Tyler, cats, and lampshades?

My girlfriend, in her infinite wisdom, takes photos of the cats on weekends while I toil away at work. Actually, I don't toil, I work with a smile on my face, as I am finally at a job I love and am happy to be at.  I am truly the happiest in my profession, happier at work than I've been in two decades, if ever!

Anyway, Ashley sends me photos of the cats and their antics while I am working, and yesterday was no exception.  What she sent me was an amusing photo of Jackson:

Making love to a lampshade. 

It got me thinking, I have long had a collection of felines that have loved lampshades.  As I've written before, when I was a kid visiting my great Uncle's lampshade store on Avenue U in Brooklyn, he had quite the collection of stray cats that lived in....and out.....of his store.  Whenever a customer would come in, or I would stop by, it was almost like a game at an amusement park.  A cat popping out of a lampshade here....a cat popping out of a lampshade there.  No customer every complained, and it went a long way towards cementing my life-long love of everything feline.

Years later, when Tyler came to live with me, he seemed to have carried on this tradition of the feline love of all things.....lamps.  If he passed by a lamp, he would rub his face along the edge of the lampshade, over and over and over, purring away.....the happiest cat, even when he would occasionally send one crashing to the ground.   I can't tell you how many lamps I went through with him!  At first I had expensive Bissell lamps, with pleated shades and brass bases, that I inherited from my mother when I moved out on my own.  Eventually....one by one....Tyler would knock them over when his lampshade rubbing would get a little over zealous.  Having learned my lesson, from now on it's nothing but durable.....and inexpensive....Target and Ikea lamps.

CRASH!

"Tyler, did you break another lamp?"

"Meow?"  

How could I actually be mad at him?  Maybe he was trying to keep our electric bill down? 

What is it about lampshades and cats?  Is it the warmth?  Is it how the edge of the shade feels against their gums?  

Only Tyler knew.

Here's to cats and lamps, and to Jackson for keeping Tyler's tradition alive.