LMAO Cats

When Sonia climbs onto my lap and singsongs, “Burger, please?” she’s not requesting food.

“OK, kiddo. Once time, then Mommy has to get back to work.”

“Fwee times?”

“One time.”

I cue up the by now insanely familiar video clip and watch as Burger—a feisty Chihuahua—zips from room to room, his toenails clicking excitedly on the tile, the cameraman’s chuckles and a baby’s joyous squeals bouncing along behind him.

Once Burger has finished his house tour, Sonia somehow talks me into an encore, followed by a retrospective of Burger’s greatest hits. She chortles her way through Burger on the bed; Burger fetching his miniature, plush doppelganger; and, for reasons I don’t quite “get,” Burger panting after a long walk.

The kid loves her some Chihuahua comedy.

She’s also a huge fan of funny montage videos on You Tube, particularly those synched to bad ‘80s rock and/or featuring sound effects.

If a cat somewhere was filmed boxing a cactus or taking a ride on a ceiling fan, my kid wants to see it. If a dog clotheslines a toddler, she’s there.

We’re not above using this information to our advantage: Sometimes we can even get her to do her dreaded speech therapy cards with the promise of a “Supercats” and “Supercats 2” double feature. You can’t imagine how much we wish Hollywood would green light “Supercats: The Movie.”

And while feline hijinks apparently never get old, videos involving people falling down are also wildly popular, especially if a trampoline is involved and the spill is accompanied by classical music. Treadmill wipeouts are gaining fast, too.

In fact, if we could track down a video with an “Ode to Joy” soundtrack that showed a cat falling off a trampoline onto a treadmill, we could probably bribe Sonia into eating broccoli.

I—for one—love that her sense of humor is so absurd.

Cats chasing bears and dogs riding skateboards? Yes, please!

Ostrich falls into pond? Hilarious.

A horse playing peekaboo? “That crazy!”

And while it might not earn me any Mother of the Year awards, I’m happy to Google endless variations on “funny animals” for the chance to give my kid a good belly laugh.

My own favorite clips are from “Walk on the Wild Side,” a BBC series that pairs documentary-style footage of animals in their natural habitats with human dialogue. As a huge fan of both "Wild Kingdom" and "Mystery Science Theater 3000," I consider the show’s cheeky anthropomorphism humor at its finest.

Unfortunately, owls lamenting their overzealous caffeine consumption are a little sophisticated for Sonia. Her appreciation of absurdist comedy is still at sneezing panda level. Plus, the British accents throw her. I guess I’ll hold off on ordering the Pink Panther collection … for now.

In the meantime, we can both agree on chimp-sniffs-finger-and-passes-out.

Because some things are just undeniably funny.

Amy Lynn Glor would like to thank ICanHazCheezburger, "America's Funniest Home Videos," the producers of "Supercats," Burger & The Petersik family over at Young House Love, and all other funny-animal-montage You Tube video makers. Please post more!