Happy 7th Birthday, Tony B. (the Cat)

June 7, 2026

By Karen

I’m a day late. Tony’s birthday was yesterday, June 6, but I’d be remiss if I didn’t report that he’s fine and had a nice special day. Here he was yesterday morning, chilling with his favorite stick toy, Bumble…

His birthday surprise was a rotisserie chicken. Tony graciously shared a breast with Roc and Tater, and let me have a thigh and drumstick. I think they each packed away more chicken than I did. We’ve got enough left for another meal, too.

It’s hard to believe my wild child is already 7. Where do the years go? Tony still has his kittenish ways, loving toys and his daily throw-downs with Roc, even though Roc is about 150% his size.

Tony’s still obsessed with shadows, though we no longer play with a laser pointer since I learned a dot of light that never provides the thrill of a real “kill” can frustrate a cat. God knows Tony gets enough frustration living with Tater Tot.

Tony and Tater have reached the plateau of tolerating each other’s existence. Sometimes Tony will playfully tease Tater, which never goes over well. But I think Tater has been using the box consistently. Tony may now be a sprayer for life, and he’ll let loose without warning anywhere.

The peeing issue has been fraught for me since early May when I caught COVID getting my teeth cleaned. Yes, I’m sure it was COVID, and no, I happened to go nowhere else that week, so the carrier could only have been the dentist’s.

My last booster was exactly six months earlier, and it was my first-ever bout of COVID. I think I had what they call “razor blade throat.”

Over the past few weeks, I noticed most of my taste and smell are gone, which led me to the horrifying realization that I haven’t smelled any cat pee since COVID.

Until my senses return (PLEASE return!) I have to see (or step in) a pee puddle, catch Tony backing up and twiggling his tail, or see someone sniffing a suspicious spot. This is less than ideal for my pet stain housekeeping, to put it mildly.

Happy Birthday, Tony, you little fire hose! I still can’t imagine life without you in it.

10 Comments | Cats, Lifestyle | Tagged: , | Permalink
Posted by catsworking

Trailer Thoughts: TONY (Bourdain) Movie

May 7, 2026

By Karen

At last! TONY seems to be in the final stretch to hit the big screen, they say in late August. For some reason, the fine print at the bottom of all the posters I can find is blurry, but here it is…

And here’s the trailer…

The film is set in 1975 Provincetown, Massachusetts. Bourdain would have been 19. He had a summer job working in a restaurant kitchen, which he calls the Dreadnaught in Kitchen Confidential in the early chapter “Food is Sex.”

[For more, Charles Leerhsen covers that period in Chapter 4 of his book, Down and Out in Paradise.]

This is the phase of Bourdain’s life that’s least documented. I flipped through The Nasty Bits and Medium Raw, but didn’t land on any other writings about that year. (I must say, the paper in those books isn’t aging well; yellowing already.)

In KC, Bourdain said it was 1973 and he’d graduated from high school a year early to follow his unnamed girlfriend (first wife Nancy, we now know) to Vassar. So, he would have been 17 at graduation, but he implied in his book that he was 18. I believe Nancy was two years older than he was.

Bourdain dropped out of Vassar after two years, which would have made him in the summer of the film a college dropout. We know he then enrolled in the Culinary Institute of America and graduated in 1978.

Bourdain wrote that he and Nancy were an on-again, off-again couple, and she’s played in the movie by the lovely Emilia Jones. Jones at a glance seems more delicate than the image I got of Nancy from Bourdain’s description of them as the Drugstore Cowboy cohorts. They wouldn’t marry for another decade, in 1985.

Dominic Sessa plays Tony. From what little I’ve seen so far, I suspect it could be one of those roles where Sessa embodies the character so well, you’ll forget for a few hours that Bourdain is gone.

Nancy’s been so circumspect all these years, I would give anything to know how she feels about seeing her early relationship with Tony dramatized, and how accurate they got it, but we’ll probably never know. On the other hand, it may be fun for her to watch it played out as an alternate universe.

Watch the trailer and let me know in comments if you hear Eric Ripert’s French voice right at the end, saying, “Sorry, what is your name?” And teenage Tony replying, “Anthony Bourdain.”

If it’s Eric, that would be weird because if I recall correctly, Bourdain and Ripert didn’t meet until after Kitchen Confidential was published, when Tony was about 44.

7 Comments | Bourdain, Film, Food | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by catsworking

Cat Chat on Max’s 15th Birthday

April 9, 2026

By Karen

Happy Birthday to our dear Max…

Max is still living large in his bachelor pad on the living room bookcases. His only exercise was jumping down from the mantle, so I squeezed in a scratch pad. He loves having good stretches and claw workouts on it…

Max’s 15-year milestone will be low key because he’ll only eat dry food and the Gerber chicken or turkey he gets every morning.

Max had a health scare last November. One Friday, he was retching liquid almost hourly from morning into the evening. We went to two emergency vets over the weekend, and then his regular vet on Monday. After two sets of bloodwork, and x-rays, I never got a reason for the retching. His vet noticed a slightly enlarged heart and maybe a touch of asthma, but everything else checked out.

The vets gave him fluid and he was on Cerenia and famitodine (Pepcid) for nausea for about five days, and mirtazapine for appetite, and bounced back.

Every other day since then, he licks Tomlyn Laxatone Hairball Remedy off my fingers and hasn’t missed a beat since.

But last Thursday right before the long Easter weekend (naturally), he had diarrhea and wasn’t eating or drinking, so I popped him 5 mg of famitodine and he got back on track, so knock on wood.

[ASIDE: I’ve been criminally lax in posting, but it’s not that I’m not writing. I rant my fingers off about politics on Bluesky, and I’m doing technical prep to reset my novel, Once, Upon a Ship, on the real SS Norway. That led to rethinking characters and plot, and now I’m almost done with groundwork so I can start the fun part, telling the story.]

Now, for more cat news…

I’ve been promising a post for — what, over a year? — on the pee wars between Tony and Tater. Just as I thought we’d achieved lasting peace after adopting many techniques from The Cat Whisperer by Mieshelle Nagelschneider (out of print, I believe)…

…they went back into battle. It’s been 2 ½ years with no end in sight.

Tater leaves puddles mostly on the kitchen floor, and occasionally the table. But lately the table is where she spends all day playing Muffin Loaf in a basket I was about to toss after Roc fell on it and broke off its handle…

I think Tony has simply discovered the joy of spraying to relieve frustration, and I never know where he’s going to do it next.

[ANOTHER ASIDE: This photo of Tony was taken to illustrate another instance of a book flying off the bookshelf in my bedroom, which has happened before. Notice the distance, and curve of the book to the floor from the shelf, which I don’t think a cat could achieve. Flying straight off, it would have landed in the litter. And which book is it? It’s MINE: How to Work Like a CAT. Bizarre, no?]

Tony ate tin foil last week. It was a tiny corner that ripped off, and I foolishly left it on the counter when Tony showed up to lick Max’s Gerber spoon. He was swallowing the foil before I could pry it out of his mouth. I haven’t seen it come out the other end, but I hope it has.

Tony also licks the plastic drip trays under the houseplants, and I don’t know what’s up with that. I’m sure an x-ray of his stomach would be horrifying.

Tony’s got a new food puzzle because the Cat Whisperer recommended challenging his mind to distract him from spraying. Every morning, Roc and Tony supervise while I restock the puzzle with 5-6 types of treats. Of course, their favorite treat is exorbitantly expensive freeze-dried chicken. Girls aren’t invited (but Tater sneaks sometimes when they’re not around). Here’s Tony at work…

I say Tony and Tater don’t get along, but it’s not constant fur flying…

There’s screaming only at sudden encounters around a corner or when Tater gets hissy at mealtime (stray memories never fade, it seems)…

Tony is passively aggressive. He’ll lounge across a doorway on his back, all cute and innocent. The Cat Whisperer calls that guarding territory, and it pisses Tater off.

And finally, Roc bops along with everybody when he’s not being a wise guy, wrestling with Tony, which Tony likes, and teasing Tater, which she hates. For example, Max paid me an unexpected daytime visit on the couch just before I started this post, and Roc joined us (on the left)…

4 Comments | Cats, Lifestyle | Tagged: , , , | Permalink
Posted by catsworking

Cautionary “Tail” About Smalls Cat Food

March 2, 2026

By Karen

We cat lovers want our cats eating high-quality food so they live nine long and healthy lives. That’s what made me scope out Smalls Human-Grade cat food.

[Disclaimer: My intent is not to impugn or disparage Smalls’ products. Cats Working has neither touched nor tasted them. I’m sharing my experience with only their marketing.]

Max as a kitten

I first saw Smalls a few years ago on Instagram, and rejected it then as too expensive.

But lately we’ve been upgrading, switching from Fancy Feast to Blue dry food. So, when I saw Smalls advertise on TV while my laptop was open, I thought, “Maybe I should check this out again,” breaking my cardinal rule about nighttime internet use, which is…

NEVER EXPLORE ONLINE SHOPPING OPPORTUNITIES WHILE DISTRACTED (or having a martini).

The site asked basic questions about all four cats: age, breed, body type, food preferences.

Then it offered a customized $52 “sample pack.” But wait! You’re in luck. It’s 50% off. So, $26 for the samples.

For a gourmet meal for four, that sounded reasonable, so I entered my credit card info.

GOTCHA!!

I was automatically subscribed to four meal plans Smalls formulated without even divulging how much lobster and caviar they contained, which they must have, because they cost $179.

A WEEK

That’s $776 a month. For cat food.

In a panic, the only ways I could find to reverse this catastrophic error were to call a number or email their “Cat Concierge.” Since it was late, I sent an email with the subject line “CANCEL.”

Roc as a kitten

Then I went to bed to have nightmares of Max, Roc, Tony, and Tater sitting like fat cats around a sumptuous table groaning with platters of succulent human-grade proteins while I ate cold rice from a dirty bowl on the floor.

(Just kidding about the nightmare, but if Social Security is your main source of income, that’s not much of a stretch.)

Tony as a kitten

Smalls drove Trump completely out of my head as my first horrible thought the next morning. Before coffee, I went back to that website. This time I scrolled all the way down and found a Cancel button, which I hit hard and hoped I did it in time.

Weirdly, I later found a message from the Cat Concierge on my business email account, but that’s not the address I gave Smalls. Here’s what it said:

Thanks for reaching out! I completely understand your concern about this. When you place your first order with Smalls, it also starts a recurring subscription that kicks off two weeks later. We include a note about this on the checkout screen, along with follow-up emails during your transition process, so it doesn’t come as a surprise.

If you’d like, I’m happy to help create a meal plan that better fits your needs. Subscriptions can always be adjusted with budget in mind. You can switch to our smallest box, space out shipments up to every 12 weeks, or postpone whenever needed. Smalls also works great as a topper. Our fresh food packets last up to a year in the freezer and 5 days in the fridge once thawed, so you can stretch one packet over multiple meals.

In the meantime, I see your Smalls subscription was canceled. If you ever want to give us another try or talk more about using Smalls as a supplement, I’d be glad to offer 25% off your first order back. Just let me know!

I could be wrong, and maybe I missed it, but if Smalls had shown the eye-popping cost of a subscription on the checkout screen BEFORE I confirmed the sample purchase, I would have canceled on the spot.

Tater, as young as we ever knew her

When I canceled, it also canceled the sample, which I still would have liked to try. But apparently with Smalls you either take the whole enchilada or you get nothing.

Silly me thought I could see how the sample pack went over before committing to a subscription — BECAUSE CATS ARE NOTORIOUSLY FINICKY EATERS.

The concierge’s options seem to defeat the purpose of Smalls. What’s the point of skimping on the cats’ meals or mixing highly nutritious food with commercial junk? It’s like telling Trump he gets only one patty on his Big Mac, or swapping his pickles for broccoli.

Anyway, if anybody uses Smalls, I’d love to hear how your cats like it. And if you’ve been thinking about it, and you’ve got multiple cats, be warned that you may find yourself eating a lot more ramen noodles.

13 Comments | Cats, Consumer Issues, Lifestyle | Tagged: , , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by catsworking

How the USPS Instigates Revival of GOING POSTAL

February 9, 2026

By Karen

Trump hates mail-in voting, so he’s tried for years to destroy the U.S. Postal Service. Now, for the first time in my life, I know what living without the PO means, because…

MY MAIL HAS NOT BEEN DELIVERED SINCE JANUARY 24

My mail carrier has failed to show up 12 DAYS, and counting. (To be fair, I exclude Sundays).

It started January 24, when Richmond got snow, turning to sleet, then freezing rain. Two sunny subfreezing weeks followed, where daytime melting would refreeze at night to create increasingly thicker ice.

Main roads were passable within a few days. One side of my street got some sand, but not my side. Plows were useless; they couldn’t dent the ice. I didn’t try to get out for 10 days myself after falling backward dragging the trash bin to the curb (which then wasn’t picked up for another week).

I think schools were closed seven days. But even four days after abundantly cautious school buses resumed their routes, THE MAIL STILL DIDN’T COME.

Local news did a story on people trying to fetch their delinquent mail, because THEY could drive to the PO (irony intended). But postal workers said, “It’s out on the truck,” or “The back room is such a mess, we can’t find anything.”

A USPS spokesperson claimed their main concern was carriers’ safety. What they meant was, “Remember our slogan, ‘Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds’? Yeah, no. Fuggeddaboudit. That’s all bullshit.”

I get a daily USPS email called Informed Delivery that sends photos of what may or may not arrive that day.

It’s 2025 tax season, so I see 1099s from my banks and clients (along with a real estate assessment and a client’s payment check). But God only knows where they are.

Normally, my carrier sometimes skips me three days. Usually, it’s no biggie because like most people, I went as paperless as possible when Trump installed that bastard Louis DeJoy over the USPS to sabotage the 2020 election. DeJoy ripped out mailboxes and sorting machines, did massive layoffs, raised prices repeatedly, and crippled what was left of the PO.

[SIDENOTE: Louis DeJoy finally quit in 2025. I love Joe Biden, but if he and that useless milquetoast Merrick Garland had had the courage to take out the Trump trash, we’d all live in a different world today. DeJoy should have been prosecuted for interfering with the 2020 election and be rotting in prison today, not happily retired, enjoying the fruits of his malicious fuckery.]

Now, even though my street has been dry and clear for days and the mail carrier’s packing a 12-day backlog, nothing’s coming.

If normalcy ever returns, I expect epic misdeliveries causing more headaches. Before this, I’d get wrong mail almost once a week. What I fear is people won’t put misdeliveries back in their boxes, because some feckless shithead didn’t with my father’s original death certificate in a law firm envelope, which went missing in 2024. All I ever got was Informed Delivery’s photo of it.

Worst case, the PO catches up by throwing away the backlog. It’s happened before.

February 16 is Presidents Day, a federal holiday. I sure hope the USPS doesn’t plan to close with piles of very late mail sitting around. But if they do, it wouldn’t surprise me if someone who can’t file their 2025 taxes or has run out of their mail-order anti-psychotic meds revives that custom we haven’t seen lately. It’s called GOING POSTAL.

FEBRUARY 9 UPDATE: Thankfully, all the overdue mail showed up today, with no misdeliveries. Now I can do my taxes. Postal workers must really, REALLY want Presidents Day off next week after the two-week vacation they just took.

6 Comments | Weather, American politics, Lifestyle, Consumer Issues | Tagged: , , , , | Permalink
Posted by catsworking

Cats Working at Christmas 2025

December 23, 2025

By Karen

We’re low key this year. In lieu of the tree, I hung ALL the kitties’ stockings and realized only my original four (down the stairs from top, Coco, Cleo, Rex, and Ginger) weren’t Cats Working. If you’ve been a longtime reader, you’ll remember the late Fred, Yul, Adele, and Cole. They all loved Christmas…

The present crew’s stockings are on the fireplace, whose mantle is lopsided because a friend who’s a dog person gave me a Christmas planter that for the cats is poisonous and edible (but pukable). Having no cat-proof inch in the house to put it anywhere else (not even the top of the fridge), I barricaded it, while leaving Max’s path of descent from his bookcases open…

I wasn’t able to put up the tree because in March I inherited my parents’ massive roll-top desk, which caused a Christmas turf war. You can see what I mean, compared to last year’s tree placement…

If I can’t figure out another spot for that lovely 8’ tree, I’ll have to get a smaller one next year.

Speaking of Christmas trees, I almost missed getting my Fancy Feast ornament. In November, when I realized I hadn’t seen an ad this year, I discovered it had been promoted — but only on Facebook. And it was already sold out! The Facebook post was loaded with complaints about that.

Like any good Karen, I bypassed useless kvetching on fucking Facebook and went straight to Purina. As an outraged collector of their damn Fancy Feast ornaments since the mid-‘80s, I demanded to know what marketing genius thought hiding it on Facebook was a good idea.

In response, they apologized for my inconvenience and sent me an ornament from their “private stock.” So, my collection continues. I must say, putting this year’s ornament only on Facebook should get somebody at Purina fired because it’s stunning. It looks like crystal and comes in a green velvet box like a Crown jewel…

One morning recently, the cats’ “Secret Santa” dropped off a Rescue Box of treats and toys. Proceeds go to help kitties in need. It’s going to be their Christmas morning surprise…

You’ll notice Tony legs in that photo, but rest assured he doesn’t realize the box is his. Connecting dots is not his strong suit. Now, I’ll tell you how Tony got a “poodle leg”…

In October at his annual checkup, Tony received the bad news that he needed his teeth cleaned, and he had it done December 3. It was the first time I’ve ever had to leave him anywhere, so it must have been scary. He threw up on the drive over. He’s still pissed his leg was shaved. The first few days he was home, he was missing all his jumps and falling backward as if his balance was off.

The good news is that his teeth were just dirty, but otherwise fine. (He has some gingivitis.) The vet found an extra little fang on the top and bottom, and a tooth Tony should have on the bottom may have never grown in. Here’s his mouth. His teeth are actually white. The vet apologized that his printer made them yellow…

Max would like to wish you all a Merry Christmas. This photo is from 2022, but I don’t think I could do any better with him today…

I tried to get Roc into the Santa spirit this year, and here’s how that went…

And Tony…

Tater was having none of it, and wouldn’t even allow a regular photo, so here’s one from Christmas 2019 when she lived with my parents…

The cats and I hope you and yours have beautiful holidays, and thank you for staying with us.

5 Comments | Cats, Lifestyle | Tagged: , , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by catsworking

Virginia FINALLY Secedes from the Confederacy

November 5, 2025

By Karen

Historically, I’ve heard crickets when I’ve written about politics here, and it’s another reason I haven’t posted much lately. I actually spend (too many) hours every day following Trump’s treachery and searching for signs of his inevitable collapse because I don’t feel as if I can breathe easy again until he stops.

But you know what? Fuck it. Today I’m writing for the crickets. Virginia just did the most amazing thing in my 53 long years here and I can’t NOT talk about it.

Yesterday, November 4, we had an election for governor, lieutenant governor, attorney general, and all 100 seats in the House of Delegates of the General Assembly (our state-level Congress). Both houses of the General Assembly already had small Democratic majorities, but the top three jobs were in MAGA hands.

I’m thrilled to say that for the first time since 1972, I voted a straight Democratic ticket and all four of my candidates WON!

Democrats’ wins were also historic. Abigail Spanberger, former CIA agent and Congresswoman, is the first female governor in Virginia. Lieutenant Governor Ghazala Hashmi is the first Muslim ever elected to statewide office in the U.S., and Jay Jones the first Black attorney general in Virginia.

(For the record, I’m in House District 73. My fourth candidate was Democrat Leslie Mehta, who knocked out Republican Mark Earley after only one term, rounded to 52-48%.)

With Jones, I believe after early voting had already begun, Republicans pulled their usual shit. They revealed some stupid old texts from when Jones served in the House of Delegates. He idiotically joked about shooting the former speaker (who WAS a dick) to his Republican colleague Carrie Coyner. Coyner saved the texts for a chance to stab Jones in the back because MAGAs love kompromat. They also dug up an old speeding conviction where Jones was clocked doing 116 m.p.h.

So, it was touch and go for Jones, but he managed to pull off a win (53-47%) despite his immaturity. And because Karma’s a bitch with a sense of irony, Coyner’s duplicity LOST her her seat in the House by the same 53-47% margin.

Wins by Spanberger (57-42%) and Hashmi (55-45%) always looked fairly certain because Spanberger’s opponent was screeching harpy Winsome Earle-Sears, our current not-too-bright Trump-worshipping lieutenant governor, though Trump never specifically endorsed her. Maybe this campaign photo of her explains why…

Earle-Sears ran mainly on keeping trans girls out of restrooms. Sure, that’s what we’re all worried about, with prices for everything crazy-expensive, hospitals closing, people starving, and Trump’s roving gangs of masked goons attacking, tear-gassing and kidnapping everyone they fancy.

Hashmi’s opponent was a gay man who was probably the most reasonable person on the Republican ticket. Had they prevailed, Earle-Sears would probably have tried to fire him because she buys into Trump’s ultimate power schtick, and as a “devout Christian,” she doesn’t believe anyone LGBTQIA+ deserves to exist.

So, this former capital of the Confederacy, which has already progressed as the only southern state not to ban abortion, though Youngkin tried, and removed most of the Confederate statues, has made a clean break with stupidity. Backwardness does exist in rural areas where people still love Trump, even though his demented bullshit is closing their hospitals, destroying their farms, and making life generally too expensive to survive. But blue Virginia can now stand proudly with the other sane states Trump hates.

I woke up this morning feeling happy. Trump may squat in what he’s left of the White House, but I feel Virginia now has a buffer against his evil. I hope what the country saw here and in New Jersey, Pennsylvania, California, New York City, and other states motivates us all to keep up the fight and not lose hope. That fucker can’t live forever. His corrupt, incompetent toadies have nowhere to hide without him. And we outnumber them by millions.

6 Comments | American politics | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by catsworking

NEW BOOK: The Anthony Bourdain Reader

October 31, 2025

By Karen

Guilt hangs over me every waking moment for neglecting this blog so terribly.

I’m STILL churning the cat pee post. Tater and Tony had no incidents in over a month, and I thought it was time to tell you how and why, but just this morning I found “something” on the slate hearth. I’m not sure exactly what it was, or who did it, but it was wet.

Other than my own procrastination, rest assured there’s nothing bad happening at Cats Working that’s keeping me from the keyboard. In fact, I’m preparing to dive into a major rewrite on my novel about people on a cruise. It happened so many years ago, it’s become a period piece like Ship of Fools because cruise ships have become almost unrecognizable as ships. (Katherine Anne Porter once came to speak at the University of Richmond while I was there, and I got within 3 feet of her. She was white-haired, tiny, and wore pink.)

My book has always felt like THE one I MUST write in this life. Its tentative title is Once, Upon a Ship. But I’ve digressed.

I don’t recall how I got wind of The Anthony Bourdain Reader because I haven’t seen a word of hype, but it’s the brainchild of his literary agent, Kim Witherspoon. She combed through his body of published and unpublished writing and compiled what is best described as a textbook for possible future college courses devoted to Bourdainia.

When the Amazon box hit my doorstep, I was surprised by its heft. It’s 488 pages published under the Ecco imprint of HarperCollins, Bourdain’s old stomping ground. Its cloth cover and titles in what looks like the old monospaced Courier font reminds me of old schoolbooks and typewriters.

But let’s face it, since Tony’s no longer generating new material, we have all become Bourdain scholars, studying what he left behind. Here’s just a sample from the table of contents.

I haven’t begun reading yet, but just flipping through, I see quite a few never-published pieces, belying Tony’s claim (boast?) that he never wrote anything unless it was for publication. I also see excerpts from his lesser known books you may not have read, like Typhoid Mary: An Urban Historical (my copy the last book he ever autographed for me).

The oldest piece I see is from 1984, when he would have been 28, over a decade before fame found him, but some pieces have dates unknown, so could go back even further.

Anyway, I wanted to get this out quickly to 1) Keep the Bourdain record at Cats Working as complete as possible, and 2) Let know you this amazing book exists. It looks well worth having if you’re still interested.

In the aknowledgments, Witherspoon thanks Ottavia and Ariane for their “trust and clarity,” and Laurie Woolever for reading the draft, among others.

BONUS: Remember when Tony and Eric Ripert went to Peru and ended up getting into the candy business? It was 2012, and their $18 Good & Evil chocolate bars sold for a limited time. The price was too rich for me, so I never tried one. I also never heard what went into their production, but Ian Fortey at Tasting Table tells the story.

PS: I’m searching for a Bourdain quote where he talked about how travel should change you. I want to use it at the front of my book because it encapsulates my theme. I don’t remember if he said it or wrote it, but if anyone remembers what I’m talking about and puts it in the comments, I’ll know it when I see it. I’d really appreciate your help on this!

8 Comments | Books, Bourdain, Consumer Issues, Writing | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by catsworking

Happy 10th Birthday, Roc!

September 1, 2025

By Karen

I can’t believe an entire DECADE has passed since Roc (a.k.a. RockyMan, which he’s most likely to answer to) came to live with us.

Roc living dangerously; that’s Tater’s favorite mouse toy he’s posing with

Today is his big day, and since it happens to be Labor Day, maybe he’ll get fireworks tonight.

Otherwise, we’re keeping it low key. Since they’ve got every toy known to cats and a smorgasbord of half a dozen treat varieties, at a minimum, in their food puzzle every day (more on that later), you could say Roc’s a lucky cat who has it all. He’s even shacked up with his girlfriend, Tater Tot, and she occasionally allows him a nose boop.

So, tonight I’ll make us Roc’s favorite dinner — shrimp — and crack open some cans of Fancy Feast I save for special occasions for Tony and Tater, and we’ll call that a birthday bash. (Max only eats dry food.)

Roc really is our rock. He’s the only cat who meshes with everyone. But power sometimes goes to his head and he becomes a bully. Tony takes it as an invitation to wrestle. Max recoils from the unnecessary roughness. Tater turns into a hissy shrew.

Rereading my first post on Roc’s arrival as a kitten (link above), I see that I mentioned him biting. He grew out of it for some years, but now it’s his worst habit. He bites me constantly, and will bite Max. Not in anger or to break the skin, but hard enough to be a pest and sometimes leaves bruises. I can tell him 1,000 times to cut it out, and he always looks surprised.

On the other hand, no cat is more affectionate. If I lie down on the couch for a nap, Roc appears from wherever he’s been to flop down beside me. He’s usually got me within his sights. Right now he’s napping on the perch behind my computer.

These pics were taken this morning. I gave Roc a safe communal mouse before Tater caught him with hers

Roc and Tony are pals, but Roc and Max are cuddle buddies. Whenever Max comes down from the bookcases to watch TV, Roc and he will groom each other and snuggle like an old gay couple — until Roc bites Max.

Roc, thankfully, has remained neutral in Tony and Tater’s pee war. (As I was about to tell you all about their miraculous détente, they relapsed. But we’re back on track again and it’s a useful story that includes the treat puzzle and much more, so stay tuned.)

Even at 10, Roc’s still a kitten at heart. He loves to romp and play with stick toys and Tony.

So, Happy Birthday to my RockyMan. I hope we have many more together!

7 Comments | Animals, Cats, Lifestyle | Tagged: , , | Permalink
Posted by catsworking

Book Review: Zamir Gotta’s ‘The Fixer and the Chef’

July 7, 2025

By Karen

[First, my thanks to Cats Working reader Stephanie Pyrzynski for alerting me that this book exists. It’s available on Amazon in hardcover, paperback, and Kindle.]

Anthony Bourdain’s zany Russian sidekick Zamir has independently published a memoir (available online via print-on-demand, not in bookstores) called The Fixer and the Chef: My Adventures With and Without Anthony Bourdain.

Physically, it’s a respectable hardcover with professional photography and well-written cover copy. The interior layout falls a bit short, though readable, with narrow margins and clunky justification in spots. At only 183 pages, it packs a lot of story into a deceptively thin volume.

But I nitpick.

Zamir says Bourdain began urging him in 2011 to write his remarkable life story. His childhood in the Soviet Union was filled with dire deprivation and squalor, which made me feel almost ashamed that I ever laughed at how communism was mocked in the movies Ninotchka with Greta Garbo…

And its musical remake Silk Stockings (this French poster captures the Soviet angle best)…

Zamir spares no ugly details in the first 89 pages, mentioning Bourdain several times in passing as he describes how he grew into a fixer. He was an A-list wheeler-dealer long before a relative nobody from Food Network ever pinged his radar. He’d already chalked up Billy Crystal and Ted Koppel, to drop a few names. Zamir was even an associate producer on Tilda Swinton’s Oscar-nominated film, Orlando, although his name was strangely omitted from the credits.

Zamir thoroughly disabuses the reader of any notion that Anthony Bourdain ever plucked Zamir from obscurity like any rando Russian.

Their adventures together begin when “Two Odd Guys Meet” in Chapter 5 on page 90.

Disregarding any negative connotations of the word, I’d describe Zamir as an opportunist. He’s someone who, in seeking workarounds to communism’s mandatory poverty, learned how to remove the peel from a single grape and turn it into a bottle of champagne — with a side of caviar and blinis.

It all began when Tony’s production company ZPZ recruited Zamir to help film two episodes of A Cook’s Tour. That relationship lasted and spanned 10 episodes over Tony’s three travel series.

[NOTE TO ZAMIR: If you’re reading this, despite your stern warning about reproducing “no part of this book” without permission, I’m quoting you. It’s called “fair use.”]

Zamir recalls his first impression upon meeting Bourdain…

“A Bohemian figure, slim and tall, dripping with charisma. He wore a thick silver thumb ring and a hoop earring. The jewelry looked uncomfortable. In my preconception, he was too tall and too thin to be a chef.”

“Dripping with charisma?” Maybe to a Russian he was. But in the handful of encounters I had with Tony some years later, I found him diffident, almost shy.

Readers know I’m always on the lookout for the ever-elusive Nancy. Zamir gives her a cameo, accompanying Tony…

“Nancy was tall and quiet. She made me think of what an American hippie might look like. She was nice, but never said much.”

During that first Cook’s Tour shoot, Zamir says Tony asked him to co-host.

Hmm… To verify, I just rewatched that episode. Zamir spoke very little, so “co-host” is a bit of a stretch. His role definitely grew over time as his antics became well-loved comic relief.

Tony might describe Zamir as an acquired taste that’s best enjoyed with the proverbial grain of salt.

The episode I was most eager to read about was Romania but, alas, Zamir mentions it only to say that Tony was annoyed by all the toasting.

After many hours spent talking and drinking, Zamir says he and Tony became friends, then confidants. Tony featured Zamir in the No Reservations Rust Belt episode to show him how destructive unbridled capitalism can be. The upside was that Zamir found a cadre of his own fans and fell in love with Buffalo, NY, which led to him producing Zamir Vodka.

At that time, Bourdain was in the throes of the Bourdain Market deal on Pier 57 in Manhattan that ultimately fell through. He promised Zamir that if his vodka wasn’t shit, it would be sold there. Losing that endorsement and distribution outlet was a huge disappointment and setback for the product.

Zamir’s final episode with Tony was in the country of Georgia for Parts Unknown, wrapping in November 2015. They never saw each other again. In early 2016, Tony went to Rome and met the skank, and you know the rest.

Zamir has a burning desire to honor Bourdain as a globe-trotting peacemaker, because making peace within his family was his role as a child, and became his most marketable skill.

When the news of Tony’s death broke, Zamir shared the shock we all felt…

“When I first learned of Tony’s death on the train from Buffalo to New York in June 2018, it felt like all things fell apart and the center could not hold.”

He found ways to move on, but suffered another unimaginable loss when his son Anton died by suicide in 2022.

If you’re still hungry for more about Anthony Bourdain, I heartily recommend The Fixer and the Chef as an entertaining read. It doesn’t have any new answers, but Zamir does share a wealth of insight into the brutal oppression and corruption of Soviet Russia that Putin misses so much.

Zamir’s collaborator was Miriam Margala, Ph.D., a Czech writer and lecturer who specializes in linguistics, philosophy, and academic writing.

Had the book been traditionally published, it would have benefited from having a native English-speaking copy and line editor, who would have smoothed rough spots in grammar and punctuation, and caught factual discrepancies, such as Zamir’s father being 15 when he enlisted in the Russian Army on page 7, but 16 when it’s repeated on page 12.

I know Zamir must feel elated to have his story finally out in tangible form. If Tony were alive, he’d have written a killer foreword, ensured top-notch production and publication, probably under his Ecco imprint, and made it a bestseller.

BONUS: A few other Bourdain bits I’ve collected…

Tony the movie: It’s set in Provincetown during the summer of 1976 when Bourdain first entered restaurant kitchen life. Emilia Jones is the only female cast I’ve seen.

Connecting dots out of nothing, I’m guessing she plays young Nancy.

Another cast member is Antonio Banderas, who may be one of Tony’s chef mentors. I have no idea which one.

Filming is now underway in Massachusetts. Seeing some photos of Dominic Sessa as young Tony, I think if he gets the swagger down, shadowed by shyness, he’s got the character nailed.

Here are a few more shots of him. And here’s another batch of photos from the Daily Mail, which calls the film a “chilling” biopic for some reason.

Get Jiro! animated series: This is also in production. According to Variety, it “welcomes the audience into a world where people will literally kill themselves to get into good restaurants.”

“The only thing they actually enjoy anymore is eating, so chefs in the future have the most power. They’re like influencers, warlords and drug dealers — all the good things together,” said Peter Girardi, EVP at Warner Bros. Animation at an Annecy Festival presentation.

The article says the series will introduce a new catchphrase. The guess: “No soy sauce!”

No date for airing, but it will be during the Adult Swim block of mature programming at night on the Cartoon Network.

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