Butterfly or moth?

A passing Badger has informed me that as the butterfly has a furry thorax it's actually a moth. Which is a pity, as I consider the moth to be the evil twin of the butterfly, though I have no idea why that should be. Maybe it's because moths are nocturnal and are always frying themselves on my halogen lamps.

I like lamp

I'm hoping you're noticing the difference between the daily strips drawn four years ago, and the current Sunday ones. I'm finding that the more panels I have, the less dialogue I have to use, and the last few have been pretty well silent. Also the colouring is less brash and the drawing is looser. The cats expressions convey their emotions more clearly as well.

Very much a Billy and Annabelle inspired strip, this one. The last few months have been flutterby season. Any moth or crane fly that dares to enter our house gets stalked, caught, and then toyed with for a quarter of an hour before finally being eaten. Bella is the tactician, Billy is the muscle. And if we had an invasion of moths like these not an ornament in the house would still be left standing.

Moth roast

We had halogen uplighters in our old flat in Tunbridge Wells. If you heard a 'Ftttzzzzt!' followed by a roasting smell, you could guarantee that the lamp had caught itself another victim. Every now and then we would have to upend the uplighters to pour out the charred remains into the bin.

Moth noises

A moth's main role in life is to torment cats by coming into a room at night and then fluttering about j-u-s-t out of reach. Billy and Annabelle are being driven mad by moths at the moment - later on in the year they're going to be sent even madder by a predicted bumper crop of Daddy Long Legs.

I've noticed that cats have a special call they make when they see a moth. It's a sort of trilling 'BRRREEEEEP!' that is unlike anything else in their vocabulary. It's not unique to Billy and Annabelle, I've heard Smudge make the same noise as well. It's invariably accompanied by a cross eyed upwards stare, as the cat tries to focus on the moth as it flutters randomly about.