Midge the Runner

An unlikely one-eyed feline has gained her moment of fame from the 2009 Cannes Film festival by taking the leading role in an 8-minute 'short' film from England that cost just £1000 to make and was selected for the Short Film Corner. Midge is a tortoiseshell cat from Wrose, a district of the city of Bradford in the county of West Yorkshire; she is 12 years old and came originally from a local rescue centre.

Midge loves to follow her owner, parish councillor Martin Humphreys, wherever she can, and for some time ago she started following him when he walked to the local shops. She would wait on a wall outside for him to finish his errands, then jump down and sometimes start the journey back to his cottage by running. One day Martin decided to run with her — but found that he couldn't overtake her! If he ran faster, she accelerated too. 'She always wins our races,' says Martin. Now she is a familiar sight as she accompanies him when he goes jogging.

When he won £1000 in a competition at work, he decided to use it to make a children's film called The Great Race, featuring himself and Midge running one of their races. The film was made by Motus TV of Oulton, near Leeds; Martin wrote the musical part of the soundtrack, sung by a children's choir.

Martin flew out to Cannes for the film's screening, while Midge was looked after by a friend at home in Wrose. His dream is that a major film company, perhaps even Disney, will see the potential for a full-length children's film starring Midge, and he is convinced it would be a success. He already has ideas for it, including having Midge run against Olympic 100-metre champion Usain Bolt. He is convinced Midge would win!

For photographs see this Daily Mail article, and there is a video of Martin and Midge racing at BBC News.

Susan Boyle's cat Pebbles

Millions of people around the world have now heard of Scottish amateur singer Susan Boyle, who in middle age totally stunned the audience, the judges and her critics when she appeared in 2009 in British TV talent show 'Britain's Got Talent', singing I dreamed a dream from Les Misérables. (If you haven’t heard of her yet, see Wikipedia, and you can see the performance that started it all at YouTube). Such is Susan's new-found fame that she has even appeared, by satellite, on Oprah Winfrey's show in the United States. On 30 May 2009 she took part in the final of the British show and was placed second, after which she needed a break for rest and recuperation.

She still lives in her parents' modest council house (both parents are now dead), which she shares with her cat Pebbles. Pebbles is 10 years old and we are pleased to be able to show her photo here (with acknowledgements to Kent Jeffrey in the US).

It was reported by Scottish newspaper the Daily Record on 3 June that, according to her brother, Susan has been invited by President Obama to sing at the White House in July. We await further news.