May 3, 2007
Bodega's Mouser Needs a New Home
New York Shitty's Miss Heather let us know that this adorable cat named Julie needs a new home. Miss Heather rescued the husky and healthy adult cat from terrible conditions last December and found a temporary home for her. Miss Heather writes:
Well, her temporary home (a local bodega) ended up being just that: temporary. Although the owners of this store (and their landlord) love her dearly, the decision to let her go was not theirs to make: someone saw fit to call the Department of Consumer Affairs and complain about her.Miss Heather has some more information about Julie, as well as some very cute pictures and contact info, on New York Shitty - so to anyone with a vermin problem, Julie needs the home ASAP!The result was a whopping $300 fine from the Department of Health and a warning that the store will be shuttered if Julie remains there. It just goes to show you that no good deed goes unpunished. By New York Shitty officials.
I find it strangely ironic that after being embarrassed by the now-infamous West Village Rat Cavalcade, the DOH has seen fit to save face by going after the very creature that keeps such vermin at bay. Come to think of it, Julie doesn’t just keep them at bay: she enthusiastically disembowels them in the most gruesome fashion imaginable. To the amazement and revulsion of her keepers, though one of them was genuinely touched when she left one of her kills at his feet as tribute.
We can't believe that someone called DCA because of a store cat. Sometimes we specifically visit certain stores because they do have cats! A commenter mentioned (on the post about mice at the Waverly Inn and how co-owner Graydon Carter said he'd get a cat) that there's a law that prohibits stores from allowing cats to roam - if anyone can shed some light on it, please let us know. In the mean time, store pets: Yea or nay?
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Nay.
Cats at large in a store are disgusting. They mean that the store has vermin. And they also mean that every surface in the store has been tracked over by a creature that first walked in its own shit.
Ugh.
stores without cats can also have vermin...I know the day I saw a mouse running over the nutritional bars at the Duane Reade on 23rd, that a cat in the store would have been awesome.
also, do you really think a cat is going to be any worse than what's already on a lot of people's hands? yuck.
i guess i'd rather take pet dander and fur than rat turds...
I agree with everything goggles just said...
Except the exact opposite.
Cat are fastidiously clean animals whose presence pretty much guarantees that there are no critters around except themselves.
If I see a cat in a bodega I'm twice as likely to go back.
I like my bodegas with cats, mainly just because I like cats but if I think about it for a second also because that means there are going to be a lot fewer mice in that place.
And goggles's logic is pretty questionable.. presence of cats doesn't necessarily mean the store has mice, and the absence of cats definitely doesn't mean there aren't mice.
For what it's worth, I like cats in bookstores even better than cats in bodegas.
The Fancy Feast cat lives in Jackson Heights.
I enjoy shoppping with Prospero. But Prospero lives in a little boutique-ish shop, not a grocery store.
I know too many people who are violently allergic to cats to support them roaming throughout stores. When my sister's brother-in-law comes to visit, she can't even take his or his wife's coats to hang up because that is enough to make her sick for a couple of days.
What a f*cking tool that ratted (gah) on this bodega to the DCA. I wish we could find out who that was. Park Slopers are familiar with the two fat tortoiseshell cats at the copy store on 7th avenue - I go in there specifically to see them.
F*cking NY City self-rightous @ssholes, I tell ya. You people can keep this city.
I wonder how the DOH weighs having a cat who can actually go after vermin against using chemicals and other methods. In the scheme of things, this seems ridiculous.
But ah choo's point about allergies is understood. If only the hypoallergenic cat makers could figure out a good wipe to de-dander cats next!
Free roaming cats are a bad idea in any establishment. Skipping over the fact that there are a good number of people with severe allergies, cats are a vector of Toxoplasma gondii. This parasite causes miscarriage or severe malformation of the fetus if pregnant women are exposed to it. Furthermore there is evidence that it can cause depression and psychotic-like-symptoms when it infects immuno-compromised people. The DOH is not being crazy or vindictive here, they are controlling a real health risk. Cats can only get T. gondii and pass it on if they are feed on other animals. Since this is what the cat is doing it's problematic from public health view point.
if we get rid of cats in bodegas,
we should get rid of dogs in bars and restaurants.
I'm dropping a dime on these people post haste this summer starting tonight.
The DOH cracking down on cats because they're a disease risk? Clearly, you don't know your epidemiology.
First off, you don't get toxoplasma from an infected cat through casual contact. You have to be exposed to its feces, which usually occurs when cleaning its litterbox. I don't know about you, but when I'm in a bodega I just buy stuff, I don't clean the bathrooms.
Secondly, the cat gets toxoplasmosis from the vermin it eats. So if you don't have the cat, you have mice with toxoplasmosis running around.
Your suggestion that cats in bodegas are dangerous to pregnant women and HIV+ people is ridiculous. The doorknob of that bodega, or the money in the register, carrying flu and colds and all kinds of human germs, is far more health-threatening to them.
Most of the bodegas by my apartment in Chelsea have a cat in or around the store and I don't mind. 99% of the time, the cat is going to make in a litter box or outside the store, not where it lives.
There is a HUGE difference between mice, rats and roaches running in the store then a cat.
Re: [10],
That's what happens when laymen get their hands on the Internet and start thinking they're experts. They read just one or two webpages written up by people of questionable (if not nonexistent) credentials then start spreading around the same misinformation. If toxoplasmosis was that much of a public health menace, don't you think there'd be more of an outbreak among the tens of millions of cat owners in the U.S.? Why is it no real experts (veterinarians, MDs, CDC, etc.) recommend that every woman who gets pregnant should get rid of any cat in the household? All they say is don't let them clean the litterbox and if they must, wash their hands thoroughly after doing so. Learn to read and don't believe everything you find on the 'net.
Cat in bodega=less pesticide being sprayed onto your food. And Goggles, ummm, cats don't "walk in their own shit."
Nothing brings a smile to me quicker than seeing a content cat in a business. And if they're fat and lumbering, that's more of an attraction.
My local pharmacy has one, sadly he died but they got another cat. All's well where I get my zoloft.
"Hey Mr. Rivera, how come every time I come in here, the cat sleep on the bread?"
Anyone familiar with that comedic gem about nyc bodega culture?
Search "rasheed comedian" on youtube. I guess you can't put the URLs into the comments.
Some people are allergic to cats...
Some people are allergic to nuts...
So we should get rid of all the nuts in the bodega, right? Especially the ones that rat on the cats... what an @sshole!
I definitely go out of my way to shop at stores where there are cats. Yes, it's unfortunate that some people are allergic to cats, but hey, I'm allergic to dust and mold, and believe me, there's more dust and mold in most bodegas than there are cats!
i am allergic to cats and i love when i see them in stores because then actually get to observe a fat, happy cat without actually living with one and being miserable all the time.
I'm highly allergic to oranges. I think I'll just go ahead and write that letter to the DOH now to report stores with oranges in them.
In all seriousness, though, I am pro-cats in stores for all the reasons mentioned by others above. They are clean animals, they keep mice and bugs under control, and they're great little ambassadors. Hopefully Julie can find a good home.
"I'm highly allergic to oranges. I think I'll just go ahead and write that letter to the DOH now to report stores with oranges in them."
This argument is really illogical. It is necessary for a bodega to sell food, even food that some people are allergic to when they choose to eat it. A cat in a bodega is not necessary to the bodega's success in the way that food is.
I hate pets in bodegas or restaurants. I find it fundamentally disgusting.
More proof this country is breeding a bunch of whiny bitches.
When a bodega can't have a cat because some whiney douche bag complained that is just plain bullshit.
There is absolutely nothing wrong with cats in an business.
The benefits far outweigh the negatives.
As for the whiners with cat allergies..
Remember this one little thought...
THE WORLD DOES NOT REVOLVE AROUND YOU!
I have severe reactions to some perfumes and colognes.
to the point where my throat closes up and I need to take medication.
Should all perfumes be banned? I know for a fact I am not the only person with this problem.
I have to avoid elevators with elderly women who splash that stuff on so thick I can't go near them.
But you know what... Big freaking deal.
I get over it and just have to deal with it. That is life.
I am not out to ban perfume even though my life would be much easier.
This country is beginning to suck royally because we are constantly catering to the whiney minority of self important asses.
I also live in Jackson Heights, and I love Prospero, the Rudy Volcano cat! I go in there just to see him and always end up buying something, so I think he's really good for business.
There's a little bodego on the same side of 37th Avenue, a few blocks down--I think on 37th and 75th Street. There's a fat and happy little bodego kitty there named Francis, and I always stop there when I need to pick up a soda or something small because I know I'll see her. I definitely like to see happy, well-kept cats in stores; I believe they do help control pests, and I also think a happy store cat is a testament to the humanity and compassion of the ownership. It's one little way I use my spending power to reward kindness.
I'm baffled by this. People don't want cats in their food stores, so I'm presuming they'd prefer rat poison or rats.
You can't get plasmosis from petting a cat, you get it from their poo... which is very likely kept in a little litter box somewhere in the back room of the store.
Sorry, folks... you live in a city with nine million people. If you want sterile, move upstate.
Eric, that comment was sarcastic. I would never dream about writing such a letter; as Whiners_Suck points out, the world does not revolve around me. I choose to live in this city with it's congestion and pollutants and germs and spitters and you know, I deal with it. When someone sitting near me on the subway starts peeling an orange and the fumes make my eyes water and my throat get scratchy, I get up and move away. I'm not going to make them stop eating their orange just for my sake.
Vermin are a problem in this city, and I still believe that the presence of cats is a good way to control that problem. The last thing I want to do is track bug spray or rat poison home on my shoes from some store.
"disembowels them in the most gruesome fashion imaginable."
That line is so funny, that the miso soup I was eating just came out of my nose!
Awesome! I can't wait to meet Francis!
gachk why are you censoring me, Jen. I tried to reply to this twice yesterday and still my comment is not up.
I think the Editor's getting tired of you all poking fun of her spelling errors . I can tell because she's using a lot more foul language . It's kind of sexy, Say "Shit" again ? * Gets the whip and some leather* Lol .
I thought readers of this article might enjoy my blog workingclasscats.com. Although in its infancy, I hope to make my blog the authority on cats in shops, delis, and bodegas. My goal is to chronicle the stories of cats in all five boroughs of NYC. Although if you cats in philly, san fran or even tokyo, I'd love to hear about them or see them.