I'm an animal lover. Nadi, my dog, has been the greatest thing to happen to me since moving to South East Asia in 2004. She has been the only stable thing in my life in more than 20 years and I am the only stability that she has ever known. We are a good team.
I will be the first to recognize that having a dog is a huge pain in the butt, especially in a place like where I am and without citizenship or a 100% certainty about the future. I have missed out on a lot of opportunities because of her, but these are sacrifices that I gladly make and would make again if it arose.
As all dog owners are aware, dogs are very hands on in that you cannot just leave them to their own devices. Other than farm dogs, and probably even in those situations, the dog is completely dependent upon you for almost everything in their lives. With Nadi I do have doggy pee pads indoors but of course she would prefer to go to the great outdoors for peepeepoopoo time and she will lightly growl at me if I wait too long before taking her out.
The other day we encountered a cat on our walk and even though she has never been given a good reason to feel this way, Nadi hates cats. I would be quite fearful for Nadi if she ever managed to get a hold of a cat, especially one that still has its claws.
But after encountering this feline fella, I was talking to a friend of mine who has a cat. Our levels of necessary dedication towards our pets is extremely different. While I must be on top of thing every single day including for the most part, at least 2 walks per day, this woman's cat has never been outside of her apartment and would probably be really afraid if it was to go there.
While I don't mind my Nadi-walks, I do admit that having an animal that never needs or wants to go outside would be considerably easier. Also, and this probably isn't a great idea, this woman has a cat food trough of sorts that never runs out of food. The cat just eats as much as it wants to all day long.
if I were to give Nadi that option she would scarf down a mountain of food until she threw up and then she would wait a few minutes and start eating again. I think a lot of dogs are like this. I normally think that dogs are smarter than cats but are they really? Dogs do seem to have very little impulse control.
I did get really lucky with Nadi though. She is quite content to just laze the day away without a great deal of activity. If we get to go for a bit of a run outside or if I play fetch with her, she is cool with it, but if it doesn't happen she is perfectly ok to just sleep the day away on the floor or one of her 4 doggy beds, one of which is perched on my bed and takes priority over my own pillows.
My friend with the cat, well I've been to her place and the cat rarely so much as comes out to say hello. It just stays hidden all the time and maybe, if you are lucky it might come to say hello for a little bit.
Cats never need baths. Nadi needs one at least once a week. A cat can have a never-ending water bowl. Nadi refuses to drink water out of anything other than a hamster feeder type thing, and if it isn't filtered water, she will often turn her nose up at this as well. She is a fancy pup I guess.
I am sometimes a bit envious of my cat having friend because if she goes out of town, she just pays some service to come by once a day and make sure the cat has food and clean up a bit of the litter box. The cat almost always never even comes out to say hello.
Fortunately for me I have a friend here who absolutely loves Nadi and wants to watch her if and when I am away but if I didn't know this guy named Mark, it would cost me a small fortune to drop Nadi off at a doggy hotel.
I prefer dogs of course because I feel like their love is more genuine. Cat people would probably disagree with this but I will admit that I am extremely biased because of 12 years with Nadi.
I don't think I would really want to have a cat but I will admit that having a cat seems to require a significantly reduced amount of responsibility. Nadi would lose her mind if all of a sudden she was cut off from going outside. My friend's cat would claw at you trying to get back inside if you were ever take it so much as into the hallway.
I can see the benefits of both situations, but I am a dog guy forever.
What about you?
