Ladies and gentlemen, it is my grave duty to inform you that we, the law-abiding public, have been deceived. We have been deceived right from the very beginning, by no less than our greatest enemy. No, I am not talking about terrorism, or communism, or even the vast underground space-lizard conspiracy that has compromised us all. No, dear reader. I am talking about cats.

Yes. The horrible truth our secret reptilian overlords cannot acknowledge, is that our feline “companions” have been the true masters of our lives for thousands of years. How do I know this, you ask? Well, allow me to answer your question with a better one: how do I not know this?

I’ll let you think about that for a minute.

Now that that’s settled, allow me to enlighten you further about the nature of what we’re dealing with here.  You see, we have unwittingly witnessed this whole plot unfolding before our very eyes. It is only now I have finally started to realize it.

I remember the day clearly. It was Tuesday: the second day of the week, and the first  of the two days to begin with a “T”, which also happens to be the first letter in the word “tuna”, which I don’t think I need to remind you happens to be the favorite brand of flesh our feline friends like to feast on. Coincidence? I think not. Alliterative? I think so. On this first and convenient “T” of the week, I was working on homework (like the good citizen I am) when my cat, who I call Ferris, entered the room. I should have taken immediate warning, as this was a blatant invasion of privacy, but I, being a generous and polite soul, allowed it.

That proved to be a foolish action. My cat seized the opportunity, and leapt onto me! His launch was evidently well-calculated strike, and the impact left me paralyzed for several precious minutes. When I regained consciousness, I saw that my ‘feline friend’ had taken claim to my homework.   Stunned and speechless, I tried to remove him from the paper, but, unfortunately, his mass made the task impossible. It is evident to me now that he must have gathered the weight for this express purpose. His task complete, I was forced to concede. My trignometry belonged to the empire.

Now, of course, this could have easily been dismissed as simply a random act of aggression, as my mother did, but as an semi-adept investigative journalist, I knew better. I took my investigative-journalist skills to the internet, where I intended to investigate, and then if necessary, to journal.

Warning: What I discovered may shock you, quite possibly to the point of paralysis, or spontaneous combustion.   Before you read on, I ask that you first prepare yourself. My recommendation would be a light break, some breathing exercises,  a dose of Dramamine, 30 jumping jacks, a bag of Doritos, a stalk of celery to counter-act those Doritos, more Doritos to wash-down that celery , an nice Columbian-style massage, participation in an overly-aggressive sport you have never played before, and copious amounts of Pepto-Bismol and Gatorade. If you happen to vomit during this process, do not worry. That means it’s working.

Finished? Good.

After a vigorous search on the Google network, I found, to my horror, that this was no mere isolated incident. All over the world, there have been reports of cats seizing their master’s precious papers. Business arrangements, floor plans, novels, textbooks, top secret aircraft designs, recipes to prized chicken soup. These are only some of the countless array of documents lost in the midst of what is, evidently, a massive and coordinated effort. Nothing is safe nor sacred to the feline conspiracy.

Now that brings us to the ultimate question. What is this feline conspiracy? What is the purpose of all of this paper stealing? Well, the answer is quite horrifyingly simple: to attain the knowledge and means to control all of humanity.

By sitting nice and cute on our papers, they render us unable to work or to learn. They intentionally distract us, while playing to our collective weakness to all things fluffy and cute. Thus, rather than taking affirmative action, we opt to give them a free massage, unwittingly rewarding them for their fiendish efforts. This, done on a mass scale, has helped to gradually push humanity into a perpetual state of ignorance and compliancy. Should it continue, humanity will become a race of, as the scientific community once put*: “complete morons”.  The only documents and literature we would have available would be the ones approved by the feline regime, and if you have ever read anything written by a cat before, you know that they certainly are not proponents  of democracy.

It only gets worse, dear reader. They are not only stealing these books, they are also studying them. Learning from them. They are learning of our culture, our customs, our language. Sites like ‘I Can Haz Cheezburger.Com’ show that they are not only starting to master our manner of speech,  but that they have also adopted our manner of clothing, in-jokes, television, musical instruments and even our strange obsession with fast-food products. It is likely that by learning these things, they seek to strike a closer connection to the public, which would be vital to their success in the upcoming cat-inclusive elections of 2032**. I understand that Mr.Fluffums will be in the running for candidacy.

Dear reader, we are on a dangerous course towards destruction.  Our trusted furry allies have waged an evident silent war against us, and we have been blind to it for far too long. Soon, our world will be swallowed up by the regime like a couch swallows up a TV remote. Governments will topple, monuments will be destroyed, seafood will be eaten, and all will be done in the glorious name of their monotheistic diety known only as ‘Ceiling Cat’.  You may ask now, is there anything, anything that can be done? Why, yes, dear reader, there is. Go to the store, by plenty of Catnip, treats, and mouse-shaped laser-pointers. If nothing else, we can at least stall them and the upcoming takeover a few days longer.

Ceiling Cat help us all, Ladies and Gentlemen.

*May  or may not have been spoken for another topic or particular journalist entirely.

** I calculated the year 2032 by first thinking of the number of the sides on a triangle 3. 2015 divided by 3 is 671.33333. That number, applied to the Double Illuminatis Theory (as purported by Dr. Jimmy-Bob  Lee-Jameson II Phd) , produces the year 2033. Take into account the theory’s 1% error, and you have 2032. Boom.