I don’t really like animals. In my mind, the non humans kingdoms of the world divide down more or less like this:

Animals (food) – I have no desire to coo over anything I might one day eat. This, I should add, would include human babies, were cannibalism legal and safe.

Animals (dangerous) – Anything that might leave me in pain, really. I don’t want to admire that at a distance, because you never know when one of the bastards might have snuck round behind you. Or worse: behind the sofa. Nature documentaries are just a cunning hunting ruse, invented by a particularly lazy lioness, you know.

Animals (allergic) – This pretty much covers the all the smaller land mammals, who I basically loathe and or fear.

Animals (aquatatic) – I don’t like fish. They are in league with Cthulhu and are not for eating. No.

Animals (avian) – basically boring. They have nothing to say to me, and I nothing to say to them. Except for a few of the smarter parrots, and even then, my interest will wane once the thing has learned how to swear properly.

Animals (creepy) – I am suspicious of things with more than four legs, unless they are Strandbeest.

Animals (a few of the smaller reptiles) – Which is more or less everything that’s left.