As you grow older, it becomes harder to feel 100 percent happy; you learn all the things that can go wrong, you become superstitious about tempting fate, about bringing disaster upon your life by accidentally feeling too good one day.

If animals could speak, the dog would be a blundering outspoken fellow; but the cat would have the rare grace of never saying a word too much.

Neither man nor any animal can enjoy life to the full without taking some risks to life or limb.

She fell on the bread and cheese as if she were a lioness. Did lions eat cheese? He didn__ know. He knew Mrs Prater__ kitten ate cheese. He ate anything. Poor bloody animal. Still, he was a slum cat, no reason why his life should be better than a humans' sad ruddy existence.

Dark alleys, like social networks, are romantic, because you never know what might happen while I perform there every Caturday night. Cats do know, but won't tell. So don__ even ask.

And in his heart, I think, he's now learned what I came to believe, which is, as I've said all along, that the sun may burn brightly, and the faces of children may be plump and achingly sweet, but in the air we breathe, in the water we drink and in the food we share, there will always be darkness in this world.