The Faces Of Nip

Our local Fox station here in Portland occasionally does a feature they call "Meth Watch" when talking about local drug busts. By now you may or may not have seen something on the internet called the "Faces of Meth" created by the Multnomah County Police Department to show the effects of meth use on arrested users with before and after photos.

This is not that presentation.

Instead this is the Faces of Nip, a short documentary on the use of catnip by three Bengal cats who live in the MyNWX home, meant entirely as comedy. And while it IS comedy, there may also be something to be learned about nip use among felines, so some may also consider this a case study. (And not only are there pictures, but making its debut here on the blog is video!)

In the following video one Bengal - let's call her "Lilo" - shows the effects of nip use on a seemingly normal feline. After use of nip she proceeds to act erratically, at times even kicking herself in the face repeatedly. It ends with an epic loss of balance, surely nothing any self-respecting feline would want shown to the world. Oops. (The video is two minutes, eighteen seconds.)

The following photos are stills from the same nip high. As you can see, Lilo has lost all sense of staying vertical. Instead, she rolls around on her Royal Meow cat castle, rubbing her body in copious amounts of dried nip.

Then she proceeds to attack the nip, to pounce on it, like it's a living thing. One can only presume in her altered mental state the nip is moving. Or maybe it's talking to her. It's really impossible to know.

Lilo soon has a buddy join the party. Just for the sake of differentiation, let's call her "Sera." Sera prefers simply to ingest the nip orally, skipping the rolling around routine. She claimed to have an excellent recipe for "brownies." When offered, we declined.

In this photo Sera appears to be having a serious staredown with a piece of nip. The nip must have lost, because the scene ends with Sera skewering the leaf with a claw and taking it down in one bite.

Lilo continues to act like a crazy kitty, but now another Bengal - again, just for differentiation purposes we will call him "Moochie" - joins the party. At this point Moochie takes the slow and steady approach to his nip use, marking him as a veteran user. Lilo is overly aggressive with her consumption, leading us to believe she is new to the drug and hasn't yet found her personal limits.

Lilo's actions are so erratic, leading the veteran nip user to give here the classic "What the hell is wrong with you?" look. This is a look commonly given to new users by the grizzled vets, and the reason for it is why so many veteran users tend to shun newbies. The new users are unpredictable, sometimes violent, and prone to overuse.

Moochie, now feeling like he has to watch everyone, keeps an eye on Sera. She seems to have eaten half the stash, meaning there is no limit to what she may do; literally every avenue has to be considered as a possible next step for her. Climb curtains? Slash the chef? Jump off the balcony? Swing from the chandelier? At this point nothing can be ruled out.

Moochie, it turns out, despite his veteran status, gets a little mean when using. He starts fights, even with the young users like Lilo. These lead to intense physical disagreements and sometimes blood can be shed.

As much as a veteran claims he can monitor his own use and stay under control, the following pictures prove that is not the case. Here Lilo responds to a whack on the head from Moochie. Check out the eyes of Moochie, which are decidedly not chill. Isn't nip supposed to calm cats down?

After the fight with Lilo, Moochie retreats to the the safety of the Royal Meow cat castle. This is good for him, because in addition to nip turning him into an angry user it also makes him paranoid. From this spot in the room he can see everything and his head jerks around at every small noise, real and imagined.

So what did we learn today? We learned that nip, much like other recreational drugs, has different effects on different users. Some get crazy, some get hungry, and some get mean and paranoid.

These are the Faces of Nip. You have been warned. Continue your nip use at your own personal risk.