The kitty of death

When one imagines the Grim Reaper they seldom conjure up the image of a cute, fuzzy kitty. But in one Rhode Island nursing home that appears to be the case -- Death is a cat.

A cat with an uncanny ability to detect when nursing home patients are about to die has proven itself in around 50 cases by curling up with them in their final hours, according to a new book.
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The tortoiseshell and white cat spends its days pacing from room to room, rarely spending any time with patients except those with just hours to live.

If kept outside the room of a dying patient, Oscar will scratch on the door trying to get in.

When nurses once placed the cat on the bed of a patient they thought close to death, Oscar "charged out" and went to sit beside someone in another room. The cat's judgement was better than that of the nurses: the second patient died that evening, while the first lived for two more days.

The doctor who wrote the book detailing the cat's "uncanny gift" believes the cat to be gifted with an amazing predictive ability. I, however, have a different take.

I believe that this filthy vermin is preselecting victims and, once the staff is out of the room, the Kitty of Death administers the Kiss of Death.

I always suspected that cats were evil! Now we know just how evil they can be! *

* This post is entirely tongue-in-cheek. I don't really believe the cat is killing people. And I don't really hate cats - I just hate that they love to climb all over me to trigger full-blown asthma attacks -- as if they know that they're causing me distress.