Killer Cats, Weird Temperature Dissonance, and Job Hunting

[deird_lj]

You know how you can sometimes be watching a movie, or reading a book, from somewhere in another country - and you suddenly get completely jolted out of the story by a difference-from-your-country that you'd never really realised was different in other countries?


...that sounds confusing. Let me give an example.

This happened to me today. The book I'm currently reading is set in England (I think), and I've read quite a few books set in England, so I was just nodding along, picturing the English bits, and going "oh, yep, that's going to be different, and that's the same as what we have here, but that bit's going to be different too..."

And then they went to a farm.

A farm with cats.

And it took me about five minutes to stop my mind from reeling at this new and weird information, and get back to the story.
In Australia, you see, you would never ever ever have cats outside at night on a farm. (Actually, you'd never have them outside at night at all, but certainly not on a farm.) Cats kill natives. Cats are inside animals - urban inside animals.

It really freaked me out!



Also, there was the whole weather thing.

One of the characters mentioned that it was mid-summer, and so there were only about five hours of darkness at night-time.

Now, I'm aware that in Europe, it gets really-really-dark-almost-all-day in winter (have experienced this one myself), and correspondingly, really-really-light-almost-all-night in summer.

But I'm also used to the fact that, when there are short night-times, it's a lot hotter than during the short day-time bit of the year.

In winter, it gets dark at um... maybe 6pm. And there's a maximum temperature of about 10 degrees.
In Germany over winter, it got dark at about 3:30pm. There was also a maximum temperature of about negative 10 degrees.

(Ergo, the less daylight there is, the colder it is. Which fits my experience of Aussie summer and winter, too.)

In summer here, it gets dark at approximately 8pm. And there's a maximum temperature of about 40 degrees.

(This is yet more proof of the whole more-daylight-equals-hotter-weather thing. So far, there is nothing in my experience to disprove this.)

And then, the book goes and mentions that it's mid-summer, and it's getting dark at about 10pm - or maybe 11pm.

HUGE KERSLAMM! AS BRAIN RUNS HEADLONG INTO SOMETHING IT DOESN'T UNDERSTAND!!!!!!!

more daylight = hotter temperatures. This is fundamental to my understanding of the world.
And therefore, if England is getting more daylight than Australia, they should be getting hotter weather too. They should be dealing with 60 degree days, and 40 degree nights.
...and they're not.

I'm aware of the whole sun-is-closer-to-Australia-and-thus-feels-hotter-here idea - really I am. But I still can't quite convince my imagination that it would work...






On a completely unrelated topic, I am expanding my job hunt.

Rail jobs have almost completely disappeared from the online job ads at the moment - hardly surprising, really. So I've been looking into other work.

And I've just applied for six jobs as a nanny.

It makes sense, sort of. I have quite a bit of experience looking after kids - and I also keep the same hours as them! I'd be able to get to bed at a reasonable time!
...and then get up in the middle of the night to deal with nightmares, dirty nappies, and occasionally vomiting - but I'm looking on the bright side.


Wish me luck!

Comments

[gabrielleabelle.livejournal.com]

You don't have farmcats? Weird. How do you get rid of mice?

Although I think outdoor cats are more common in England than the US, they're still prevalent over here. Not my kitty, though. She's indoors-only. It's safer and healthier.

And good luck with the job hunt! :)

[taiba.livejournal.com]

See, mice woudln't be a problem if they hadn't been introduced. Bloody Europeans :-p Settling other continents without any understanding of ecology. The nerve.

Anyway :-p

our cat was a suburban cat and a fine mouser.

[deird1]

Actually, I have no idea how farms here deal with the mouse issue. Just... not with cats.

We have this thing: if it's not native, and it's not a farm animal (by which I mean cows, horses, pigs, sheep, dogs...), it's probably not something we like having outside.
As taiba said, we have a huge number of imported animals - most of which have spent the last couple of centuries wreaking havoc with the native plants and animals. Animals such as rabbits, foxes, cats, canetoads, mice, wasps, etc - not well liked here. Not outside, anyway.

[stormwreath.livejournal.com]

Actually, I have no idea how farms here deal with the mouse issue.

They let the spiders eat them?

[padawanspider.livejournal.com]

Oh, no, outdoor cats are very common in the US...

not only on farms, either. There are thousands of strays... all our cats were originally strays (if you count in-utero as stray).

[gabrielleabelle.livejournal.com]

Oh, to me "outdoor cats" =/= "strays". Outdoor kitties belong to someone. Strays don't.

Still, I do know lots of people who let their cats outside. Like I said, it's still prevalent here. I just recall reading some stats sometime that it's not as prevalent as in England.

[padawanspider.livejournal.com]

Gotcha. Where I used to live in Missouri, most farm cats were far more feral than the strays down here in Mississippi, so I tend to lump them in the same category.

[snowpuppies]

I never thought about not having farm cats. I live on a farm, and we've got 3 outdoor and 1 that's outdoor/indoor. We'd be overrun with rodents if we didn't have them!

[deird1]

*shakes head* So very weird to me...

(Also - see my reply to gabrielleabelle, above.)

[elisi]

Cats are inside animals - urban inside animals.
How odd! Farms have cats, it's just one of those things - like they have cows and stuff.

And therefore, if England is getting more daylight than Australia, they should be getting hotter weather too. They should be dealing with 60 degree days, and 40 degree nights.
*laughs* I grew up in the Faroe Islands where it hardly gets dark at all in summer (on the longest day you can go up on the tallest mountain - 1/10 of Mt Everts btw - and watch the sun set and then immediately rise again). And trust me, it ain't warmer there than in Australia! ;)

[deird1]

I really can't wrap my head around that...

I tend to think of Europe as having less daylight (only way I've experienced it) and being colder than here. Those two things are pretty much linked, in my mind.


Farms have cats, it's just one of those things - like they have cows and stuff.

So very strange... I really am from a completely different country, aren't I?
:)

[elisi]

I really can't wrap my head around that...
Heh. In *my* head it's all about how far north the place is - the further north, the colder it is and the more light/darkness you get.

So very strange... I really am from a completely different country, aren't I?
Which is why LJ is such a wonderful thing - it's wonderful to see the world through different eyes.

[petzipellepingo.livejournal.com]

All U.S. farms have farm cats as well.
more daylight = hotter temperatures. This is fundamental to my understanding of the world.
And therefore, if England is getting more daylight than Australia, they should be getting hotter weather too. They should be dealing with 60 degree days, and 40 degree nights.
...and they're not
Those of us who live in the Northern U.S. States often have hotter weather than Britain but that had to do with being more landlocked while they have the North Sea/North Atlantic cooling them off. Here in Michigan we are often cooler than States below us because we are surrounded by the Great Lakes which cool us off.

[deird1]

Those of us who live in the Northern U.S. States often have hotter weather than Britain but that had to do with being more landlocked while they have the North Sea/North Atlantic cooling them off. Here in Michigan we are often cooler than States below us because we are surrounded by the Great Lakes which cool us off.

*nods*
That makes sense. In Melbourne we tend to have pretty extreme temperatures compared to the rest of our latitude - mostly because we get north winds coming across a desert, and south winds coming straight up from Antartica...

[mauvedragon.livejournal.com]

Why are you so keen to change jobs? I would have thought it would be in your best interests to keep working as some sort of engineer even if you can't be a rail one.

[deird1]

Not terribly keen to change jobs. Very keen on going overseas...

[klme.livejournal.com]

Because she wants to be in England more than she wants to be an engineer :)

[lavastar.livejournal.com]

Wuhuh? Cats kill people?
*boggles*

[deird1]

Ack! No!

Didn't even think about that...

"Natives", down here, nearly always means native animals or vegetation.
Like possums, echidnas, wallabies, gum trees, wattle trees... Cats aren't really likely to hurt the plants, but they're definitely going to wreak havoc with the animals.



(Our native people are definitely always referred to as "Aborigines" - or possibly "Aboriginal Australians".)

[lavastar.livejournal.com]

AHAHAHAA.

I'M STUPID.

Yeah, okay, duh. I was just kind of reading it fast, and what with the whole 'killer cats' in the title...yeah.

I feel better now knowing that I won't be in danger of being mauled by a housecat if I visit Australia. XD

US cats are much too tame for that sort of shit. Also we don't have very many animals that they could best in a fight - aside from tiny ones like mice that we don't really care about.



And I didn't actually think you meant Aborigines when you said natives - I thought it was, like, people native to Australia - as in people who live there and aren't tourists. Not that that makes any sense.

[lavastar.livejournal.com]

Oh, and good luck with the job hunt!

[deird1]

Thanks!

[curiouswombat.livejournal.com]

The cultural differnce things are fascinating - I cannot imagine a farm without at least five or six cats. No cats = no grain. Actually Darwin also proved that no cats = no bumble bees = no pollination of crops. European farming relies on cats.

Also, I find it difficult to imagine a summer where it doesn't stay light until 10 or 11 o'clock at night...

[washa-way.livejournal.com]

Yeah, cats are a necessity to keep the mice in check around these parts (Virginia). The snakes pitch in, too, though I'm not much happier to have snakes in the house than I am to have mice in the house.

I'm trying to work out the cats-bumblebees connection here. So far as I know, the only things that prey on bees would be birds, but I don't think cats are the only thing keeping bird populations in check, and not all birds would attempt to eat something as big as a bumblebee anyway. How does that work?

[curiouswombat.livejournal.com]

I think actually they were honeys rather than bumbies, to be honest.

But according to Dawin, and recently someone on the BBC repeated the experiment and got the same result, mice will actually brave entering the hives/nests to eat the honey and larvae. Hives in the fields away from the cats therefore have a much lower over-winter survival rate than those in the home paddock where the cats keep the mice at bay.

[stormwreath.livejournal.com]

I had an equal-and-opposite reaction when I went to Manaus in Brazil for a holiday. It was incredibly hot, and yet the sun was setting at 6.00 pm and it was pitch dark by 6.30, just as if it were getting on towards winter in Britain. In fact, one of the other people on the tour actually asked the guide if it were winter there.

(Answer, of course - no, they don't have winter or summer at the Equator. The sun rises at 6.00 am and sets at 6.00 pm all year round.)

[immer-am-lesen.livejournal.com]

Um...okay, I'm from the same country as you Mez, and I've never been to a farm that didn't have at least one, if not a whole mob, of farm cats.
Where grain is the main crop, cats are a must to act as mousers in the sheds and around the house...
You must have been visiting strange farms where people are all allergic to cats? ;-)

And on the different topic- good luck in your job hunt! Don't you have to be registered and checked-out to be a nanny though?
If they paid me, I could get a permanent job with my sister or my brother and their littlies, I swear. No shortage of work to be done when there's a brand new baby and two little kids in the house! :-)

[deird1]

Seriously? Cause I've never been to a farm with cats. Not once.


Hmm... Must investigate this further...

[immer-am-lesen.livejournal.com]

You have been on a farm though, right? One with cereal crops?

How very odd. I agree that cats should be indoors at night, in fact, at all times would be favourite with me, but on a farm, they have to be out and about at all times, when the mousies are dashing about. And yes, sad that native birdies fall victim to them, but they do learn to stay away from the cats, eventually...

[deird1]

Hmmm... Come to think of it, I'm not entirely sure what kinds of crops the, uh, I think six farms I've been on had.
Possibly cereal crop farms have managed to stay off my radar? Or something strange like that?

[lyr]

Good luck with the job hunting! I'll keep fingers crossed for you.

[deird1]

Thanks! *is hopeful*