My Cat Died on the Titanic

Yes -- my cat also died on the Titanic. I became suspicious when I noticed that she would wake me at midnight meowing "Nearer MyGod to Thee." My wife scoffed, of course, and insisted that the tune was, in fact, "Paddlin Madeline Home" but I knew better. She (my cat) was regressed by the same fellow in Milwaukee who has regressed the better class of Dolphin. It was expensive but worth it. It turns out that Chloe had been Jack Johnson's cat -- the black fighter who was refused passage because of... oh, you all know the song: "Jack Johnson want to get on board. The Captain said: "We don't haul no coal. Fare thee Titanic. Fare thee well."Chloe (whose name was Lighting then) had already boarded the ship and was nibbling caviar in the Greater Stateroom and waiting for Jack whenthe doomed vessel left port and confesses that she was rather pleased when she discovered that Jack wouldn't be coming. She could meet him inNew York and she had quite a nice cabin all to herself and there were masked balls to attend and no-one to stop her from renting the Pierrot costume that she knew would devastate the rather snooty millionaire cats who promenaded in First Class. Jack had always made her dress as one of the chorus of dancing girls in Aida and she felt that costume much too revealing. She was, in fact, dressed as Pierrot when the unsinkable ship went down. Of course, I didn't believe any of this. I t seemed too fantastic.I had never seen a cat dressed as a Pierrot. As Rhett Butler... yes...as Sinbad the Sailor... certainly... so you can imagine my amazement when I saw the film...there it was: a pitiful little cat skeleton and on the skull a Pierrot hat with a lavender pom pom and the oozy weeds twisting about -- as Lightning in the collied night/ So quick bright things come to confusion.