You will need a high IQ to spot the hidden clue revealing the cat's owner

There is a brainteaser on the Internet today. It is an image of three women and one cat. Each woman has a sign on their clothes or person which is meant to tell us that they own the cat being held by the woman in the middle with the pink dress.

Only one of these three women owns the grey cat. All three could own it because they all have a sign which indicates that they might. So which one is the cat's owner?

I'm going to debunk and spoil (sorry) this brainteaser because I don't think it works 😈. So I will spare you the agony of trying to figure it out if it does cause you agony!

The owner of the cat is said to be the lady on the right-hand side with a green top and blonde hair.

Three women and a grey cat. Which woman owns the cat? Image: The Sun via Freshers Live.

The woman on the right is the owner because her green top has been torn by her cat's claws under the arm by the armpit.

Criticism and observation: 👿domestic cat don't tear clothes like that particularly in that area. Cats can scratch people and tear the skin for a whole range of reasons often innocuous or simply being defensive or because they are a bit anxious. Or most commonly in play. They just don't quite get it when they play with the hands of their owner.

But a domestic cat is not going to tear their owners clothes as we see in the image. This tear is about 10 inches long. And as mentioned it is under the armpit.

The length of the tear is almost unimaginable for a domestic cat to create. A cat might damage clothes slightly by kneading them. Domestic cats often knead the clothes of their caregiver because it is a kitten's instinctive behaviour and, as I have mentioned in other articles, the adult domestic cat is nearly always kept in a mental state where they believe that they are kittens because they are constantly provided for by their owner, with their owner acting as a surrogate mum.

So domestic cats knead clothes but that doesn't cause the damage that we see in this image. Cats don't scratch clothing like that unless under very rare and exceptional circumstances such as wrestling with their owner which really wouldn't happen. And in any case it is in the wrong position if that circumstance happened.

And lastly, the way it is drawn makes the image ambiguous. Does it look like it's been torn by a cat or by anything else? I don't think it does. It doesn't look like anything to me. It certainly doesn't look like it has been torn.

Conclusion: this brainteaser doesn't work. Yes, I'm being critical. Sorry for being serious about this. Just my style. 

Incidentally, I chose the lady on the left because I can see there's a cat image on her dress. The lady in the middle is meant to have a cat tattoo but once again the drawing is too poor. Does that look like a cat tattoo? It looks more like a crab to me!

The only clue that is 'readable' or recognisable is the cat image on the dress of the woman on the left! 😃

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P.S. please forgive the occasional typo. These articles are written at breakneck speed using Dragon Dictate. I have to prepare them in around 20 mins.

You have a one-in-three chance of being scammed when buying from Facebook Marketplace

Facebook Marketplace accounts for 73% of all purchase fraud cases at one British bank. TSB, a British bank, claims that more than one third of adverts on Facebook Marketplace are scams and consumers should avoid making purchases on that website.

TSB Bank added that Facebook Marketplace accounted for 73% of all purchase fraud cases and was the biggest driver of fraud by volume, as reported by The Times today Thursday, January 18, 2024.

Comment: I am flabbergasted because this is a very high percentage. I've just visited Facebook Marketplace to have a look at it for the first time and it looks perfectly normal with lots of free items by the way. Scams?

TSB Bank also calculated that £60 million ($76m) might have been lost by customers from all the banks using Marketplace in 2023. This would equate to £160,000 scammed every day on this Facebook platform.

The fraud spokesman at TSB, Matt Hepburn said: 

"You wouldn't shop at a supermarket if a third of the items were stale or counterfeit, so the same should apply to Facebook Marketplace, where you have a one-in-three chance of being scammed when paying online. Social media companies must act on their commitments under the Online Fraud Charter by urgently clearing up their platforms. Removing scam adverts is a good first test."

A TSB fraud team tested Facebook Marketplace. They contacted the sellers and concluded that 34% of the listings were fraudulent.

These allegedly fraudulent sellers used tactics such as:

• directing the buyer to fake websites and
• refusing to allow viewings of an item in person and
• demanding fees in advance.

Warning: nobody under any circumstances should send money in advance unless you are absolutely sure that the business or person you are dealing with is genuinely bona fide i.e. is behaving scrupulously and with integrity.

Example: a Ninja Air Fryer for sale on Facebook Marketplace was listed as brand-new at £65. The genuine retail price of the item is £249. Buyers were redirected to a fake website when they clicked on the link to purchase this product.

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P.S. please forgive the occasional typo. These articles are written at breakneck speed using Dragon Dictate. I have to prepare them in around 20 mins.

Google is getting worse as search loses the battle against spam?

The news, today, in The Times, is that "Google gets worse as search loses the battle against spam". This story not only refers to Google, the search engine that dominates the Internet with 90% of the market, but other search engines such as Bing and DuckDuckGo. The story is that there are online websites selling products which are dramatically over-optimised to beat the search engines so that they are listed on page one and high up in order to attract purchasers.

Image: MikeB

Google does not like to prioritise in their search engine listings websites which use "black hat" principles i.e. jammed full of keywords and using spamming techniques. Google wants to list on the first page of their search engine the best websites with the best content and the best products et cetera. It genuinely wants to find the best. Nearly everyone who uses the Internet and who uses Google click on websites listed on the first page i.e. 10 websites. And of those the first three get nearly all the clicks.

That's why unscrupulous people do all they can to be listed on page one and at the top of page one. But it appears that Google's algorithm is being tricked by these websites to be listed highly. 👎

The Times reports that a study concluded that "the top results were low quality reviews, filled with paid for links".

And therefore, if it's true, customers looking for products and using Google to find are not being served up with the best websites. And on a slightly separate but linked topic, we have to add in the fact that a lot of retailers pay for their website to be listed at the very top, in the first four places. 

These are websites which have not been ranked by Google but which have paid for the right to be listed in the top four. They might not be the best websites for the best products but people will click on them. I nearly always avoid the top four listings on Google for that reason.

This study on which this report is based, is titled: "Is Google getting worse". The report from that study says that "search engines seem to lose the cat-and-mouse game that is SEO [search engine optimisations] spam".

The researchers are based at the Leipzig University and the Bauhaus-University Weimar and the Centre for Scalable Data Analytics and Artificial Intelligence. They added that Artificial Intelligence would make matters worse by reducing the cost of producing spam content.

Barry Adams, a search expert at Polemic Digital, said: "Google continues to improve its systems to combat spam but it is a constant arms race where generative AI now means spammers appear to be gaining the upper hand. Having said that there is no current alternative to web search engines for finding accurate, reliable information online."

The search engines mentioned were approached for comment by The Times.

Our findings suggest that all search engines have significant problems with highly optimized (affiliate) content—more than is representative for the entire web according to a baseline retrieval system on the ClueWeb22. - Quote from the study

Full title of the study: Is Google Getting Worse? A Longitudinal Investigation of SEO Spam in Search Engines. Link: bevendorff_2024a.pdf (webis.de).

Advice: Don't ignore page 2 and 3 of search engine results. There is some better stuff on those pages sometimes.

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P.S. please forgive the occasional typo. These articles are written at breakneck speed using Dragon Dictate. I have to prepare them in around 20 mins.

Middle-aged women can be happier if they eat more plant-based protein!

When you become older and when you are old, health is vitally important in achieving your objective of being as happy as possible (our ultimate objective). Ill-health makes you miserable. Being healthy helps to make you happier. The two are inextricably linked. 💚

Also linked to being healthy is your diet. A good healthy diet will therefore make you happier. Yes, I realise it is a bit boring thinking about plant-based proteins BUT...there are bigtime advantages. By far the most important thing in the lives of our more elderly citizens is their HEALTH 😆. Nothing compares.

And there is some brand-new research on the Internet right now concerning middle-aged women. I'm concerned about the health of middle-aged women because lots of them live with cats and I want them to be healthy so that they can look after their cats in a really excellent way, which, by the way, begs the question as to whether domestic cats can also eat food based on plant protein. 

RELATED: Are plant proteins as good as animal proteins for cats?

There's a product on the market right now which permits that. You might investigate it. I did but my cat didn't like it! But I think a plant-based food for cats might be advantageous in terms of feline health which sounds strange but research it and be open to a change of mind.

RELATED: A vegetarian cat? No. But manufactured vegetarian cat food containing all the necessary nutrients. Yes.

To return to middle-aged women which is the subject of this article. The Times reports in a snippet of news today that "middle-aged women should eat more plant-based protein to boost long-term health."

The article is based on research published on January 17, 2014 coming from Jean Mayer Human Nutrition Research Centre on Ageing at Tufts University in Massachusetts.

The study of 48,000 women found less heart disease, less cancer, less diabetes and less cognitive decline and mental health issues for those who ate more plant protein.

The researchers believe that it isn't the actual protein it makes a difference but the plant diet itself. They looked at the health of women from 1984 to 2016 and compared their diets with their health today.

The lead author of the study, Andres Ardisson Korat, said that:

"Consuming protein in midlife was linked to promoting good health in older adults at. We also found that the source of protein matters. Getting the majority of your protein from plant sources at midlife, plus a small amount of animal protein seems to be conductive to good health and good survival to older ages."

He added:

“Dietary protein intake, especially plant protein, in midlife plays an important role in the promotion of healthy aging and in maintaining positive health status at older ages,” Ardisson Korat said.

So, ladies, give it a try please. Start when you are young and you'll almost certainly be happier when you are old. And you'll probably be slimmer too. Maintaining a good BMI is very important to general health and happiness. I know it is hard but the benefits outweigh the downsides.

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P.S. please forgive the occasional typo. These articles are written at breakneck speed using Dragon Dictate. I have to prepare them in around 20 mins.

Narcissistic veterinarian with an inferiority complex over his small phallus stabbed his girlfriend

Hodgkinson and Fioletti photograph I believe that this image is in the public domain at this time.

Alberto Fioletti, 31, had, it was claimed in his criminal trial, developed a narcissistic personality disorder. His defence barrister, as I understand it, claimed that he slept with many women to "validate" himself". And he had an inferiority complex because of his "small penis".

His state of mind contributed, it seems, to his behaviour when he stabbed his girlfriend six times in the chest and once in the back with a kitchen knife.

The murder occurred on May 5 last year after an argument. His then girlfriend, Stephanie Hodgkinson, 34, a veterinary nurse, kicked Fioletti out of her flat in Bournemouth, Dorset.

The pair had met on a dating app and then started their relationship in October 2022.

They were both employed in veterinary practices. After the argument Fioletti told Hodgkinson: "I hope you're happy with yourself. You're gonna have a death on your hands now."

Fioletti admitted manslaughter on the grounds of diminished responsibility. He denied murder but was found guilty of murder after a three-week trial.

Stephanie Hodgkinson's mother collected her granddaughter shortly before Stephanie was murdered. The grandmother, Sally Lloyd, said that, "I am tortured by the fact that as we played in the park, Stephanie's life was taken".

Fioletti's defence KC (King's Counsel - a top barrister) said that Fioletti had a severe personality disorder which affected his culpability and that he had been on suicide watch when on remand waiting for his trial.

The judge, Susan Evans KC, sentenced him to life with a minimum term of 15 years. She said to him that, "The damage you have done is immeasurable."

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P.S. please forgive the occasional typo. These articles are written at breakneck speed using Dragon Dictate. I have to prepare them in around 20 mins.