Before you take offense, please know that I consider myself to be both a dog person and a cat person—although anyone who knows me personally, knows that I tend to gravitate toward cats.

I love dogs. I understand dog people. I’ve spent much of my life caring for both.

But over the years, I’ve noticed something kind of funny:

Dog people and cat people often have very different senses of humor.

Of course, this is purely an observation and there are plenty of exceptions, but this is the general idea behind my assertion...

Dog people seem to get a particular kick out of physical humor.

Someone walks into a glass door?

Funny.

Someone slips, falls into a snowbank and comes up looking like the Abominable Snowman?

Hilarious.

Someone lets out an unexpected fart at precisely the wrong moment?

Apparently, this can remain funny for the rest of one's natural life.

😂

And dogs themselves fit beautifully into this kind of humor. They’re wonderfully spontaneous. They crash into things, make ridiculous noises, chase their own tails and occasionally seem genuinely surprised by something they themselves just did.

Cat people, on the other hand, seem to lean toward a different kind of humor.

Wordplay. Sarcasm. Irony. Clever captions. Absurd situations. And especially imaginative humor.

Show a cat person a picture of a cat sitting at the kitchen table with the caption:

"I've reviewed the household finances. We can no longer afford the dog."

Now we're laughing.

Because cat humor often involves imagining an entire personality, conversation or story from one facial expression.

A dog staring at an empty food bowl might be thinking:

"Food?"

A cat staring at an empty food bowl is clearly thinking:

"Interesting. So, this is how you've chosen to end our relationship."

A cat sitting beside a broken vase isn't responsible.

He's the lead investigator.

A cat staring silently at you from across the room isn't just watching you.

He's gathering evidence.

And a cat slowly pushing your coffee cup toward the edge of the table while maintaining direct eye contact?

That's not misbehavior.

That's performance art.

Dogs are often beautifully straightforward. Their joy is right there in front of you—the wagging tail, the happy dance, the excitement when you walk through the door after being gone for approximately 47 seconds.

Cats require a little more imagination.

You learn to interpret the whiskers, ears, eyes, tail and body language. You start wondering what they're thinking.

And before long, you're having entire conversations with them...

including their side of the conversation. (GUILTY. LOL!)

Maybe that explains why cat humor so often depends on imagination. We don't just see a cat sitting in a cardboard box.

We see the captain of a poorly funded spacecraft preparing for launch.

We don't see a cat staring through the window.

We see the head of Neighborhood Watch documenting suspicious activity.

And we don't see a cat knocking something off the counter.

We see a scientist conducting another important experiment on gravity.

So, yes...

I’m a dog person.

I’m a cat person.

I can appreciate both kinds of humor.

But if you give me a choice between a fart joke and a photograph of a cat wearing reading glasses while reviewing someone's tax return...

I'm probably going with the cat.

😂

— Aunt Kat

Because sometimes the funniest thing about our pets isn't what they're doing...it's what we imagine they're thinking.