cats are heroes to society, and through their generous undertaking give us reason to feel proud of humanity today. 

Before, these cats were society's strays, hoping to find some half eaten fish in a garbage bin. And now, they've gone from gaunt to corpulent, from sad to happy, and from longing to loving. Let's take this time to congratulate the cats who have made it from rags to riches. For all the homeless, vagrant, nomadic cats to homey, cozy, wealthy, and healthy. Enjoy these hilarious cat memes to properly enjoy the chaos of the weekend. Cats will always be capricious, chaotic, and mischievous, we might as well enjoy the fun!

Another story about influencers: of course, they are demanding something for free and throwing a tantrum over nothing.

If we mention influencers, you know that they will appear entitled and demanding something, as if it were their signature. If they complain, you know they are going to post about it on social media, or at least threaten to do so. Do businesses even benefit from them still? It seems as if they have created such a negative image that people are always feeling uncomfortable working with them. But the truth is, they still get work. Some companies trust them, and they do bring clients. But not these unknown local ones. These ones only make messes and scenes.

Cats never seem to stop and think, "Maybe this is a bad idea."

They see a glass sitting near the edge of the table and give it a little tap. They spot an open cabinet and decide they need to climb inside. They hear a strange noise in the next room and come flying around the corner like it's the most important investigation of their lives. Every questionable decision starts with one curious paw.

Living with a cat means accepting that something unexpected is probably going to happen every day. A pen disappears. A roll of toilet paper gets shredded. A houseplant suddenly has bite marks. The evidence is usually scattered all over the floor, while the furry culprit sits nearby looking completely unbothered.

The impressive part is the confidence. Cats never hesitate before making a questionable choice. If they think they can jump onto the top shelf, they're going to try. If there's a tiny gap behind the couch, they're squeezing through it. Whether the plan actually works out is a problem for later.

Cat pawrents know the routine by heart. You hear a loud crash from another room, take one deep breath, and already know who's responsible before you even get up to look. Half the time, the guilty party is still sitting there, staring at the mess like they're just as surprised as everyone else.

Maybe that's why cats are so entertaining. They don't spend much time worrying about consequences. They see an opportunity, follow their curiosity, and let the rest sort itself out. It may leave a trail of knocked-over decorations, missing socks, and mysterious chaos behind them, but life would be a whole lot quieter without their wonderfully terrible ideas.

Should one uncomfortable wedding dinner erase a $5,000 debt that's been ignored for over a year?

Helping an unemployed partner pay rent seemed like the right thing to do, until the relationship ended and the promised repayment never came. Now, with a mutual friend's wedding forcing the exes to share a table, everyone is urging the lender to "be cool" and keep the peace, despite the unresolved $5,000 hanging over the celebration.

Sometimes I don't understand people's behavior. I don't know if it's the money side of it that puts people in weird attitudes since the topic is uncomfortable, or maybe it's that people don't know how to handle money situations. But this story surprised me because a person who owes another a lot of cash asked them to pretend nothing is happening.

I do understand that the OP loaned the money because the situation was tight and his ex needed help. I actually would've done the same thing if it were my boyfriend who needed some assistance. I like how they talked about it not being a gift, so the person was aware that he should give the money back once they were back on their feet. And they absolutely did, although the relationship was over by that time.

It doesn't matter how the bond you have with someone changes when there're money problems involved: the issue here is that they all have to be careful and be mindful when requesting a loan they won't pay back. And the worst part of all is that this person is living their best life, travelling and buying expensive things, knowing they owe their ex $5000. I just cannot cope with the fact that they cannot keep a promise.

Some people bring home office supplies from work. This family somehow came home with two kittens instead.

The workday started with an unexpected surprise when three friendly little void kittens were found hanging around the office courtyard. They were comfortable around people from the start, making everyone suspect they hadn't been born outside. Before long, the entire office was stopping by to say hello, including one very excited 9-year-old who had already started campaigning to take them home.

The original plan had been to wait another year before adding kittens to the family. They already had two young cats at home and were still missing the senior cat they had lost last October. Then the Cat Distribution System stepped in and moved the timeline up a little.

As coworkers started falling in love with the kittens, one was adopted almost immediately. Another coworker considered taking a second, but that raised a bigger question. Nobody wanted to separate a bonded pair. Instead of watching the siblings go their separate ways, the family decided to bring both remaining kittens home together.

Finding homes for stray kittens is already a happy ending, but knowing two siblings get to grow up side by side makes it even better. They'll have a familiar face while they settle into a new house, explore every corner together, and probably team up for plenty of kitten-sized trouble.

For now, the pair is settling into a quarantine room while they adjust to indoor life, and the naming process is still underway. Temporary names like Midnight and Star Destroyer are already setting a pretty high bar.

Some deliveries show up in cardboard boxes. Others arrive in an office courtyard and completely change the rest of the workday.

If your partner tells you that it's either them or the cat… the choice is pretty obvious. 

We always tell people that pets are something that they have to discuss early on in the relationship, especially when one or both of them already have pets. Some people are just not cat people, as hard as it may be to believe. It's important for your cat to like your partner, but it's more than important for your partner to like cats. We have already heard stories of people giving their partners ultimatums - "it's either me or the cat", but we tend to hear these stories because the people this happens to turn to the internet for advice. They want to get support from people online if the people in their life are not giving it to them. And then the internet, of course, tells them that they should choose the cat over the person, they help these people see that it's okay to leave because of something like this, and then we get a happy ending. Rarely do we see the flip side of the coin - someone caving to a toxic relationship. 

Unfortunately, the woman we'll be talking about today did cave. And we're not mad at her. We understand that some situations are difficult to explain, especially when there are kids involved. All we know is that we are happy that things ended up working out, even if it happened eight years later. The toxic man is now an ex, and the beloved cat that she and her daughter were forced to surrender was found… as a sick senior stray. He was brought to a vet, and at the vet's, they found this woman's information still on the cat's chip. He's back home now, where he belongs, and that's what really matters. 

Should a company be able to fire someone who hasn't even started to work there?

It is a risky job market out there, and it puts a lot of employees in a position where they don't want to leave a role unless they have something better lined up (or they really, really have to). If the workday is bearable and the salary makes ends meet, there is little tempting about searching for work in a landscape of increasing AI automation, hiring freezes, and ghost job postings.

Still, most would agree that there are times when it is appropriate to give notice, namely when you have signed a contract for a new position that offers you more money. Sometimes career progression can only happen when somebody has the confidence to job hop, and it is fairly normal practice for people to do that while they are still employed elsewhere.

This can be a vulnerable time, as leaving what you know and going on to something different always is. In a part of life that is as fickle as work, it can be even more nerve-wracking, because your livelihood depends on it. You want it to be a step up and not an unfortunate learning experience.

Should you have to express your thanks at every hour?

Gratitude is an important concept. If you don't remember what you're grateful for every now and again, then you might wonder what it's all for. It's a good practice to stop and take stock of all the things that are going right in your life. It's too often that we focus on the things that are going wrong, and we lose sight of the things that matter the most. This is a good practice to do in your personal and private life. It's definitely not something that your employer should mandate that you do. There's no quicker way to erase any feeling of gratitude than to be forced to express it. Especially if it's in a workplace where you feel like you're already being undervalued. This is the kind of gesture that bosses may think helps improve morale, but it actually kills it instantly. The employee in this story was learning that, and had a lot to say about it. Sometimes your employer makes a decision that you don't abide by. You have to take it and stride and pretend like you're enjoying it, or else face the consequences. But if you respect and trust the people that you work with, then it behooves you to speak up when you feel like something is going wrong. Feedback can go both ways. 

"Tree law" is no joke. 

I can't imagine anything worse to come home to after a relaxing vacation. Few things give me as deep a rage as the unjustified and unwarranted removal of a mature tree. It's almost as if you are removing time itself from the property. Plus, the plotting on the neighbor's part to do this when he knew the homeowner was away on vacation is just despicable. 

It's important to remember that, even if we "own" property, in some ways we are merely borrowing the property we "own." The land and even the house on it existed for far longer than we have even been alive. Many people have lived there and owned the land before us. It's a real delight to have mature trees on a property that stand as a representation of this. 

For those who share my sentiments, as I'm sure many of you do reading this, these trees serve as important cornerstones of any property. They serve as a point of pride, a reminder that our own time on the property is fleeting, and a cool bit of shade on hot summer days.